Our biggest problem in the world

We have got problems in this world right now:  pirates from Somalia, a crisis in Congo, an economic crisis of huge proportions, and an imploding morality and political crisis such as in CA where the voters pass a constitutional amendment supporting marriage between a man and a wife and then the Supreme Court in CA says they will hear three appeals to overturn the will of the people.

But none of these are our biggest problem. What is our biggest problem:  sin!

A Scottish minister named Robert Fleming who lived from 1630 to 1694 once wrote, “In the worst of times, there is still more cause to complain of an evil heart than of an evil world.”

Do you sin as our biggest problem?  Do you sin as your biggest problem? Here are some questions Ed Welch suggests we ask ourselves:

• Do you believe that seeing sin in yourself is a good thing?  (It is because if you see sin in yourself that is a work of the Holy Spirit which means he is near)
• Do you believe that sin is against God?
• Do you believe that sin is found in imaginations, motives, thoughts, and deeds?
• Can you pinpoint, right now, a handful of sins?

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Encouragement: This won’t wear out!

“If you are one of God’s children, there is something in your life that will not wear out. In fact, it has the amazing capacity to be new day after day after day. Scripture says that God’s mercies are ‘New every morning.’

Now, you know you need mercy, because you know you need forgiveness and help. Almost every day you mess up in some way. Almost every day you face things that are bigger than the size of your personal wisdom and strength. You and I constantly need the mercy of forgiveness and the mercy of enablement. And so, it is very encouraging to know that God’s mercy is new every day! God’s mercy never grows stale and it never loses it’s transforming power. God’s mercy is brand new morning after morning after morning.

This also means that God’s mercy is form-fit for the problems that you are facing right here, right now. Each morning you are given new mercies for the particular things that you will face that day.

So, you can wake up tomorrow with courage and hope. And you can do this, not because of your strength and wisdom, but because you know that the most important thing you have ever been given will never wear out. You can also have hope because you know that the God who has given that new mercy, knows exactly what you are about to face.”

—Paul David Tripp, “It Won’t Wear Out”

(HT: FI)

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Integrity at its best!

Read how this man’s honesty cost him in the short term.

“Better is a poor man who walks in his integrity than a rich man who is crooked in his ways.” (Proverbs 28:6, ESV).

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Invest in your wife!

David Mathis at DG blog:

The apostle Peter writes,

Husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered. (1 Peter 3:7)

This is strange at first glance. How does caring for your wife connect to having unhindered prayers?

Here’s Wayne Grudem’s challenging commentary:

So concerned is God that Christian husbands live in an understanding and loving way with their wives, that he “interrupts” his relationship with them when they are not doing so. No Christian husband should presume to think that any spiritual good will be accomplished by his life without an effective ministry of prayer. And no husband may expect an effective prayer life unless he lives with his wife “in an understanding way, bestowing honour” on her. To take the time to develop and maintain a good marriage is God’s will; it is serving God; it is a spiritual activity pleasing in his sight.” (1 Peter, 146)

Christian husbands shouldn’t feel that time given to their wives is “time away from the real ministry.” Time invested with our wives is time well spent. It’s God’s will—“a spiritual activity pleasing in his sight.”

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