Dec
31
Kick ‘em Out
Filed Under Devotional
For this little anecdote to make sense, you need to understand the floor plan of my home. It’s a rather typical modern two-story with bedrooms upstairs and kitchen and living space downstairs. The two bedrooms in the back of the house are actually being used as bedrooms. The two in the front are a game room and the den, which happens to be my office now that I’m working from home.
So, earlier this week, due to an unexpected snowstorm, two of my son’s friends were stuck with us because their own homes were snowed in while they were hanging out here. They slept downstairs and effectively kept us pinned upstairs because we were too polite to wake them. It’s an odd feeling to be locked out of part of your own house. I had to walk carefully to my office just to get working. I skipped breakfast so I wouldn’t wake them. It really changed our morning routine and I was surprised how disruptive it was.
I guess the analogy I’m going for here is what happens to your otherwise normal life when something moves in that you are too polite to dislodge. These kids are great and we didn’t mind having them over, but in our own lives it’s often sin of some kind that is suddenly flopped in the living room of our life.
Like a deadbeat friend, you aren’t in a rush to push them out the door, but you find your life off kilter from day one. Then slowly the sin spreads out and begins to intrude on more and more of the walk with Christ you had before. Before you know it, this unwelcome visitor is consuming your time, your energy, and maybe even your money. It’s disrupting your marriage and interfering with the parenting of your children. It’s an all-around mess.
It all comes from letting it take root and grow. Make no mistakes, the unwelcome visitor does not break in, it is allowed in. And it never stops growing:
“Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.” James 1:15
Don’t let sin hang around and take root. Get it as far away from you as possible. You can’t have sin downstairs and try to keep living right upstairs. It just doesn’t work like that:
“If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth.” 1 John 1:6
Deal with sin like you should deal with the deadbeat houseguest. Don’t be hospitable. Kick ‘em out.