The Question

Jeremiah 16:10

“When you tell these people all this and they ask you, “Why has the Lord decreed such a great disaster against us? What wrong have we done? What sin have we committed against the Lord our God?”

One of my daughters had a friend over to spend the night when she was younger. She was a nice young girl, and this was the first time the family had spent some time with her while we were eating dinner. Dinner at our house has always been a family thing. We sit around a table as a family and chat about the day. As we were eating, I looked up, and my daughter’s friend was eating like she came from a place where manners and table etiquette were never taught. Not wanting to be rude, we just kept eating while this friend had no clue how to hold a fork or close her mouth while she was eating. In other words, she was oblivious to table manners completely.

We can all be somewhat oblivious to things we need to fix in our lives, our mannerisms, the way we speak to someone, or how we drive. How often do we have someone who can talk to us about sin? That’s right, sin. The one thing that separates us from God. If you don’t have that someone, it is always a good idea to find him or her. They can be very instrumental in keeping you from the place the Israelites were in, as described in the verse above.

Just like table manners are generally taught while the infraction is happening, sin in our lives should be treated the same way. If we let sin get a hold of our lives, we will find ourselves saying the same thing the Israelites said: “What wrong have we done? What sin have we committed?” In other words, unrepented sin has a blinding effect on us. When left unchecked, it will slowly squeeze out the Holy Spirit until you can no longer hear Him.

If you remember the story of David and Bathsheba, David was caught in this trap. He was so far down the road of sin that he could not even recognize that his sin was against God. Instead, the prophet Nathan was sent by God to snap him back into recognizing his own sin. You can read about it in 2 Samuel 12. Sin blinds us from seeing how destructive it is and instead portrays it as fun and acceptable. In Proverbs, it says that sin is fun for a season, but in the end, it is death.

Remember Noah? He was building an ark that took him years to complete, and the whole time, I am sure all the people around him were asking why he was building it. He must have told everyone what the Lord was doing. The funny thing is, no one wanted to be on the ark until it was too late. The doors were closed. Their sin had blinded them.

Today, make an effort to let the Holy Spirit do some house cleaning in your life. When you accepted Jesus as your Savior, sin should no longer be fun or acceptable. Keep on sinning, and you will find yourself far from hearing the Lord—just like the Israelites did when Jeremiah told them what was coming from the north. Sin is a cancer; it will take over you and destroy you. The good news is that we have the best chemotherapy—Jesus Christ. Submit to Him, and He will clean you up until the pleasures of sin are no longer a temptation.

Prayer: Father, I pray that the pleasures of sin are no longer a temptation for me. I pray that I keep my mind fixed on You. I pray that I meditate continually on the Word of God and surround myself with godly friends who can let me know when I am stepping out of line. I pray this house cleaning ushers in the Holy Spirit to guide me and direct me into all truth. In Jesus’ name, amen.