Walk
325. What you compromise to keep, you
ultimately lose!
2 Peter
chapter 1 tells us that God gave us everything that we need to live in this
world for life and everything that we need for godliness, or to give us the
character of Jesus for this life and the next.
However, many people, even Christians choose to use their
own resources for life and godliness, not God’s. The problem is self-deceit. We actually think that we are doing the right thing. Many times we cover up compromising
acts with religious self-deceit.
Religious
Self-Deceit is the worst!
Judges
17 tells a story of a man named Micah
who kept bending principals (and even what he thought God thought about them)
to suit his own desire, selfishness, worldly attitude, greed and
conscience. Here was a man, a Jew,
who lived with his mother. He
heard her cursing the person who stole her 1,100 shekels of silver. That scared him. So he went and confessed to his mother
that he was the thief. All of the
sudden, instead of chastising him, she praised him saying, “Blessed be you by
the Lord.”
She then dedicated the silver to the Lord, for her son to
make a graven image. She took 200
of the pieces and gave them to a silversmith to make a graven image and a
molten image. This was an
abomination in the sight of God.
These were common household idols that were worshipped instead of
God. Actually, they thought of God
as an equal. Micah had an entire
house full of gods, one for every occasion. He needed a priest for his gods, so he dedicated one of his
sons to become a priest to the idols.
One day a homeless person was wandering around (nameless)
and Micah said, “Hey man, what are you up to?” The man said that he was of Bethlehem of Judah and was a
Levite, or from the family of God’s priests. So Micah got the great idea of hiring this guy to be his own
personal priest to God. This is a
good example of covering our worldly garbage and hypocrisy with what looks like
God. All sorts of religious stuff
can make a person feel righteous.
He paid him and took him in.
Then Micah said the sickest thing, “Now I know that the Lord will favor
me since I have a Levite to be my priest.”
Later on a group of Danites (Hebrews also) came by, 600 of
them, on their way to conquer a new land for themselves. They came by Micah’s house and noticed
the Levite. They offered the guy a
better deal if he would be their priest and he took it. He actually stole Micah’s idols and
images and ran off with these 600 thugs.
Micah came running after them to get back his idols and they threatened
his life, so he backed off. They
took Micah’s things and his priest.
What Micah compromised to keep, he ultimately lost. False gods always leave you empty!
Hypocrisy
with religious things affects others.
Children
will want to become not so much who their parents are, but who their parents
admire. If her parents look at
pornography with lust, that pornography is who the daughter will want to be
like. If the mother reads or
watches worldly stories, the son will want to become an adulterer. The boy who cheats on a test may be
using a pen that his father stole from his office. Perhaps Micah lacked integrity because he saw his dad
married to a woman who had no integrity and he thought that he could get his
dad’s favor by being like his mom.
What
is God’s way?
In 2
Peter chapter 1, Peter tells us that God, not us, not the world system, but God
has given us EVERYTHING that we need to make it through this life and
EVERYTHING that we need to be godly so that we may escape the witchcraft and
corruption of this world.
Then, he issues a warning, a strong warning. He tells us that there is a process in
which we are required to participate.
He says that what we need are in the promises of God. We must partner with God and do certain
things in order to inherit the promises.
They will not just overtake us, neither will we find them in our
laziness. If we do not participate
in this process, we will eventually end up going to the world for everything we
need, and we will not inherit God’s character.
Peter tells us that he even heard the voice of God during
the transfiguration of Jesus, and that the Word of Prophecy, or the anointed
Word of God to us now is more reliable than what he heard. It is fine to have a mountaintop
experience with the Lord, but Peter says we must live in the valley of normal
everyday life by applying ourselves to integrity and diligence. This leads to real fellowship with the
Lord. This is His Way, and there
we will find Him.
Peter gives us the process, but will we trust the One
Who died for us?
The question for all of us is, “Can you trust God Who died
for you, or will you trust your own intelligence, wits, pretending and power
for life and godliness?”
If you trust God, then you must trust the truth and being
real.
If you trust God, you must be willing to give up all of
your rights.
If you trust God, you must be willing to be misunderstood,
mocked and persecuted.
If you trust God, you must be willing to work hard in
obedience to the Holy Spirit’s leadings.
If you trust God, you must be willing to take your hands
off of situations and after you have done all in obedience to God, you must
stand and trust God to act for you.
If you trust God, you must be willing to be humble, meek
and considered nothing.
If you trust God, you must be willing to die to all of your
plans and ideas.
If you trust God, you must be willing to use integrity in
everything you say and do.
Peter says that the process we need to understand is:
1. We need to trust in
the promises of God, or in hearing from God for everything that we need.
2. We need to use our
faith to develop virtue, which is defined as excellence, honesty, resolution,
Christian energy, integrity, being honest with people, ourselves, and God. Not being double-minded, hypocritical
and two-faced. If we are wrong,
admit it.
3. We need to exercise
our virtue to develop knowledge.
This can mean intelligence and can mean knowledge of God’s will. We do not need to let our minds get
lazy.
4. We need to exercise
our knowledge to develop self-control, patience, and steadfastness.
5. We need to exercise
our self-control to develop godliness.
6. We need to exercise
our godliness to develop brotherly affection or love.
7. We need to exercise
our brotherly affection to develop Christian love.
Peter says that if we lack these things, we are blind to
the fact that our sins have been forgiven. However, if we develop those things that we will have a
richly proven entry into the Kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ, we will not fall
or stumble and we will have a personal contact with Jesus (Paradise).
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