When it comes to sin, the battle is the mind and heart. Jesus says it over and over and He is simply repeating the truths of the past prophets.
The Lord saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth, and that every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that he had made humankind on the earth, and it grieved him to his heart. Genesis 6:5-6
Jesus followed by summarizing in Mark 7: the previous statements to get across to the Conservatives the notion that our focus needs to be on the inner life of the soul not the outer life of the body. His greatest theological adversaries were the Pharisees whose basic theology was close to that of Jesus but they missed the mark when it came to trying to tame the behavior of people. Like Conservatives today the Pharisees got all worked up over what people ate, how they looked and how they behaved. It was a Performance Orientation?
5 So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, “Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?”
14 Then he called the crowd again and said to them, “Listen to me, all of you, and understand: 15 there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.”
20 “It is what comes out of a person that defiles. 21 For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, 22 adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. 23 All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.”
These passages are why I have not gotten very involved in campaigns to stamp out sinful sex, sinful drugs, sinful drinking, sinful, rebellion, and so forth. Not only is it contrary to the teachings of Jesus it simply does not work. Every research study on marketing shows that negative messages fail to motivate change and can even backfire.
I prefer equipping God's people to examine and clean the gunk out from the heart, mind and soul. If we train Christians how to abide in Christ they will open up to God and allow the Spirit to flush their hearts out with His holiness! I am currently rewriting my old Rational Christian Thinking book that thousands have enjoyed. I did a new book on that theme called Power Christian Thinking. I guarantee it will help you examine, pinpoint and remove any elements of deep heart destruction.
No comments:
Post a Comment