Christians are very good at resisting temptation. Unfortunately, they usually get their resistance backwards.
There are two general kinds of sins. The church generally refers to them with a mnemonically helpful rhyme scheme as "sins of commission" and "sins of omission". In plain English, there are sins you commit by doing something that is wrong, and there are sins you commit by not doing something that is right. Each of these types of sin has a corresponding type of temptation associated with it. All Christians are familiar with the temptation to do something wrong. Those are the kind of temptations we deal with every day...the temptation to be angry, the temptation to eat something terribly unhealthy, the temptation to look a little too long at that secretary with the miniskirt...we know these, and we (I hope) actively struggle against them. But because these are the sins we struggle with the most actively, they are also the temptations we are most likely to crack and give in to from time to time. After all, we all sin.
But "sins of omission" involve a different temptation. Have you ever read a passage in the Gospels, or in Acts, and seen how Christ and His disciples lived...how purely, lovingly, compassionately they behaved, and how they dropped everything and went out into the world making known the message of God's hope and salvation? If so, you may have thought to yourself "I wish I could do that", but then you simply convince yourself that it's completely impractical. After all, nobody lives like that nowadays. Nobody has compassion on the poor, or goes out by themselves to help the hungry and the needy. And besides, you donate money to a charity that helps the poor and hungry and needy, and that's doing your part.
Congratulations, you just resisted temptation. Too bad this time you shouldn't have. Christians are well experienced in resisting the urge, the "temptation" if you will (I will), to do right. We come up with however many excuses it takes to get out of doing what we know deep down that we ought to be doing. Yet when it comes to resisting the things we know we shouldn't do, it's a much harder struggle. What backward lives we lead! (And I'm talking to myself as well, here.) Personally, I believe firmly that if we started focusing on removing our resistance to good and starting living actively in the principles of true Christ-like ministry, we would start to see that the temptation to do wrong disappears. Our minds are so attuned to a defensive state that we just sit in our shell and let Satan attack us with temptation to do wrong, but ignore when God tries to pull us out of the shell to do something right. It's high time to return to Christ's calling to abandon our shells and do as He called us to do, to go on the offensive against evil by repaying it every day with good.
Give in to temptation this week. Do something right.
2 comments:
This is why i want to get Forsaking all, we follow Him tattooed around my ankle. To remind me that I'm supposed to follow the will of God and help others
Great post Matt, I totally feel you on this one, and i've done a terrible job of resisting the temptation of doing something right. I always say I'm going to do something and never end up doing it.
My goal for this week is to try really hard to love my neighbor as myself (My neighbors are very rude and inconsiderate and throw parties every weekend, resulting in smashed bottles and trash all over my driveway). It's tough
Matt - Great post; you are right. Too many people, me definately included, find all sorts of excuses (I'm not cut out for it, it is not my job, someone else will do it, I'm busy, etc...) to avoid showing compassion to the world in the way you described and the way Christ wants us to.
It seems the world hasn't changed too much from even bible times - the poor and needy in society are still considered the "outcasts" and are not paid enough attention to. Story after story in the New Testiment, Jesus left the crowd to seek out these people and help them (and most importantly, he helped their souls).
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