Lord, Save Us From Ourselves

Already we are well into a new week.  How is your spiritual experience?  Are you growing in Christ?  On Sabbath afternoon did you discuss with anyone the things from the discussion of the Sabbath School lesson, or the sermon?  Did you open your Bible to search and see "if those things were so" as the noble Bereans?  Have you been reading from the assignment for Prayer Meeting from Prophets and Kings?  I know, lots of questions.  But as events constantly shout at us each day:  The end is near!  Jesus cannot wait much longer if there is to be anyone left alive.  It was Jesus Himself who asked: "When the Son of Man returns will He find faith in the earth?"  The Devil is gaining power quickly.  We must flee to the Stronghold - God alone can save us.  So I ask again:  Are you keeping God in your thoughts, talking with Him by His Word and your unceasing prayers?.
     Most of the daily newscasts (besides regular programing) these days are filled with crimes, and the constant question seems to be "why?"  Check this answer from God as found in Adventist Home p. 407 - "Many of the popular publications (movies, games, TV) of the day are filled with sensational stories that are educating the youth in wickedness and leading them in the path to perdition. Mere children in years are old in a knowledge of crime. They are incited to evil by the tales they read. In imagination they act over the deeds portrayed, until their ambition is aroused to see what they can do in committing crime and evading punishment."  And from page 403-4:  "When the daily newspaper comes into the house, I feel as if I want to hide it, that the ridiculous, sensational things in it may not be seen. It seems as if the enemy is at the foundation of the publishing of many things that appear in newspapers. Every sinful thing that can be found is uncovered and laid bare before the world." -- So parents and all adults -- what are you watching and allowing your children to watch?
     Prophets and Kings p.233 - "Sin ... destroys in the human soul both the desire and the capacity for knowing God. Through sin, the whole human organism is deranged, the mind is perverted, the imagination corrupted; the faculties of the soul are degraded. There is an absence of pure religion, of heart holiness...." 
     I had a dream last week I was going to share in my sermon.  But I didn't remember it then so guess I wasn't supposed to tell you till now.  I dreamed that my Dad was in prison and was going to be executed the next day.  His crime?  He had told a lie.  You probably laugh, as my parents did when I told them, and Rose did.  It seems ridiculous to us that someone would be put to death for just telling a lie.  But it really is just a sad commentary on how "ordinary" sin is to us.  The commandment plainly says we are not to lie.  One "little" sin brought the Son of God down to die on the cross.  We say we know this yet we are so corrupted by sin we cannot really believe we could die because of just one sin, and such a "small" one too. 
     We cannot understand the terribleness of "just one sin" because we are sinners.  This is why God has given us His word, both in the Scriptures and the spirit of prophecy.  We can trust His evaluation because He loves us, and we can take Him at His word when He tries to separate us from sin - especially the "small" ones.
     Oh my friends,  I want holiness of heart, I want to be totally changed, don't you?  Seek the Lord each day, and each moment of every day.