Читать книгу Going with the Flow - Linda Estes - Страница 24

21…Don’t Open the Door

Good morning! I have a little fall display at my house. It consists of a bale of hay with mums and pumpkins in front of it. A couple of my pumpkins are green and they look just like an apple. You guessed it … they are called apple pumpkins. Although the outsides are different, they are what you’d expect a pumpkin to be on the inside. I had to trash one of the pumpkins already. When I picked it up, I found that it was rotten on the bottom. And upon further investigation, I discovered that the inside of the pumpkin was rotten too, even though the outside still looked good. It made me think about how in life we often try to disguise sin by wrapping it up in something that looks appealing or pleasing. But when you take the cover off, the sin remains. You might be able to conceal the sin for a time, but just like how the pumpkin rotted, sin that is left unchecked in our lives will start a decaying process in us and lessen our witness for God.

Paul tells us in Ephesians 4:27 that we should not give Satan an open door to enter into our lives. “And do not give the devil an opportunity.” The enemy gets that opportunity when we try to cover up our sin instead of dealing with it head on. Satan is just a big bully. Once he gets one foot in the door of our life, he makes himself at home, where he keeps doing more damage, and we begin to drift a little further from the Lord. The good news is that there is a way to put this bully in his place. And that way is through Jesus. James 4:7 tells us that if we will resist the devil, he will flee from us. My prayer for us is that we don’t allow the enemy to put even a toe in our life. Instead, I pray that we keep our focus on the One we want to 100% fill our lives … Jesus!!