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Today’s Scripture Reading [August 22, 2010]
And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. [Deuteronomy 6:5]
The heart is really the essence of who and what we are. When Jesus was asked which is the great commandment of the law, He quoted Deuteronomy 6:5. The heart is the expression of the inner life of the person. It is the purpose of God is to capture our hearts. Because of God’s desire to capture our hearts, then it ought to be obvious that the intent of Satan is to wage war against the heart. Indeed, today we are all engaged in this raging battle for the heart and soul of each individual of us and of the nation in five key areas:
(a) Secularism
The impact of secularism is the belief that there is no God, and if there is no God, then there is no heaven, there is no hell, and of course, there is no eternal life. We have seen people openly declare that Christianity if far from true, the Bible is not the Word of God and Jesus did not die for our sin. This satanic-induced culture of secularism brings to the death of our soul and the lost of the heart.
In this culture of secularism where people believe there is nothing beyond our immediate existence, it is then obvious that they will try to escape the monotony of life by engaging in all kinds of pleasure and leisure activities. The ‘god of pleasure and leisure’ has over taken many of us so much that it can become a spiritual booby trap – a trap that once you are caught inside, it is very difficult to get out. It is like a fly caught inside a spider-web; the more the fly struggles to free itself, the worse it becomes. For Christians, the great danger is that when we are caught inside this spiritual booby trap of secularism, it can turn us into ‘half-Christian” but the bad news is that there is no such thing as ‘half-Christian.’ We are either God’s children or you are not. We cannot be half-children of God. We can only hold on to the complete Truth of His or none at all. In John 8:31, speaking to a group of Jewish believers Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples, then you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.” What then is the truth that Jesus speaks about? It is the truth that every one sins is a slave to sin which is found aplenty in the world of secularism, of pleasure and leisure-seeking.
Satan is not afraid of anything, except God’s truth. He will do everything to confuse people about God’s truth. This confusion will cause many to compromise, especially in their search for pleasure and leisure. True, we need to relax, we need to be entertained to de-stress ourselves at times, but we must exercise Godly wisdom and Godly stewardship in our search and to prevent ourselves from falling into the spiritual booby traps of secularism.
(b) Relativism
In the culture of relativism, everything is relative and there is no absolute value. The impact of relativism is that we compare ourselves to others which this is, tragically, consistent with our sinful nature of covetousness. The end result of comparing with others is seldom pleasant because we always compare with others who are better of or wealthier than us. Sometimes it can make us sick to its core when we feel that we should be more deserving and we started to question God why others are wealthier or better than us. In Ecclesiastes 5:10, we are told: “He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver”. The danger of relativism is that it can negatively impact our heart-felt love for God because our focus is switched to the love of earthly treasure. Our battle of relativism may just start from a simple comparison of ourselves to someone and if we allow this to be our way of life, our culture, our heart-felt love for God which God is yearning for us will simply be blocked out.
(c) Selfishism
In the culture of selfishism, nothing is more important to an individual than his desire to be served rather to serve; to take rather than to give. Everything centered and evolved around me. The impact of selfishism is that we are so saturated with our own selfish desires that we lose the focus on God and things of God. We forget who we are that we are created to be image of God. Instead we let this culture of selfishism transforms us into mere creatures no better than those animals of the wild.
Recently I read about stories of two dogs that have become even more human than human has become of themselves! The first story was about a dog trying very hard to save another dog that was knocked by a car in a highway. You can see the desperate efforts made by the dog trying so hard just wanting to bring the injured dog to safety, even disregarding its own safety. In spite of the busy highway, this hero dog tried to pull the injured dog to safety away from the running trucks, cars and motorcycles.
In the second story, it was told that a dog heard the cries of an abandoned new-born baby. This second hero dog which had just given birth to six puppies of her own had the God-given mother instinct immediately kicked in. She went to search, found the baby, pulled the poor new-born baby to her kennel and treated the baby like one of her own ‘puppies.’ Police later said that had the baby had not been rescued by the dog in time, the baby would have died. The sad truth is that, if we continue to surrender our freedom and our rights to Satan and continue our selfish practices and refuse to take accountable and responsibility for things we do without due regard to God’s will and God’s calling, we will all end up no better than animals! We must take every conceivable effort to live our lives that reflect who we really are: “We are created to be God’s own image, after His likeness (Genesis 1:26).”
(d) Materialism
In the culture of materialism, we accumulate stuff – give me more stuff and I will be happy. Our effort to accumulate stuff will lead us to irresponsible consummation of things. Things are not evil in themselves but it is the heart’s continuous desire of things, of material possessions and that’s the root of our problem, just like money is not evil but it is the love of money that is the root of all evil. We can have all the money or stuff in the world, we still can be empty inside because our heart is dying, spiritually-speaking. All of us need stuff and money – we need money to pay our rent, we need money to buy food, we need money to pay for our children’s education, etc. Beyond these essential needs, the culture of materialism of our desire to accumulate material possessions when taken to an extreme can become mere accumulation of toys that Satan is more than please to see us pursue. He knows that our never-ending pursuit of toys is always done at the expense of our spiritual well-being.
(e) Mysticism
The greatest mystery of all time is told in the Bible. There has never been a greater act of love for a sinful people such as us than when God’s only Son took on human flesh and was willingly nailed to a tree so that none would perish but that all would come to repentance. From the very first book of the Bible in the Genesis when God said to Adam: “Adam, where art thou (Genesis 3:9)” to the very last book of the Bible in the Revelation when Jesus is saying to His people: “Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me (Revelation 3:20)”, we can really sense the desperate search by God, yearning for us to come back to Him. Since the day of Genesis, God is still searching for us and He wants each and everyone of us to say to him: Here I am, Lord. Please come and sup with me.
Instead of accepting this mysterious love of Jesus, the world is battling the culture of mysticism of a different kind – a satanic-induced mysticism culture of witchcraft, palm-reading, calling out the dead in an attempt to communicate with them, crystal balling their future life events through witchcrafts, and other forms of occult practices like human sacrifices, self-destruction through tattooing which is clearly prohibited by God as written in Leviticus 19:28. This satanic-induced mysticism culture is now a growing practice all over the world. People who are in this culture of mysticism worship everything and anything because anything and everything can be their god or gods. We must remind ourselves always that there is one only God as told by Prophet Isaiah: I am the LORD; there is none else (Isaiah 45:18).
To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are corrupted and do not believe in God, in our Saviour, nothing is pure. In fact, both their minds and consciences are corrupted (Titus 1:15). The message today is revolutionary in how we perceived the world around us, how the culture of secularism, relativism, selfishism, materialism and mysticism can affect our Christian life. Jesus said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” Does everything around you seem corrupt? Maybe the surroundings are not the issue; may the things around are not the issue. The issue is our heart, our unwillingness to let our hearts flow towards God. The world, especially since the invention of the Internet, offers us material galore from all three categories: the good, the bad, and the ugly! As important as they will be to our lives, and the lives of those we care about, we must take the advice of Jesus Christ: "Blessed are the pure in heart." We must learn how to choose our material possessions wisely. Let our victory in the battle for our heart be our testimony that God is all that we need: “Above all else, guard your heart; for it is the wellspring of life. Put away perversity from your mouth; keep corrupt talk far from your lips. Let your eyes look straight ahead, fix your gaze directly before you. Make level paths for your feet and take only ways that are firm. Do not swerve to the right or the left; keep your foot from evil. (Proverbs 4:23-27). In Matthew 7:18, Jesus has said to us: A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Our victory in the battle for our hearts will give us the essential spiritual fertilizers to ensure that we grow into good trees.
