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Thursday, March
20, 2008
Leave It Alone
Romans 8:1-2 There is therefore now no
condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the
flesh, but after the Spirit. (2) For the law of the Spirit of life in
Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. (KJV)
As of this point forward, right now,
there is no condemnation to those in Christ Jesus; no more coming your way
as well as no more going out from your camp either. No finger pointing,
petty debates and striving over things that have absolutely nothing to do
with salvation, but are mired in the silly things of this realm. So now
that you are under a new law, a law of liberty of the Spirit, God did not
appoint you to be a private investigator, an inspector clueless if you
would, sticking your nose in places it doesn’t belong and getting involved
in things that are not of God allowing the devil to deceive you back into
the realm of this world.
Proverbs 17:14 The beginning of strife is
as when one letteth out water: therefore leave off contention, before it be
meddled with. (KJV)
Strong’s definition for strife:
4066
madown (maw-dohn'); from 1777; a contest or quarrel:
KJV-- brawling, contention (-ous),
discord, strife. Compare 4079, 4090.
When and if you start to notice a leak,
the beginning of strife, are you more apt to back out and leave it alone or
will you ignore the warning and allow it to fester? Some of these things
you have decided to get involved with and all worked up over, was it really
of God or are you entering a realm and a battle that He won’t involve
Himself in and is not asking you to either? It’s like a dam, damned if you
do but not damned if you don’t. So if you start to notice a small leak
rather than waiting around it would serve your best interest to get out of
there before the whole thing bursts and brings forth waves of damage and
destruction.
Proverbs 17:14 [The beginning of strife
(is as) when one letteth out water]-- as when, in a dam or mound raised to
oppose a flood or the sea, there is ever so small an aperture, the water
passing through is sure to make it larger and larger, until with one mighty
volume of water the whole embankment is swept away. [Therefore leave off
contention, before it be meddled with]-- leave off, instead of eagerly
discussing most minute offences, and devising means of retaliation, with a
pertinacious determination to conquer. `It is easier to abstain from a
contest than to withdraw from it'. `The mother of mischief is no bigger than
a midge's wing. ' Strife is compared to the two most merciless elements,
fire and water. (from Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown Commentary)
Proverbs 17:14 The figure is taken from
the great tank or reservoir upon which Eastern cities often depended for their
supply of water. The beginning of strife is compared to the first crack in
the mound of such a reservoir. At first a few drops ooze out, but after a
time the whole mass of waters pour themselves forth with fury, and it is
hard to set limits to the destruction which they cause. [Before it be
meddled with] literally, "before it rolls, or rushes forward."
(from Barnes' Notes).
Whether its striving with the world or
with our own brethren in Christ which is even worse, few things are more
destructive and brings one back into a realm of condemnation of the devil
quicker and faster than a wave of strife, which as we see in the above
illustrations can start out so small and trivial but end up to be a large
cesspool. So are you being quicker to hear and slower to speak, or are you
trying to answer a matter before hearing it and then end up the fool?
Proverbs 25:8-10 Go not forth hastily to
strive, lest thou know not what to do in the end thereof, when thy
neighbour hath put thee to shame. (9) Debate thy cause with thy neighbour
himself; and discover not a secret to another: (10) Lest he that heareth it
put thee to shame, and thine infamy turn not away. (KJV)
Before you make some public proclamation
about someone else maybe it would do you well to go to that person first
and see if this thing you are dealing with is more of a molehill than a
mountain. Don’t flush your testimony down the drain by getting caught up in
something that was not of God originally; the deeper you got into it the
more you tried to justify yourself; rather than dealing in a more mature
way you chose to proclaim someone guilty as charged only to find out the
true verdict in the end was not near the one you imagined in your head. God
is able to declare the end from the beginning; When He asks you to do
something then you should expect His result in the end, victory. However,
when you decided to pick your own battles and got entangled with things of
this life, then our Lord is no longer working with you; you are now on your
own and basically defenseless and weak, ready for the wolf to prey on you
and tear you to pieces.
1 Corinthians 6:6-8 But brother goeth to
law with brother, and that before the unbelievers. (7) Now therefore there
is utterly a fault among you, because ye go to law one with another. Why do
ye not rather take wrong? why do ye not rather suffer yourselves to be
defrauded? (8) Nay, ye do wrong, and defraud, and that your brethren. (KJV)
You know it’s one thing when I watch a
bunch of self righteous so called Christians argue, fuss, debate and even
hold demonstrations against people of this world, which by the way people
last time I looked it said we wrestle not with flesh and blood, but quite
another when it is among the brethren. If I recall the Lord Himself said
that His kingdom was not of this world, which is why He Himself chose not
to get entangled in the affairs of it, especially when they tried to make
Him a king. Where one really gets on the devils turf and falls back into
condemnation is when the believers fuss and fight over things that are
petty and not worth getting worked up over. Rather than walk away and not
engage in the first place, what began as a trickle has now turned into a
mudslide, a wall of destruction that could have and should have been easily
avoided by people that should have had their spiritual senses exercised
enough to know the difference between good and evil.
2 Timothy 2:24-26 And the servant of the
Lord must not strive; but be gentle unto all men, apt to teach, patient,
(25) In meekness instructing those that oppose themselves; if God
peradventure will give them repentance to the acknowledging of the truth;
(26) And that they may recover themselves out of the snare of the devil,
who are taken captive by him at his will. (KJV)
It’s one thing if people are played like
a yoyo by the devil, letting him pull their strings back into his realm,
it’s another if you choose to attach yourself too and get trapped in this
silliness as well. No one wins an argument people. The fact that you chose
to engage in it in the first place made you a loser; it brought you back
into the realm of condemnation of the devil; so now when he slings the mud
your way it sticks. Quick to hear, slow to speak and especially slow to
wrath because the wrath of man does not work in line with the righteousness
of God. And rather than walking away and leaving it alone you chose to put
yourself in a path of destruction.
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