Tag: deceitfulness of sin

They Thought God Was Like Them

Examine yourselves to be sure you are in the faith.

kevingdrendel1 Comment
Smiling man with dark shadow holding a knife behind him

“But to the wicked person, God says:

‘What right have you to recite my laws or take my covenant on your lips? You hate my instruction and cast my words behind you. When you see a thief, you join with him; you throw in your lot with adulterers. You use your mouth for evil and harness your tongue to deceit. You sit and testify against your brother and slander your own mother’s son. When you did these things and I kept silent, you thought I was exactly like you. But I now arraign you and set my accusations before you.'”

Psalm 50:16-21

God’s Word is full of warnings to the wise. Take heed. God does not desire that anyone perish, but a day is coming when your life will end. A day is coming when this world as we know it will cease to exist. There will be a day of judgment for all of us.

God does not force us to love Him. He doesn’t require that we submit to Him. He gives us the terrible choice of determining how we will live. He will give us over to our desires on that day when we die, on that day when the earth ceases to be as we know it, and we will face the consequences of our choices – the way we chose to live – whether it be with Him or with our own selves at the center of our orbit.

These verses indicate that even a wicked person can recite God’s laws and claim to be in covenant relationship with God. Even a wicked person can claim to know Him. Jesus echoed the words of the Psalmist when he said,

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers.'”

Matthew 7:7:21-23

This word of warning applied to the religious. We can prophesy in God’s name. We can even drive out demons and perform miracles in God’s name. These signs do not make the person who performs them a child of God. Even false prophets are able to perform great signs and wonders. (Matt. 24:4; Mark 13:22)

Only the one who actually does the will of the Father is a child of God. (Matt. 7:21) Jesus said, “Everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock.” (Matt. 7:24) Any other way to live is like “sinking sand” as the hymn goes.

The danger we all face is our own self deception. Perhaps, this is why the Prophet said, “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure.” (Jeremiah 17:9) We cannot trust our own hearts.

Skeptics say that people have created God in their own image. That is true of the person who thinks God is just like them.

According to the writer of Psalm 50, wicked people who act wickedly can feel justified in their wicked actions, and God allows them to be deluded.

“When you did these things and I kept silent, you thought I was exactly like you.”

Psalm 50:21

They are encouraged by God’s silence that they are right in in what they think and do, but God’s silence is not a sign of acquiescence. God’s arraignment and accusations hang over their heads.

I am struck by the need to know God, to know His character, and to yield our assumptions about God to the truth of who God really is. God’s silence in our lives is not approval. God often remains silent. God is often hidden. He is like a treasure to be found. God urges us to seek Him because in seeking Him, we must set aside ourselves to learn who He is.

These verses remind me of Hebrews 4:12: “The word of God is sharper than a double-edged sword.” It pierces. It divides. It discerns the thoughts and intents of the heart. If the word of God is doing its job, it cuts, it penetrates, it divides. If we yield ourselves to the word of God, it does its surgical work in us. Bur, only if we truly yield ourselves to that process.

I have often thought that Scripture does this kind of work. I felt it when I first began reading scripture before I was even a believer. I recognized in that time that scripture was exposing me to myself, and that I had a choice. I could allow it to do its surgical work, or I could harden my heart and choose to see in Scripture what I wanted to see.

Many people have said in derision of Scripture that people can make it say whatever they want. They are right, of course. Like the wicked person who acts wickedly and embraces wicked thoughts, while thinking that God is just like them.

The height of pride is to think God is like us. God opposes the proud, but He gives grace to the humble.

My prayer today is that God would rebuke me as He needs to; that He would soften my heart and do His surgical work in me; that I would not be deceived by my own thoughts and think that God is like me. I pray that God would reveal Himself to me and that I would know God for who He actually is.

“so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love“

Ephesians 3:17

The Deceitfulness of Sin

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I woke up the other night with a nagging thought. It gripped me. I was instantly awake. It was urgent and insistent, and the weight of it remained with me when I woke up again to get up and go to work.

I will get back to the thought that woke me from my sleep in the middle of the night, but first I need to explain the backstory.

We have established protocols and precautions for COVID in my office based on the consensus of advice from the experts. We decided that we would only set appointments according to the protocols that are designed to keep our staff and the people who meet with us safe from the risk of exposure to COVID.

We don’t allow walk-in appointments. We encourage “meetings” over the phone or video conferencing. Certain meetings, though, have to be in person, such as meetings to sign documents. I do a lot of estate planning, especially lately, and we must have two witnesses and a notary to sign Wills and Powers of Attorney. Everyone must be together in the room at the same time to satisfy the statutory requirements for those documents.

The protocol includes advising clients when the appointment is scheduled to wear masks, to bring their own pens (or use one of ours and take it with them) and to answer a list of questions. The questions include the following: have you tested positive for COVID; do you have a fever; do you have symptoms, like a dry cough, fever, loss of taste of smell, etc.; have you traveled out of the area in the last 14 days (and, if so, where); have you come into contact with anyone who has tested positive for COVID in the last 14 days; etc.

Our staff is instructed to call people who are scheduled to come in to the office the night before the appointment to ask all the questions, and to explain the protocol in detail. When people come in, we make sure they are wearing masks, we take their temperature, ask them to wash their hands and use hand sanitizer, and we have have them sign off on the same list of questions.

We have been taking the threat of COVID seriously and doing what is in our power to protect people and ourselves from possible exposure. The battle of the experts and expert opinions in the media and conflicting “facts” about COVID, including reports of intentional embellishment of the number of cases reported, raise many questions, but the protocols are the least we can do to love and protect the people who work for us and our clients from the potential risks.

Our staff and I developed the protocols. All the attorneys in the office agreed that we should follow these procedures, and we have been following them.

I have some very long term clients. It isn’t unusual for me to meet with staff at their offices or for them to meet with me at my office. Most of my appointments are set up by my legal assistants, but I work very directly with our bigger, long-term clients on an ongoing basis, as I try to be as responsive to their ongoing needs as possible. We have represented one entity continuously since the 1960’s, so our diligence and conscientious work has been rewarded.

One staff member I work with often asked for a meeting with me sometime last week. He suggested meeting with me at my office to review the documents we were going to discuss. He set up the meeting through an Outlook calendar invitation, and I accepted it.

I didn’t think anything of it. This is how I have done things with them for years, and I didn’t follow the protocols we set up. I didn’t think about it.

You can probably see where this is going.

Continue reading “The Deceitfulness of Sin” →