Afraid of crickets or afraid of SIN...

Last night I was down in the living room innocently folding clothes when I heard a piercing scream from upstairs. "Oh no! Get it away from me! Yuck, nasty! Melody come quick....help!" followed by more shrieks. You'd have thought my roommate was being attacked by tarantula's or something...

The reason for the screams was actually quite small though. It was a poor little frightened cricket that was racing around the bathroom counter trying to find a hiding place. (I'm sure he was half scared out of his mind by the shrieking giant that huddled as far away as she could get!)

As I went to catch him she shrieked some more. "Nasty! Don't touch him....kill him! Smash him, get rid of him!" She was definitely out for extermination...SHE just didn't want to do the job!

But why kill an innocent little cricket. He wasn't meaning to do anyone harm was he? He was just trying to eat spiders and kill flies and find a nice warm home. No, I didn't want to kill him. Against more shrieks and protests, I picked him up and gently carried him outside where I set him free.

Then I washed my hands and went back to folding laundry as I mused... "I guess every now and then it pays to be a country girl! At least I can handle the crickets...."

As I was thinking about it all though...I started thinking about our walk with God and how carefully we should guard our sacred relationship with him. What if we had the same reaction to "compromise" and "sin" as my roommate had to that cricket. What if our reaction was immediately to run away and cry out to God for help.... "Quick quick....help me, God! Get it away for me! I don't want to even touch it. Please....get it out of here!" Wouldn't our lives be so much more victorious and filled with God's glory and grace???

But no....most of the time, we deal with "sin" so casually, it's as if we're with neighbors that have only a few weird quirks. "Oh, watching this movie may not be the best...but it's not really a big deal. God knows my heart and that I would never live like the actors on the screen." Or, "My friends are kinda crude and don't really care about God, but I need to hang out with them so I can help when they want to know more."

Or...we ponder over "sin" as if studying a microscopic specimen in biology lab. "Let me see here....well...it looks like it has rods....but maybe those are cones??? Hmmm.....I'm not sure what to think. Maybe I should have a closer look, or maybe I should invite some others to look as well..."

Our senses have been numbed by our habits and the world of sin in which we live...and nothing is outrageous, scary, or startling anymore. We not only spend time contemplating "sin"...we often stop and take some time to "converse" with it...when in reality...we should be racing away shrieking, "God help me....get it away from me! Exterminate it!!!! Ooooh, yuck....I don't even want to touch it. Help!"

Satan, and all his subtle schemes, are nothing short of a roaring lion (in disguise) just waiting to destroy us. We can't talk to him, we can't reason with him, we can't play around with him...we must RUN!!!!!!!!!!! No compromise....no conversation!! Period, STOP!!!!

"Flee youthful lusts..." II Tim 2:22

"Flee from fornication, flee from idolatry." I Cor 6:18 & I Cor 10:14

"Closed ears to the Word of the Lord and godliness, pride, envy, strife, evil surmising, perverse disputings, listening to those destitute of truth, allying yourself with those that only care about riches and gain and the love of money - which has pierced them through with many sorrows - from such oh man of God, turn away. FLEE these things..." Paraphrase of I Tim 6:3-11

"Resist the devil and he will flee from you." James 4:7

"Deliver me oh Lord from my enemies. I flee unto you to hide me." Ps 143:9

As I think of all these sobering thoughts, triggered by a little cricket, I'm reminded...that it doesn't matter the SIZE of the "compromise" or "sin" in our life. If it is there, it is dangerous and it will eventually KILL us if we don't run away. It may be no bigger than that cricket in our minds eye...but we should be as afraid of it as if it were a herd of attacking bulls.

Let me share some challenging quotes I read recently:

Through the gospel, souls that are degraded and enslaved by Satan are to be redeemed to share the glorious liberty of the sons of God. God's purpose is not merely to deliver from the suffering that is the inevitable result of sin, but to save from sin itself. The soul, corrupted and deformed, is to be purified, transformed, that it may be clothed in "the beauty of the Lord our God," "conformed to the image of his Son." "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. [However]...In order for us to reach this high ideal, that which causes the soul to stumble must be sacrificed.

Men may have excellent gifts, good ability, splendid, qualifications; but one defect, one secret sin indulged, will prove to the character what the worm-eaten plank does to the ship, utter disaster and ruin!

In closing, I encourage you to watch the challenging call...

RUN

And while I don't condone most movies now days, there are a few still worthy of recommendation. "Time-Changer" would be one...as it in a upright and godly way shows us how far we in the modern Christian world have fallen. It's a must see...and very inspirational!!

We may not be scared of crickets, but we must RUN from the world, from compromise, and from sin!