Charred butt

This time of year it is not uncommon to smell and see smoke rising in the air throughout the countryside. Timber growers including Honey Lake set controlled fires to remove undesirable underbrush in their timber tracts. It takes several weeks and even months to burn some of the larger tracts of land and usually by April charred land can be observed when driving nearly any direction. The interesting thing about it is that the charred land will rapidly begin to exhibit new growth. The fire will stimulate growth almost overnight and it is akin to an awakening.

I went to church yesterday and the pastor was encouraging everyone to get a revival going in the church. Prior to revival he said there had to be true repentance beginning with him and continuing throughout the entire congregation. Everyone would necessarily have to put away their sins and make God number one in their lives. He was comparing it to the Jewish people during the times of Ezra when they had been taken into captivity by the Babylonians because they had disobeyed the Lord and taken pagan women for wives and they immediately got their Jewish husbands to worship their idols and worse. The Jews did not want to give them up, but Ezra assured them that until they did God would continue to curse them and hold them in bondage. Like much of the Old Testament I believe this was put in the Bible as an illustration to us today. They needed to purge their sins or forever be mired in bondage by them and in 2011 we are in the same boat.

I was thinking how easy it would be if the Lord would just set a fire in all of our lives to purge the unwanted sin in one controlled burn. The burn would stimulate the good green growth, but then I remembered that not just good green growth returns after a fire; both the undesirable weeds and the good desirable native grasses grow back right alongside each other. That means next year at this time, we’ll be right back at it burning away the undesirable stuff that has grown so large now that it is choking out the good stuff. If one burn would get it we wouldn’t have to burn year after year.

Hmmm A call to revival and repentance is certainly a good thing, but I believe the key to living a successful happy life is to live our lives with God as its center every day throughout the year. I lived much of my life like a ping pong ball; one minute I was soaring through the air with God as my everything, and the next I was being slammed to the table with God as an afterthought in my life. Eventually I learned that peace, Joy, and happiness cannot be maintained without God in the forefront ALL of the time. We can rely on the fire burning us and purging our lives periodically, or we can just live the good life without the flames.

Personally I don’t like the feel of flames burning and I’ve had enough purging by fire for two lifetimes. My butt is charred from it I tell you. The Bible states that God is not mocked. I believe this alludes to we cannot get away with sin forever. There will be a day of reckoning.

Before the fire descends upon you, put those sins behind you won’t you? If you are having an affair, stop it. If you read pornography, quit. If you won’t go to church, go. If you gossip, stop. Stop talking about tithing and helping others and do it. Respect your mother and father. Don’t be jealous and always desiring what you cannot have. Read your Bible every day. Pray. If you cheat, be honest. Quit lying and no, divorce is not the answer you need. None of those things will ever bring you peace, joy, or happiness.

Galatians 6:7-10:
Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, this he will also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh shall from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit shall from the Spirit reap eternal life. And let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we shall reap if we do not grow weary. So then, while we have opportunity, let us do good to all men, and especially to those who are of the household of the faith.