1
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 a mob of tarantulas.
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, but she didn't want to be the one 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, help me, God! Get it away from 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 most of the time, we deal with sin so casually. "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."
2
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 entertain 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! As God’s Word exhorts us,
"Flee youthful lusts..." II Tim 2:22
"Flee from fornication, flee from idolatry." I Cor 6:18 & I Cor 10:14
"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
That little cricket reminded me 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 flee as if it were a herd of attacking bulls.
We may not be scared of crickets, but we must RUN from the world, from compromise, and from sin!
Oswald Chambers said,
Sin is a disposition of self-love that obeys every temptation to its own lordship. Sin is literally self-centered rule, a disposition that rules the life apart from God.
The majority of us saints are sound asleep to the devastation (of sin), and we shall come under the bitter curse of Meroz if we do not rouse ourselves up and stand with God (against sin). *
For an inspiring challenge about fleeing sin and temptation, watch the RUN video!
Fleeing from Crickets or Sin?
by Melodious Echo
"I’m a country girl from the Ozarks of Arkansas, currently serving as a "missionary" in Northern Oregon. While a registered nurse by profession, most of my time is spent working with various youth ministries, overseas missions, orphan ministries, doing personal evangelism, and writing/blogging to encourage my friends in their walk with God. I love living the adventure of the "Set-Apart Life" and my greatest interest and passion is living daily for my King, and sharing the joy of this journey with others."
A BIT ABOUT the AUTHOR:
hiking in the mountains . teddy bears . adoption . special dates with God
quiet streams . feeding a hungry child . singing in the rain . morning sunshine
heart-to-heart with girlfriends . eating with chopsticks . true love stories
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