Besetting Sins

 

I’m Duane Matz and welcome to Today’s Living Word.

 

Nu 33:55 'But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall be that those whom you let remain shall be irritants in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall harass you in the land where you dwell.

 

This passage is a reminder of the problems associated with besetting sins. You know those things that you confess as sin, and then ten seconds later, you have committed them again.

 

A thorn in the side is a good description, these repeated sins are like a sharp pain in the heart as you are reminded that you have once more offended God.

 

I don’t have time in this blog to go into all the details here, but this incident in Numbers is exactly what the Apostle Paul was dealing with when he talked of his “thorn in the flesh.”

 

It was Paul who summed up our “besetting sins” and his own struggles this way:  Ro 7:15 For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do.

 

And in verses 24,25

24 O wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 I thank God--through Jesus Christ our Lord!

 

Jesus Christ our only hope for besetting sins. Never stop fighting them, (should we go on sinning that grace may abound? Certainly not!)  But take heart from the crown of THORNS that Jesus wore. Your besetting sins were on His mind as He took on those thorns, and spilled blood to pay for every one….every time

 

You are forgiven in Christ! He does not condemn you, but for your part. keep fighting, keep resisting sin, and like that woman caught in adultery, go, and sin no more!

 

I’m Duane Matz and that’s Today’s Living Word