Vessels of Valor : Have You Despised G-D? [lesson 2, part1)

This study is in no way meant to discourage any of you. This study is meant to actually encourage you to look at things in a new light. Remember to take things slow. Deal with one thing at a time. I realize that much of what I say can be overwhelming as I will tend to use more than one example, but I assure you it is just to teach you to learn that discernment. We must learn to look at ourselves as the Father sees us. None of us are perfect, but yet, we are to pursue perfection.

Psalm 101:6
My eyes shall be on the faithful of the land, That they may dwell with me; He who walks in a perfect way, He shall serve me.

Perfect as it is used in the Greek in the New Testament means spiritual maturity. It doesn’t mean we will never stumble or fail. There will be some difficult truths shared in these studies, but who said boot camp was fun? We are soldiers, remember, we are being trained for war. We are guaranteed that we will have opposition and we must be strong in the L-rd. So let’s dive in and find out how we can shed yet another layer of our flesh and live for Christ. Also, please remember and hear my heart. I could not write these studies if I had not seen these very things in my own life. I write from experience and learning humility from them, not from a spiritually pious position. There is hardly anything written here that if I’ve not experienced it myself, then I walked through it either as a child suffering under my mother’s disobedience, or, I walked through these issues with a friend. Never the less, remember ladies, no matter how hard truth is to hear that “nothing can separate you from the love of Christ.” NOTHING. So, if this study points out things in your life that you need work on, revealing just how unholy you are: good. But, don’t let it eat you up. It is good we realize how ungodly we are, but not good to sit in guilt. Remember, there is no condemnation for those in Christ, but, we still have a call to walk on a higher road, to rise above the status quo. Too often we hear the “no condemnation” scripture and it somehow gives us an excuse to stay in our “comfort sins” as I’m going to talk about. I’ll go into how sin is sin, no matter how big or how little, and, all sin is an act of disobedience to G-D. If we are going to be strong in the L-rd, for Him, for His kingdom, and for our families, then we need to stand against our enemy, and we have two of them. 1) Satan and 2) Sin. Yes, the bible lists sin as a separate entity. Read this passage of Romans 6:12-13
Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness.

Notice the underlined word. Sin is an enemy in itself. Hence why it says not to offer ourselves unto sin. Even though it dwells in us, we need to not allow it to rule over us.

We all are familiar with the verse, “if you love Me you will keep My commandments.” But, have you ever thought about what message we give if we sin? If we love Him we obey, but if we disobey, does that mean we don’t love Him?

Consider David. A man “after G-D’s own heart” he was called. Yet, in 2 Samuel chapter 12 the L-rd speaks and says, “why have you despised Me?” Gulp. I read this and I was on my knees and wept. I know how imperfect I am. I know there are times when my flesh just rages war and I sometimes give in. I know there are times even when I decide to allow my flesh to rule even when the temptation wasn’t so strong, I just “wanted” to anyway. I never thought of the fact that I was despising my L-rd. This truth that I learned shed a whole new light on my walking cautiously before the L-rd. Will we sin? It’s inevitable, due to the human nature. Will we willfully sin? Hopefully not. Let’s look at the passage together:

9Why have you despised the commandment of the LORD, to do evil in His sight? You have killed Uriah the Hittite with the sword; you have taken his wife to be your wife, and have killed him with the sword of the people of Ammon. 10Now therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me, and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.' 11Thus says the LORD: "Behold, I will raise up adversity against you from your own house; and I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun. 12For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel, before the sun."'
13So David said to Nathan, "I have sinned against the LORD."
And Nathan said to David, "The LORD also has put away your sin; you shall not die. 14However, because by this deed you have given great occasion to the enemies of the LORD to blaspheme, the child also who is born to you shall surely die."

Granted, we know that the sins David committed were huge. However, there’s no measuring stick when it comes to sin in G-D’s eyes. Whether we steal a piece of candy or commit adultery, it was the dishonesty in our hearts that mattered. He says in vs. 9 and 10 above that the disobedience was despising the L-rd. G-D was going to be swift to execute judgment. But let’s see even the G-D of the Original testament’s mercy: verse 13 says that the L-rd put away David’s sin because David was quick to confess and repent. Notice David didn’t say, “oh but G-D, it was so hard. You know I struggle with this, and she was up on the roof sunbathing, what was she doing out there like that anyway? And why didn’t she tell me that she was in her fertile time? I didn’t want to get her pregnant. I didn’t pre-meditate killing her husband, I even tried getting Uriah and Bathsheba reunited intimately so that the boy could be raised by them. But I’m sorry.” No, David didn’t try to explain himself, he didn’t try to justify himself even during confession. He just said, “I sinned before the L-rd.”

That’s all we need to do sisters and the mercy of the L-rd is with us! Psalm 139 tells us all about how the L-rd knows our thoughts from far away. He understands them even when we don’t. Why should we even bother trying to explain ourselves? Just humble yourselves before the L-rd, and He will lift you up.

There is a consequence, according to the sins committed. We see that in verse 14. We see consequences today in unexpected pregnancies, health issues due to abuse to our bodies, and I can go on. The L-rd is a just and merciful G-D. Even though we may suffer consequences due to our actions, let’s be thankful for the things which we have not seen that He spared us from.

So, what can we do to prevent ourselves from despising G-D and committing acts of disobedience? Well, the first thing is to treat sin as a cancer. Cancer begins with bad cells that multiply and can create tumors. Those tumors can spread or grow and take over our bodies. One small cell can multiply into greater numbers of bad cells. So it is with sin. We so many times justify to ourselves, “well, I’m not hurting anyone” or “this doesn’t involve anyone else, it’s just me that’s affected” but that is simply not true. We are one body, and when you sin against one member, you sin against us all. 1 Corinthians chapters 5 and 6 deal specifically with sexual immorality but the visual of the body is just the same. When we sin against ourselves, we are sinning against the temple of the Holy Spirit. We are all His temple, therefore we are defiling one another. And notice in vs. 14 of 2 Samuel chpt. 12, when we sin we give an open door for the enemy to blaspheme against G-D. G-D forbid we give the enemy a foothold on our camp!

So, we must put on the mind of a soldier. Let us consider how an army camp is well guarded. My husband used to walk the fence line every night in pouring rain in England to guard weapons stored on an air force base. He had gear to wear in inclement weather, and he was always prepared and briefed for his watch. So should we also be, in guarding our own hearts as well as guarding the hearts of others, our sisters and brothers in the church. Our borders can not be breached. Since the scriptures command us to deal with ourselves first before one another, we’ll also look at dealing with ourselves first here in this study. In part 2, we’ll talk about the church.

Let’s do a “for instance”: If your single and begging G-D for that mate, married and having trouble in your marriage, or even just a fight, what is one of the first things we women tend to do by nature? Men can get to our hearts. For some reason, we want to perform for them, and we want our very existence to rely on them. We don’t feel appreciated or approved if we don’t receive praises from them and we certainly need a man in our lives to “feel” complete, so we think. So, when a disaster strikes, we immediately throw a pity party and, that pity party requires feeding the flesh. I’m not saying bad feelings are not deserved, but take a look at how simple sinless acts can become sinful when we engage at them in an inappropriate time. Learn to discern, not just doctrines/teachings and spirits. Learn to discern the time. Learn to discern your own heart. Pray for that discernment. Take a look:

Your husband and you have a fight, or even worse, your marriage is in disrepair. Or, your single and feeling overwhelmed with feeling lonely. So, what do you think your going to do to comfort yourself? Here’s something I have done in the past and it spells disaster:

Thinking to myself, “I know, I’ll have a cozy night in. I need to relax, I think I’ll put on some jazz music, run a bubble bath and maybe even light some candles. (if you have kids, they’re in bed early or sleeping at a friends house!) Then I’ll get in my favorite flannels, make popcorn, grab chocolate and watch my favorite “chick flick” “ Sounds wonderful doesn’t it? A perfect evening. Nothing is wrong with any of these things, except, timing.

Why? What are the odds that you are watching a National Geographic documentary on snails or volcanoes? Surely you are viewing a film about romance. Even if it is the cleanest film ever made, or a film from the 50’s or 60’s, it no doubt has romance in it. If you are having a less than satisfying love life, or feeling the effects of it, even if just a season of it right now, don’t watch that movie!! Stick to that documentary, or maybe the Boston Pops. Maybe a praise tape or a video teaching will be better than any romantic film. Because no matter how much you know better, there is no doubt you will compare your life to the one on the screen. The comparison to the less than romantic life that your now leading will actually lead you down more of a desperate road. Besides crying your eyes out and not matter how much you tell yourself “only in the movies” your flesh is now screaming, “WHY CAN’T I HAVE THAT?”

Since this ministry isn’t to couples I won’t go into the “how’s” of making relationships more romantic at this time. I am living proof though that even a marriage that appears “love-less” can be romantic. There was a time though, when Dov and I had some hard times that I could not watch a film that had any romance in it at all. These were tough times, (not because I couldn’t watch the movies LOL) but because I knew the L-rd had more for us and I just didn’t know how to capture it. I did know though, and I learned the hard way, about viewing media’s portrayal of the perfect life. This is how I began to learn how to guard my heart. I started to notice how terrible I felt afterwards, and I began to pray for the self discipline which is something I lack naturally. After the breakthroughs in my marriage, I was able to view these films again and enjoy them for just a movie.

By guarding our hearts, we are “stationed” as a security officer over our will and emotions. If we let our guards go off duty, we open the door to sin.

Let’s say we continue to take in those movies, after all, our flesh craves the romance, doesn’t it? Some of you may say, “oh, I don’t have a problem there.” Well, we’ll pray next for you to be delivered from lying!! (joke). Some of us will say, “if the only way I’m going to get any romance in my life is to watch a portrayal of it for the next couple of ours, I may as well at least “pretend” it is me, or enjoy “someone else’s” happiness. No matter how fictional the characters are. So, what happens when we continue to feed that flesh and the next morning we wake up to real life? We sink deeper into despair. Now naturally we find ourselves craving more and more of that human affection our husbands may not be giving us.

Perhaps movies are not your stumbling block. What if you crave foods that are unhealthy for you? After eating an entire pint of that Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, you lay down to go to sleep. Your stomach begins to hurt and you complain that you feel fat. Now you cry because you feel fat and you begin to look fat to yourself. Once again you feel dissatisfied with yourself after feeding your flesh and it leads to depression**. What are some other ways that you feed your flesh? Write them down in a list, and be honest with yourself. We’ll deal with these later.

** please note: I am not referring to clinical depression. There are real and true chemical disorders of the brain that can cause depression requiring natural or medical intervention depending on your personal convictions. If you continue to suffer from symptoms, even after doing all you can spiritually to help yourself, please seek for help.**

This type of depression is circumstantial or emotional depression. It also may be a spiritual oppression. It is a constant disappointment causing an emotional funk or slump that we can’t seem to roll out of. We become dissatisfied with ourselves, with others, maybe even with G-D.

Perhaps you still think that these examples aren’t so bad, whatever I watch, or eat, is it really harmful to anyone else? I am the only one suffering here, aren’t I?

The truth is, no. Your condition carries a weight along with it. While we are called to bear one another’s burden’s, burden’s that are caused by our self addictions, or afflictions, create an unnecessary web that leaves our churches to have to untangle. The above examples, although they seem minor still carry an “air” with you when you come into bible study or prayer meeting. We need to be ready, and open to do the work of the Father. Any area of disobedience in our lives is another work that has to be done before we can make progress in other Kingdom works.

Another for instance, let’s say you have a passion for shopping, or, that is what you do to “medicate“ yourself when things are crumbling around you. You over spend, even though you know you shouldn’t, and now your financial status is in serious jeopardy. You are facing bankruptcy. Another one of those “comforts to self” has led to sin that is now spilling into the church. We as a church body feel responsible to not let your kids starve, so naturally we begin to help with the bills even though we ourselves are stressed or we are trying to support G-D’s work in other areas and we have to take from those ministries to support those in our own church body who may have been disobedient.

Financial difficulty comes many times in our lives and not always due to disobedience-so please hear me on this. I’m not speaking out to those who try. I’m also not speaking to someone who had a “one time spree” and over spent, accidentally or otherwise. If you repent, you do well. I’m speaking to someone who just shrugs her shoulders and doesn’t care and goes and spends anyway, with no discipline. If this is an addiction that you or someone you know is faced with, then it needs to be treated, just like a drug. With the L-rd all of these things are possible to be delivered from. However, if we just keep on sinning, even if it’s just to “comfort our flesh” it is in fact, despising G-D.

Remember these couple of points:

1) It is not G-D’s will for you to ever be in self pity. Take the word self- spell it backwards and add an ‘h’ and you have f-l-e-s-h. Romans 7:18 tells us nothing good dwells in our flesh. If it is of the flesh, it has to go.

2) Disappointment in our lives can be and usually is His appointment. G-D has other plans or He wants to purge something from you. However, if your disappointment leads to self pity, that self pity can lead to sin. Then the sin can lead to further sin.

Like, the film example, let’s say it made you feel so terrible then you decided to indulge in that ice cream. The next day you feel so fat you decide to go buy a size larger outfit to wear and while at the mall, or Wal-Mart, you go nuts….. And all the while you are telling yourself, “it’s just a season, it’s just a time I’m going through, I won’t always be like this.”

Even though this may be true, it’s never an excuse to sin. Perhaps you have always had some of these struggles but never had a conscious thought about it. This is good, if this study speaks to you and helps you to begin to search your heart and mind for your motives. Sisters, we should search ourselves constantly, weighing the thoughts of our hearts.

Remember that list of ways you gratify your flesh? Now, confess each one out loud. If need be, call an accountability partner and share with her, or your husband, these areas that you need help in. The Word tells us in James 5:16 that we should confess our sins to one another that we may be healed. As you call out each item to the L-rd that you see that you indulge in, thank Him for the deliverance from the bond of these things. Thank Him in advance, in faith for the freedom from these things that keep you from soaring higher.

Now is a good time to read Psalm 139. I sing this unto the L-rd every so often. When we can’t seem to realize a sin in our lives, this is when we should read or pray this psalm. Let the Holy Spirit search your hearts and reveal unto you ways in which you despise Him. Confess those things and thank Him for victory over these issues! Call your accountability partner, or tell your husband, and ask for prayer coverage in these things. Once we confess and shed the sin area that’s when Satan tries to tempt us to bring it back.

Remember, humble yourself in the sight of the L-rd, and He will lift you up!! (James 4:10)

Be blessed sisters, until next time, in His love,
Jennifer