Don’t go PLOP !!

Did you see in the news this week about the bear  up a tree on the college campus of the University of Colorado? Apparently it just wanted a little snooze. But college officials didn’t cotton to a bruin hanging out with the coeds, so they placed a soft mat underneath it before they shot it with a tranquilizer and, “PLOP” it fell to the mat like a limp rag doll !   Watch the video here: http://www.theblaze.com/stories/cops-tranquilize-bear-on-college-campus-which-produces-this-hilarious-photo/

Once it woke up it would find itself in different surroundings, at least it wouldn’t have to deal with liberal college professors !!  Anyway, this reminds me of how Israel became numbed to the ways of the world. They’d seen tremendous works of God in the plagues in Egypt which helped deliver them from harsh bondage, they’d seen the Red Sea opened up and walked through it on DRY ground, then they saw the most powerful army on the face of the earth in the Egyptians, washed up drowned on the shore.  And of course the countless things the Lord would do for them after all this, yet they complained and longed to go back to the Egypt when things got a little trying for them on their way to the Promised Land.  Sound familiar in this journey we call life?

How about when the captivity in Babylon was winding down and many Jews wished to stay put there rather than go back to their homeland to rebuild it?  Ezra was so ticked at the worldliness of his people he even plucked out the hairs of his beard in disgust ! The prophets of the Old Testament often railed at the Jews’  love for the world too and Paul criticized (and justly so) Demas’ loving of this present world.   It does have a certain pull at our hearts doesn’t it?  And, like that bear, if we’re not careful we can allow it to lull us into such a spiritual stupor that before you know it you become numbed and “wake up” totally removed from where you should be to where this old world system wants you !   John wrote in no uncertain terms, “Love not the world (literally, Stop loving the world), neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him.” (1 Jn.2:15).

John suggests there is a complete incompatibilty with these two loves. You can’t have it both ways !!  And when you think about it why would you focus your affections so much on something that is so temporal anyway? “And the world passes away, and the lust thereof: but he that does the will of God abides forever.” (vs.17)  Note the contrast he is making here: the will of God and the desire to follow the world’s ways are at great odds !!   It’s good to examine often your motives, decisions, attitudes, actions to guage if they are in sync with the Word or the world.   It’s spiritually empowering to watch what you watch, be careful what you listen to (gossip as well as music), to discern what you allow to come into your mind so that you stay on track spiritually and not succumb to the tranquilizing darts of the devil !    Remember the antidote to his darts is the Word which is quick (living) and powerful (Heb.4:12) and so can keep you strong and alert !!

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