Strangely enough, the one thing I use most often with my own children is something we were told the very first day of the conference. We were asked to behave in such a way that we didn't make the hotel staff where we were staying or the PDYM staff at Saddleback sorry that we had come. We were encouraged to make those around us happy that we were there.
Today as I continue my Read Thru the Bible in a Year, I read Genesis chapters 5-8 and was reminded of this instruction. Unfortunately, God's creation made Him sorry that they were there. Chapter 6 verses 5 & 6 state, "God saw that human evil was out of control. People thought evil, imagined evil - evil, evil, evil from morning to night. God was sorry that He had made the human race in the first place; it broke His heart."
WOW! God was sorry that He had made man. His very own creation broke His heart.
"But Noah was different." Oh, what a great verse. God didn't like what he saw in His creation, but He loved what He saw in Noah. Noah chose to live in the world but not of the world. Enoch was Noah's great-grandfather, and although he was taken by God before Noah was born, I wonder if his legacy affected Noah. Twice in the four verses talking about Enoch, it states that Enoch walked steadily with God.
Steadily. Direct or sure in movement. Unfaltering.
What a way to walk with God. What a testimony for all Christ followers to strive toward. A life lived in that manner would definitely affect the family. I'm sure Noah's father and grandfather reflected the life of Enoch on Noah as he was growing up. And in Noah, God was not sorry. He was not sad that Noah was alive and He chose to preserve his life. Even in the midst of His clean sweep.
God chose to get rid of all evil in the world. He chose to rid the earth of all things that entangled creation and kept them from the abundant life that God had prepared for them.
Hebrews 12:1 states "Since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses [Enoch, for example], let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perserverence the race marked out for us."
Let us make a clean sweep as we enter this new year. Prayerfully consider all those things that hinder your growth in Christ and choose to get rid of them. Name the sins that so easily entangle you. What is it that Satan uses time after time to trip you up and pull you away from the One who died for you? Get rid of that sin. Allow the blood that Jesus shed to wash that sin away and through your voice in prayer, defeat Satan. At the very mention of the name of Jesus, he must flee.
Make a clean sweep of Satan's hold on your life. Sweep him up and throw him out.
Make 2010 a victoriously clean year!
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