With a little interest in the outcome, I've been reading and watching the debate on "Building an Islamic Mosque on Ground Zero." For those playing at home, Ground Zero is the location of where the twin towers, the World Trade Center in New York, stood until the events of 9/11.
You might have caught it, and, you might not care. What I do find interesting is the rancor, hateful speech and deep running emotions which have polarized people on this topic. Some Pastor is Florida even threatened to burn several Korans. Frank pointed me to a great "rant" Greg Stier (Dare2Share) wrote on his blog. You can read it
here.
With regard to Muslims, Greg wrote this, "I refuse to use the weapons of this world and choose to engage the minds and hearts of my Muslim friends with the message of the gospel (yes, even the extreme ones who want to kill me) and I challenge you to do the same. The "weapon" we fight with is love, not hatred, living water, not burning fire."
What if all this rancor, hateful speech and deep running emotions was turned onto our own personal sin??? What if we felt as strongly toward our sin as we do towards those who have hurt us, maligned us or abused us??? What if we screamed out, "I hate my sin!" rather than "I hate you," to our parents, siblings, enemies.
Do you hate pride and arrogance? Do you hate evil? Do you hate perverse speech?
As a Christian, those are good things to hate. I wonder, however, how much we really hate these things when we allow the influence of them into our lives (via media, music, friends, etc.)?
When my son was 7, he was playing down the street with some friends. One of the boys began to use foul language. My son jumped up and said, "I don't talk like that! If you're going to talk like that, I'm going home." And, he did just that. Would that we all were still as sensitive to unwholesome language, behavior, etc.!
What do you hate?
Read on....
| Wisdom Says: Good Hate Posted: 09 Sep 2010 01:00 AM PDT " 'I, wisdom, dwell together with prudence; I possess knowledge and discretion. To fear the LORD is to hate evil; I hate pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech.' " (Proverbs 8:12-13) What do you hate? What do you truly loathe deep in your spirit? God wants us to get in touch with our dark sides. He wants us to learn how to hate deeply and honestly. He wants us to get to the point where our vision blurs a little and our stomach roils at the thought of "pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech."
In short, God wants us to hate sin. Most of us are lousy haters. We might talk casually about hating certain foods, music, TV shows, or even a teacher or a sibling. But we don't mean real hate; we mean those things annoy us or make us angry.
Wisdom's message to us is this: If you really understood life from God's perspective — if you caught a glimpse of the beauty and power of His holiness and love — the ugliness of sin (especially your own) would send your soul into a murderous rage. Your hate would make you want to kill your sin.
Think: Have you ever felt real hate toward your own sin? Would you want to?
Pray: Ask God to help you to fear Him enough to hate your own sin.
Do: Read Proverbs 4.  |
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Mary E.Hickcox
www.CalvaryBaptistSM.org http://mary-neotes.blogspot.com/
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