Friday, April 7, 2006
Spiritual Adultery
You adulterers! Don’t you realize that friendship with this world makes you an enemy of God? I say it again, that if your aim is to enjoy this world, you can’t be a friend of God.
—James 4:4
When the devil uses this world to appeal to the sinful bent inside us, all hell can break loose in our lives. James 4 likens this flirting with the world as unfaithfulness, or spiritual adultery.
This analogy of unfaithfulness is used often in Scripture. The Bible likens the church to the bride of Christ. We are to be loyal to Him. We are to be faithful to Him. And to have another god would be the same as leaving one’s spouse for someone else.
God used this analogy to describe the wayward wanderings of His own people,
A broken cistern was like having a well with holes in it. And when we lose our passion for Jesus and go after other things, the same can happen to us.
Remember when you first gave your heart to Jesus Christ? Remember how excited you were to come to church and hear a Bible study and worship with God’s people? Remember the first time you prayed and actually had God answer your prayer in the affirmative?
The problem is that as time passes, you can leave your first love. Sure, you still come to church, unless something more interesting comes along. Something has changed.
Whenever we leave our first-love relationship with Jesus Christ, it is only a matter of time until someone or something will take His place
For more relevant and biblical teaching from Pastor Greg Laurie, go to www.harvest.org.
Copyright © 2006 by Harvest Ministries. All rights reserved.
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc.,