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IN TOUCH WITH GOD    by Edward Heppenstall

 
Christian Obedience JULY 17

THE DECEPTION OF SIN

Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. Eph. 6:11.

This generation tells us that sin, if it is sin, is safe. It swears to us that sin is innocent. Dishonesty, immorality, all manner of vice, stride boldly in every city. There are thousands of so-called moral adjustments and ten thousand disguised ambiguities to integrity that encourage disloyalty to truth and Uprightness. There are millions of liberties that men take that tend to wear away confidence in the moral standards of the Bible, that sear the conscience and destroy sensitiveness to truth.

Alexander Pope wrote:

Vice is a monster of so frightful mien,
As to be hated needs but to be seen;
Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,
We first endure, then pity, then embrace.

Satan's technique is to excite the imagination, then arouse the desires and the urges, and finally persuade the will. Achan said, when confronted with his descent into sin, "I saw, I coveted, I took." The ten plagues have visited our literature, our music, our pleasures and entertainments. They have been let loose upon our homes and families. Have any of the commercialized places of entertainment ever made any concessions to virtue and to righteousness? A saint of old reproached the devil for stealing a young man found at a degrading house of entertainment. The devil promptly replied, "I found him on my premises, and I took him."

What kind of husband or wife do we want? What kind of children do we desire to grow up in our homes? What kind of security do we provide for our families? Today there are endless lusts of the flesh, moral deceptions that delude the brain with appeals to license. Pleasure is offered in its gayest, boldest, and most fascinating forms.

Above all this Jesus Christ offers us an abundance of all that is true and beautiful. The power of God "casts down all imaginations and every high thought." The abundance of Christ's purity and love summons us. The eternal love of the Father constrains us. We are to let the elevating power of the Holy Spirit conquer our minds.

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