IT IS NOT A SIN PROBLEM, IT IS A WILL PROBLEM

I have felt a heavy burden of intercession lately, as I pray for so many dear ones that are walking a dark road.  Every choice they make places a little more distance between them and their, once strong, relationship with God.  The sin they once found abhorrent has become an everyday lifestyle and I wonder what will awaken their spirit and hunger for the things of God.  As I continued to weep and intercede this morning, I felt a “God-pause” in which He spoke this to my spirit, “Susan, this is not a SIN problem, it is a WILL problem.  I settled the SIN problem on Calvary; my blood was payment enough to take care of sin for the whole world.  When I created humans, I gave them free will; they can choose SELF or they can choose GOD.  When someone walks down the path away from My presence, they will manifest sin because they are choosing SELF.”

It Started In A Garden!!!  Adam created in the image of God, received the breath of God and became a living soul.  God took a part of Adam and created him a mate, which he called Eve.  To this first man and woman, God provided everything they would ever need including FREE WILL, the freedom to choose.  Of course for free will to be valid, a choice must be present, so God provided a choice; to eat or not to eat of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.  We know that Adam and Eve both made the choice to eat.  This action, we call SIN and as God said, the consequence is DEATH.  We teach our children this story of how sin came into being because Adam and Eve ate the “forbidden fruit,” but was that the real story.  I would submit that sin was conferred upon all of mankind because the first man and woman chose SELF instead of GOD!

Do not fool yourself into thinking that God loves you so much that you can serve Him and still serve self.  Romans 6:16 Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death or of obedience leading to righteousness.  Serving SELF is the antithesis of serving GOD and will lead you far away from everything that is pure and holy.  SELF is a greedy master with a voracious appetite that can never be sated.  SELF’s hunger will push you on a never ending search; on a new, more exciting quest to experience, to feel, to obtain anything that will temporarily satisfy the emptiness that cannot be filled.  As Romans states, you will become a SLAVE to SELF!!!

We know that as soon as Adam and Eve sinned, God set a Redemption Plan in motion.  God had told them, “In the day that you eat of the tree, you will surely die.”  A Holy God demanded DEATH FOR SIN but a Merciful God had a PLAN CALLED GRACE!  The Plan involved a BIRTH, a DEATH, and a RESURRECTION.  So the great Creator of fallen man, robed Himself in flesh, stepped from the Heavenly realm and was born.  He would become the PERFECT substitution for IMPERFECT man and satisfy the death sentence for sin.  When Jesus died on the cross, the SIN PROBLEM was settled once and for all.  Hebrews 9:12 “Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption.”  That’s it!!!  It is finished!!!  The Sin Problem is settled!!!  But there still remains the WILL PROBLEM!!!

Jesus paid the price that sin demanded but you still have FREE WILL.  You still have to choose and the choice is the same for you as it was for Adam and Eve.  Will you choose SELF or will you choose GOD?  The actions are still the same; OBEDIENCE TO GOD or FOLLOW YOUR OWN LUST.   Finally, the consequence to your choice is still the same; SUBMISSION to GOD leading to ETERNAL LIFE WITH GOD or SURRENDER to SELF leading to DEATH AND ETERNAL SEPARATION FROM GOD.  Is there really any question?  CHOOSE TO SUBMIT!!!