DAILY READING
Trespassing = Death
by Mary Alice McGinnis
When you encounter a “No Trespassing” sign, what is your immediate reaction?
Being told “do not cross this line” we often find ourselves immediately drawn - like a moth to a flame - to do exactly what we are told not to do.
When I was a little girl, I remember my mom telling me, “Don’t touch the hot iron, it will burn you!” SO, what did I do? Of course, I touched it. And I certainly did get burned.
Have you ever wondered why that is? This tendency is revealing.
Romans 7:8,11 says, “But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of coveting. . .For sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me, and through the commandment put me to death.”
Crossing the line and trespassing against God’s holy law = death.
“And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh. . ." (Colossians 2:13a)
It’s not a pretty picture.
Picture yourself on this ledge. Below is a deep gorge and a raging river. The boundary line is clearly marked, but you keep stepping closer and closer to the edge. Your foot lands on a wet, slippery piece of moss. Your feet slip out from under you and find yourself going headlong down into the depths of the canyon to a certain death.
Charles Spurgeon put it this way:
“Each of the ten commandments has, as it were, united with the rest to draw up an indictment against us.
The first commandment says, ‘He has broken me.’
The second cries, ‘He has broken me.’
The third, ‘He has broken me;’
and the whole ten together have laid the same charge against each one of us;
that is the handwriting of the law condemning every man or woman born . . .”
Once we slip over the edge of sin - trespassing God's law - and crash to our death, there is no coming back. We don’t get a do over. We don’t get to collect “lives” like on the popular video games of today. The only thing left to do is to be buried.
Now read again this portion of today’s reading:
“Having been buried with Him (Jesus) in baptism, in which you were also raised with Him through your faith in the working of God, who raised Him from the dead.”
A sick person needs a doctor, a dead person needs a Savior!!
“When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; He has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. And having disarmed the powers and authorities, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.”
Now that is reason to “be overflowing with thankfulness.”
PRAYER PRACTICE
Use the words of this song as your prayer of gratitude today.
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