"For even though they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks, but they became futile in their speculations, and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures. Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them. For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error. And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful; and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them." - Romans 1:21-32

I know we've covered the first couple of these verses several times already, but I wanted to add them on as a refresher since it's been a little while since we last looked at them. I won't be directly addressing them, but they're there to show their relationship to the verses that we'll be looking at today.

This is all a continuation of one thought... darkened hearts, without the light of Christ to illuminate them, fall into the deepest pits of sin and rebellion. The list that Paul gives... "being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful..." (vv. 29-31) it shows us that there is a broad spectrum which he calls the foolishness of those who do not acknowledge God. So, do we mean that those who are disobedient to their parents are not acknowledging God? Yes... God gave us parents, He told us to honor and obey them, and when we do not follow this command upon our lives we are breaking God's law and are not showing acknowledgement of His authority over our lives. We should be acknowledging God's authority over every aspect of our lives, but this is often easier said than done...

Well... I'm running out of time, much quicker than I would have hoped... My prayers for you, today, is that you will take some time to reflect on how you either have or haven't been acknowledging God as your ultimate authority.... What drives us? What is the determining factor of our actions? Who do we serve? Ourselves and the lusts of our flesh, as Paul mentions? Or are we serving the One Who has called us to forsake our own agenda and to follow Him, wholeheartedly?

If you call yourself a Christian, you've been called out of the depravity of "self." Paul says, "How shall we who died to sin still live in it?" (Rom. 6:2) We're a part of something bigger, by the grace of God, and that's not something to take lightly! We must take the necessary steps to be freed from the lusts of our own desires! Confess your struggles to the One who understands... repent and turn away from them... And be used by the One who has set YOU apart for His glory and your ultimate good! He loves you... that's why He called you out of your darkened state of depravity. That's why He was willing to send His Son to earth to live a perfect life and die a gruelling death on your behalf... because of the great love with which He loved us... The least we can do, in return (not that we could ever repay the debt which He covered with His own blood), is live a life which points to Him in everything that we say and do... to flee from the things which cause Him sorrow and which separated us from Him in the first place.

Grace and Peace!

Questions or Comments? E-mail me at afflquestions@yahoo.com .