- But
Jesus replied, "Only an evil, faithless generation would ask for a
miraculous sign; but the only sign I will give them is the sign of the
prophet Jonah. For as Jonah was in the belly of the great fish for three
days and three nights, so I, the Son of Man, will be in the heart of the
earth for three days and three nights. The people of Nineveh will rise up
against this generation on judgment day and condemn it, because they
repented at the preaching of Jonah. And now someone greater than Jonah is
here--and you refuse to repent. The queen of Sheba will also rise up against
this generation on judgment day and condemn it, because she came from a
distant land to hear the wisdom of Solomon. And now someone greater than
Solomon is here--and you refuse to listen to him. "When an evil spirit
leaves a person, it goes into the desert, seeking rest but finding none.
Then it says, `I will return to the person I came from.' So it returns and
finds its former home empty, swept, and clean. Then the spirit finds seven
other spirits more evil than itself, and they all enter the person and live
there. And so that person is worse off than before. That will be the
experience of this evil generation."
(Matthew 12:39-45 NLV).
- We have just returned from helping David move home. He
has lived in Lubbock for several years. I had no idea how much stuff could
be accumulated by a college student! I had rented a 6’x12’ trailer
thinking that would be plenty of room. However, when we began to pack it, I
found that it would require using all the space. Of course with a little
planning it all fit and we arrived with everything at home. Now the real
test is where to put it all here! But, that’s another story for another
time.
-
- I was reminded by this experience of how much wasted
space that we might have in our lives. At first, you may protest and declare
emphatically that you don’t have any wasted space. In fact, you’re
probably going to assert that you have more to do than you can “say grace
over.” But I believe if we are honest, we will find a lot more wasted
space than we ever imagined!
-
- So often, we define our faith
by what we don’t do that the world does. In fact, when sin enters our
lives, we do everything we can to rid our lives of that sin. And in all
honesty giving up, stripping away, avoiding, and putting to death sinful
thoughts, habits, and actions are crucial parts of our walk with Jesus.
However, when we work to remove many of these sinful elements, we do little
to put anything in their place. We neglect the empty wasted spaces left
behind when we excised these sinful elements of our lives. Before we know
it, the same old thing or some new thing has crept into that wasted space
and taken up residency. Why? Because we only cleaned out the bad. We
didn’t intentionally fill it with godliness. We didn’t invite the Lord
to take residence and control of that area of our life and lead us into
something new and productive to put in place of the sin driven out.
-
- That’s
the warning Jesus issues in our reading this morning. When we’ve left too
many unguarded, wasted spaces in our lives that are not consciously and
consistently turned over to the Lord for his use, we focus so much on
avoiding sin that we don’t put something back in its place that is
righteous and good and nurturing. Renew your commitment to invite the Lord
into the areas of our life that are empty, wasted spaces.
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