| Whatsoever
Things Are True
by Dan Coburn Pastor, Emmanuel Baptist Church pastordan@mtida.net We all have an enemy, while some of us recognize him and some of us do not. His name is Satan, and his goal is to keep us all in bondage to the power of sin. Why? See Romans 7:23. According to the Apostle Paul, he would be a slave to sin apart from the Holy Spirit - Romans 8:2. For Christians, according to Romans 6:6-7, this plan has been thwarted, so Satan resorts to Plan B, which is where he diligently seeks to block us from appropriating all that He (Jesus) procured for us on the Cross. Why? He wants you to remain in bondage, if for no other reason than you will only be a benign, defeated Christian, bearing little or no fruit. What are his methods? Ignorance, fear, even comfort in bondage. Lets turn the Spiritual Switch. After the Emancipation Proclamation, a strange thing happened. Not every where, but still more common than you would think. When the slaves were declared free, many of them Chose to Stay where they were. Why? Well, for years prior, the underground railroad had been smuggling some of them north. This was done in great secrecy. Some of the task masters had been explaining the disappearances to the remaining slaves, by saying: “They ran off, into the cold cruel world, and they surely were killed by man or beast, and they are never coming back”. The fact that they were never seen again only gave credence to the claim. So – some were afraid to leave when they could, some were truly content where they were, and some just thought they were. Remember when the nation Israel left Egypt, the first thing they wanted to do was go back. In 1519, Cortez brought settlers to the “New World”, and he ordered his men to “burn the ships”. He wanted to discourage the men from even thinking about going back. Satan’s #1 tool for keeping Christians in bondage, is Legalism, and we will look at this in depth next week. If you have never received Jesus as your Lord and Savior, and if these verses are true, and you are a slave to sin, what is keeping you from freedom? Are you afraid? Has someone sold you a “bill of goods”? Or are you truly comfortable where you are? “The thief comes only to steal, to kill and to destroy; but I Am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly” – John 10:10. God Bless. |
 |