Innocence is Better than Penitence
TODAY'S READING: Rom. 13, 14, 15, 16
SCRIPTURE: Rom. 16:19
19 Everyone has heard about your obedience, so I am full of joy over you; but I want you to be wise about what is good, and innocent about what is evil.
OBSERVATION: This verse caught my attention because it is so counter-culture to our current societal values. It is not considered "cool" to be innocent today. In fact, if you are innocent you are likely to be considered socially inept, a nerd, and to be put down and teased unmercifully. Kids are pressured by each other to become sexually active before they are out of high school (if not junior high), to drink alcohol and smoke weed, shoplift for fun, be disrespectful of authority figures, and it is definitely NOT cool to be kind to others. Even friends are expected to poke fun at each other with denigrating comments. I have a quote in the fly-leaf of my Bible that says, "Innocence is better than penitence". So true! God loves innocence. He desires to spare us the pain that inevitably follows the pleasure of sin. He forgives us when we are penitent, but how much better would it be to be innocent and not have to suffer the effects of sin? Oh, how God loves us and wants to keep us free from the cynicism and jaded view of life we get when we become "worldly-wise".
APPLICATION: We need to be obedient to God ourselves, knowing that the restrictions he gives us are not to keep us from good fun but to spare us personal pain and destruction. We also need to encourage others, especially young people, that innocence is "cool", good and wise. They need our encouragement because they get none of it when they are among others in their peer groups at school.
PRAYER: Father, I thank you that you have given us the keys to living a happy, fulfilled life. Help me to live in obedience for my own good and also for the purpose of being a good example to those who are coming behind me. May I encourage others to live innocent lives and to avoid evil. In Jesus
Name, Amen.
2 Comments:
If you are too innocent, your point of view will be branded by others as naive. And you may very well be naive about the way the world works, but you have to be okay with that if pleasing God is more important to you.
Another argument I have heard (even from Christians) is the idea of being unrealistic - not living in the "real" world; the "adult" world. So, I guess you have to sin a little to be considered a grown-up... but not in the eyes of God.
I admit that I really struggle with this... I guess that's why it's important to, as the apostle Paul said, "clothe yourself with Christ". That way, you start to see things from God's point of view and not the world's. Then it becomes easier to go against the flow.
Dianna
i am trying to locate where this idea/quote ("innocence is better than sacrifice") originated. i suspect one of the saints first ennunciated this.
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