I was thinking today about how much my cancer reminds me of the sin in my life. As long as I took the treatment the cancer was kept at bay but when I went off treatment the cancer started to grow again. I was not cancer free while on treatment, the treatment just made the cancer powerless.
When Christ entered my life, forgave my sin, and made me His child; He broke the power of sin. As I remain in Him and allow His word to abide in me, sin remains powerless. But when I stray from Christ, stop reading His word, stop praying, and stop allowing the Holy Spirit to fill me; sin rears its ugly head once again.
I live in a sin infested world; my body, my nature, and my heart are sinful. Satan is just waiting for the opportunity to pounce and draw me back into my sinful way of life. That will be true as long as I remain on earth. I know that one day, when I stand before Christ and see Him face to face, I will be free from sin! Until then I must “stay on treatment” or as Jesus put it in John 15, abide in Him. My abiding in Him and His abiding in me sets me free from the power of sin.
Cancer will always be a part of my life; it is in my body and there is nothing I can do about it. But I can control it by staying on treatment. Sure the treatment brings with it many side effects that are hard to bear sometimes but it does the job of keeping the cancer at bay. This brings me full circle to “Lessons from the Lathe” and why following Christ is difficult at times. But regardless of the hardships, abiding remains the only way to keep sin defeated.
I encourage you today to “stay on treatment” for sin. Make time with Christ apriority; allow His word to fill your heart and mind; allow His Spirit to do His work in your life. That is God’s plan for delivering you from the power of sin; there is no other way.
