It Will Never Happen To Me

“Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body.” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20(NIV)

“It will never happen to me.” I believe that everyone has said or thought that way or if not, at the very least lived like it. It is a dangerous realm that we all enter into throughout our journey here. It’s a thought, conscious or unconscious that one person had as they continued to overeat and then faced a life of diabetes. It’s the feeling of a young man in the hospital ER the morning following a motorcycle accident in which he was not wearing a helmet.

Several years ago I woke up to a car that wouldn’t start. When the Triple A driver arrived, he noticed that one of my battery terminals was filled with battery acid, the powdery corrosion of an old, tired battery that had leaked out. It had sapped that power from my battery. He looked at me and said, “Do you have any coke?” Not knowing him, I didn’t know if he needed a fix or a cold refreshment, however, giving him the benefit of the doubt, I said, “no, but I think I have some Dr. Pepper.” To which he said, “No, Coke works best to clean batteries.” What I witnessed next blew me away. As he poured this bottle of coke on the corrosion, it melted away like butter and cleaned the terminal like new. It was acid eating away acid. He told me that was why he had given up drinking Coke. If it could do that to battery acid, he said, what does it do to our teeth, our insides? But “that will never happen to me!”

Scripture gives us instruction, promises and warnings as to how to live this life and how to live it in such a way as to be protected from some of the harsh consequences of this sinful state that we live in. However, when we are feeling good, when we are not in “seeming” danger, when all is well with us and ours we allow ourselves to participate and partake of things that in time can maim kill and destroy us both physically and more that that spiritually.

In his sermon, “Pay Day Some Day”, Rev. R.G. Lee tells of Jezebel and that scene in 1 Kings 21, regarding Naboth’s vineyard. After her treacherous deeds, years went by and she thought she was off the hook. However, as we read in 2 Kings 9:30-37, payday came and her “sin found her out.” She lived as though nothing bad could ever happen to her and the unrepentant sin became a “cancer” that ultimately became the death of her.

What are you and I consuming today (internally or externally) that we know is, bad, wrong, and sinful? Do we think that just because it’s “blue-sky” today and that we’re feeling just fine that everything’s going to be alright? God has called us to be good stewards of all He has given to us, our time, our resources, our bodies, our families. Are we good care takers of His gifts or do we assume that a clear day means that there is not a tsunami brewing?

“We may not be what we eat,

but assuming on God’s goodness and patience

could lead to our ultimate defeat.”

Pastor MJ