Letting Go of What Is Wrong

My friends, let me say this as clearly as possible: There is no right way to hold on to any wrong thing. That is very simple, and very, very true. The apostle Paul said something for the ages, and it should be taken into serious consideration and heed today: "Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: Neither give place to the devil" (Eph. 4:26,27). My old pastor used to say, "You can't stop a bird from landing on your head, but you can stop it from building a nest there." As long as we are in this world there will be things come to us that are not right, and there will be all kinds of situations that give place to wrong things coming to us. Demon spirits are in this world with us, and they will be here until we leave this world; so we will be aware of them until that time. But the battle is to not accept their suggestions and persuasions, or to act on them. The apostle Peter said it this way: "Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour" (I Pet. 5:8). To get to the point, if we allow anything that is contrary to God's love hang to around, it WILL devour us. You can let the sun go down on a whole lot of wrong things other than anger, and any one of those wrong things can and will take you down spiritually. Allowing any unrighteous thing to linger with you is exactly what Paul was referring to as "giving place to the devil." So then, it comes down to being soberly minded and vigilant [watchful] as Peter said, and "keeping our hearts with all diligence" (Prov. 4:23). The failure to do these things can only lead to the tragic condition that Jesus spoke of, when he spoke of believers in the end time: "And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold" (Mat. 24:12).

Make no mistake my friend; Jesus was speaking of the "love of God [that] is shed abroad in our hearts by the holy Ghost," when he said it would wax cold. And just how will that love wax cold? By believers leaving off to "keep their hearts with all diligence" from everything that is contrary to that love. In other words, they will find what they think to be a right reason to hold onto something wrong in their hearts. And in doing so, they will be turned over to believe that "good is evil, and evil is good" (Isa. 5:20). And that is exactly why Jesus said that "they shall betray one another, and shall hate one another" (Mat. 24:10). And that is also exactly how it has and will come to pass that God's own people have and will "kill you thinking that [they] do God service" (Jn. 16:2). There is only one remedy to that problem friend, and it is a preventative measure. It is what has been alluded to throughout this short article, and it stands alone as the pathway to salvation; which salvation is in reality the immortality attained to at the first resurrection, the "one hope" of the gospel: "And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he [Christ] is pure" (I Jn. 3:2,3; I Pet. 1:5,9; I Thess. 5:8; Eph. 4:4; Rev. 20:6). And herein is the truth of Jesus' saying that he directly stated after saying that "the love of many would wax cold:" "But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved" (Mat. 24:13). And so again I say, There is no right reason to hold onto ANY wrong thing. And there is no good result to be gained by doing so, and giving place to the devil; for he is only a thief, a liar, a destroyer, and a murderer (Jn. 10:10; Jn. 8:44). Amen.