Come out from among them

We are on our way into the New Year with normality already starting to gain momentum; it is the first working day of the year for many. As Christians I would endeavour to encourage us with a very simple request and yet to take it rather seriously and not run with the crowd. We are floorboards for the world to walk all over with the masses looking to discredit our every move and with time moving on, it will only get worse. We have been called to “come out from among them”…

“Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty."” (2Corinthians 6:17 -18) – All this simply implies is that we are to be a people that do not behave like the rest of the world and if we take this instruction seriously we will make it part of our behaviour. We will not behave like the world and they will unsurprisingly look at us with strange eyes. Nevertheless that is the call for every Christian.

There was a time when I walked as close to the world as I possibly could, I ran with them in hope that I could win some but sadly before long I was running with them. My selfish wants wanted to hang onto the world with all its lusts, this was still part of who I was. “You shall know a tree by its fruit”. That is the only true test that proves where we actually stand with our profession of faith.

This is Charles Spurgeon’s take on those who feel that it is necessary to flirt with the world and their indulgences; “Now, I have heard of some professed Christians, wanting to see, they said, the ways of the ungodly, going into low places of amusement, to spy out the land, to judge for themselves. Such conduct is dangerous and worse. 

My dear friends, I never found it necessary, in my ministry, to do anything of the kind, and yet I think I have had no small success in winning souls. I must confess, I should feel very much afraid to go into hell, to put my head between the lion's jaws, for the sake of looking down his throat. 

I should think I was guilty of a gross presumption if I went into the company of the lewd and the profane to see what they were doing. I should fear that perhaps it might turn out that I was only a mere professor, and so should taint myself with the dead matter of the sin of those with whom I mingled, and perish in my iniquity. 

"Come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing!" The resort of the ungodly is not the place for you. "Let the dead bury their dead, but as for thee," said Christ, "follow thou me."

If we must in this life, in a measure, mingle with the dead, let us take care that we never suffer the supremacy of the dead to be acknowledged over the living. It would be a strange thing if the dead were to rule the living: the dead must be laid into their coffins, and put away in their narrow cells according as the living may decree. 

Yet sometimes I have seen the dead have the dominion of this world; that is to say, they have set the fashion, and living Christians have followed. The carnal world has said, "This is the way of trade!" and the Christian man has replied, "I will follow the custom." Christian, this must not be. 

"Ay, but," saith one, "I must do as others do, for you know we must live." This also is not true, for there is no necessity for our living; there is a very great necessity for our dying sooner than living, if we cannot live without doing wrong. O Christian, you must never endure that corruption should conquer grace. 

By God's grace, if you get at all under the power of custom, you must cry out, "O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me?" You must wrestle till you conquer, and cry, "Thanks be unto God, who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ."”

Time is closing in on the offer of God’s grace for people to find their salvation, let us therefore be examples so that some may see our lights in a dark and dying world as some draw nigh unto the Lord calling out for His redeeming power.

Signing off

Tyrone

This thought was ignited after reading a post from Pyromaniacs (another Christian site)