Bad Blood

            Did you know there was this man who kept himself very fit, ate vegetables and fish all the time, exercised regularly, made sure he got his rest, did all the things you need to do to stay fit.

            He goes to the doctor and the doctor tells him he has a heart problem. A serious heart problem. The guy is in total disbelief - How could this happen to him after doing all the right things? The doctor tells him he needs a heart operation or he will die.

            There is something very similar to this the in spiritual life. For some, we try to do everything right and by so doing, we try to get spiritually healthy. It seem to work for a while, but then there’s the fall. Man commits sin, he falls, he can’t seem to stay on the right path. We need the hand and the presence of the living God, The Ultimate Heart Surgeon. To heal our sinful nature.

            We simply can not make it spiritually without belief in him, reliance on him and abiding in His Holy Spirit. That’s what heals us, makes us healthy and whole.

            I recall in the very popular movie, Apollo 13, when the astronaut, Tom Hanks hears an incredibly loud noise and the picture perfect mission to the moon has suddenly turned very troublesome. Tom Hanks, in one of the most memorable lines in the movie, - shouts to the space control center on the ground “Houston, we have a problem”. Excellent movie, excellent line.

            In a very real and similar way we humans have a problem, a huge problem, a sin problem. If unchecked, it will lead to our ultimate demise.

            Dustin Hoffman in a conversation with Charlie Rose on PBS on a program on actors and their bosses make a very unusual re mark.

            He says our nature is basically flawed. We are defective as human beings, we tend to do evil things. Hoffman went on to say, we want to think of ourselves as perfect, we want to get comfortable about ourselves so we say we’re O.K. In actuality, we are very evil people with very evil tendencies, very evil desires.

            The panelists on the talk show were absolutely surprised and puzzled by his remarks. Actually, he was saying something very profound, an idea that transcends did any talk show on actors.

            The reality is we all have a problem. With some people it is a great deal more obvious with others. It is the problem of being prone to thinking bad things, saying evil things and doing evil things. You see it all the time. In the newspapers, you read about individuals doing outrageously evil things. You see it on TV - stories of extremely evil people. You hear about it from people you speak with. You read your history. There are atrocities, terrible things done one man to another. There’s one thing about all these evil deeds; it’s constant, it’s all the time, it’s everywhere. Notorious and known world wide, is the story of Joseph Stalin - responsible for 21 million people dead and the story of Hitler - responsible for some 11 million people dead. Yet you say there are millions and millions of good people and so it is. And this has been time for hundred of years. Nevertheless the problem remains.

            We need a most important insight without which we are truly lost and without a chance of success in our lives. This insight, once realized, once understood, and appreciated and more importantly, once implemented into our daily lines will not just change a few things. It will change everything.

           

            It will change the way you think.

            It will change the way you talk.

            It will change every encounter            you have with another person.

            It will change your encounter you      have with God.

            It will change the things you say.

            It will change the things you do.

            The insight we need to really need to grasp is that we are flawed, fundamentally, basically, we are flawed and fatally flawed, unless we do something about it. The reason is we are all sons of Adam and Eve, we are all daughters of Adam and Eve.

            It’s that simple, it’s that profound. It’s that easy to figure out and it’s something are must never forget.

            WE‘RE ALL ADAM’S; WE’RE ALL EVE’S.

            We need to realize this as a basic fact because Adam did sin, his sin and its horrible consequences we have all inherited. Sin is an integral part of us. It is inherent in us, it is innate, i.e. we are imprinted with it, it is a basic part of an inner selves.

            We have a sin nature, a sinful nature Sin is in like seeds in an apple we have been preached to 100’s of times we have listened to sermons 100’s of time yet many still don’t get it. We still continue to sin. We can’t stop sinning. We need to realize we need to fix the problem. We need to realize if we don’t fix it will kill us it will be fatal for us, eternally fatal. And yet many still fail to act. Fail to adjust, fail to do what’s necessary. What or who do we turn to? Who will help us fix our problem? Some go to a friend, some a church, some counselor none of these the answers have.

            If I had a serious tax problem with the IRS, would I take it to my auto mechanic. You would regard me as absurd. If I had a serious medical problem would I go to my brother in law? - Of course not. That would be ridiculous. Yet we have our most serious problem, and we don’t take it to the one who can fix it! Who should we go to with our problem of a sin nature an Adam/ Eve problem. The answer is we need to take our “Adam problem” to God.

            First, I acknowledge to myself ourselves I’m an Adam, a son of Adam. I must never lose sight of the fact that I am an Adam. If I’m a woman, I am an Eve. WE ARE ALL ADAM’S; WE ARE ALL EVE’S. Once we come to a full realization of this fact we can begin to build a new life with God and our lord Jesus Christ. We need to remind ourselves. We have received an inheritance and that inheritance is sin. We have a very strong persistent, ever constant tendency to do bad things. You hear people say “the devil made me do it, she made me do it”. Often times we are bombarded by evil influences from other Adam’s, other Eve’s. We need to counteract all these influences in our lives.

            Now, in our everyday lives we keep an awareness of our weakness, reminding ourselves of our flawed nature and putting on a defense against it. Paul tells us in Romans chapter 7 verse 8 “but sin produced in me every kind of covetous evil desire. For sin, serving the opportunity afforded by the commandment, deceived me and put me to death. (Literally, we are put to death by sin.)” Paul continues “I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. For what I want to do, I do not do, but what I hate to do. It is no longer I myself who do it, but it is the sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that us, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I can not carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do: no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep ongoing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.”

            So I find this law at work: when I want to do good, evil is right there with me, and stays right there with me. In my inner being I delight in God’s law, but I see another law at work in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind making me a prisoner of the law ( the reality) of sin at work within my members. Then St. Paul says, “What a wretched miserable tormented) man am I! Who will rescue me from this body, this body of death?”

            Who will rescue us, who will save us from this horrible condition? JESUS CHRIST WILL. He has conquered sin and given us the ability to wage war against our sinful nature and by the indwelling and power of the Holy Spirit be delivered from this fundamental and fatal flaw. Paul continues “ the mind of the sinful man is death but the mind controlled by and under the influence of the Holy Spirit is alive to spiritual realities and is at peace.”

            If Christ is in you, your body is dead to sin, yet your spirit is alive because of righteousness, and if the spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to you mortal bodies through his Spirit, who lives in you for you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again, but you received a spirit of son ship, and by him we cry, ABBA, Father.

            To summarize, WE ARE ALL ADAM’S; WE ARE ALL EVE’S. This is our inheritance from Adam. Realizing this and taking into account this spiritual reality, we will be much better prepared to live a successful Christian life.