Reproof

We need to reprove. That means to expose the evil. You know, you can’t just say, well, I don’t like to say anything about what they’re doing. You’d better say something. That’s your commission by your life and your words. You know, sometimes just the way you live can expose people. Have you ever walked into a conversation that was really filthy, and they know you’re a Christian, and all of sudden it gets real nice and clean? And how’s church going? I know you go to church a lot. How’s church? Yeah. I mean, I remember playing golf with people, and about the fifth hole they’d find out I’m a minister, and it changes their whole game.

They can’t cuss, they can’t hit. You know, it’s amazing. You know, I know that I know certain people who have lived a life of godliness in an ungodly environment, and there’s such a rebuke to the system that it cannot tolerate them, and they’ll be fired. But there’s more. It’s not just what you live, it’s what you say. You’ve got to be honest. You are commissioned by holy god to expose the evil of the world, to diagnose it, to confront it, and to offer the solution. That’s what he says. Reprove it, expose it, crack it open.

It’s a cancer to be removed. You aren’t helping anybody by hiding it. We can’t go waltzing around the world with all this lovey-dovey stuff. Never ever acknowledging sin. You know, some people say, well, we just want to love everybody all the time. Well, that’s not evangelism. I’ve told you before, you’ve got to make people feel rotten first, then make them feel good. They’ve got to feel bad, and then they know they need to feel good. We’re not only not to fellowship, we’re to expose it. Now listen, people. You know what’s wrong with us in most cases? As Christians, you know, we don’t see this contrast as dramatically as God sees it, just light and darkness.

I mean, we are just out of that system altogether. But here we are, we’re piddling around, playing around with the deeds of darkness, miles from being a spiritual CIA, from really going after and uncovering evil. You know, we should be so mature and so far along that we can expose evil, that we can search it out and expose it and offer the diagnosis and the cure. But instead, most Christians are barely hanging on to the edge for their own life, let alone trying to deal with somebody else. People say, well, I certainly can’t help anybody else get out of this thing until I get over some of my own problems.

You know, that’s way back, people. You’ve got to take care of that part, and then we ought to be out there really exposing evil. I’ll tell you something else, if you’re busy exposing evil, it will have an impact on your own life, right? Sure, it will. We are to speak to sinners, we’re to tell them it’s evil. Why? Look at verse 12. For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret. I mean, the stuff that they do is so rotten and so wretched and so vile, it isn’t even to be spoken about, let alone done.

It desperately needs to be reproved. You see, you can’t just let it go on. It’s evil, it’s vile, the things they do are unspeakably evil, and this is the heart of God talking here. And here we are in our world, where we’re drowning in a sea of media stuff that pumps into us, that there’s no such thing as evil, and we say, well, it’s not so bad. It’s evil. It shouldn’t even be talked about, it shouldn’t even be entertained in a conversation, it’s so wretched, and it needs to be dealt with and exposed.

And yet sometimes, you know, by just turning on your television in your home, you expose your child to a tolerance of the very thing you shouldn’t even talk about, the thing that you should expose as evil. So he says, the things that they do in secret are shameful to even talk about. It shouldn’t even be talked about. You know, I read a book on the homosexual problem written by a Christian this week that talked about the problem of homosexuality in such lurid terms that it was like pornography. Now, that isn’t right.

You don’t need to do that. You can give God’s solution without portraying every evil thing that could possibly go on in that relationship. That’s not necessary. These are wretched things that the world does, and they are to be reproved. They are things too shameful to even speak of, let alone to tolerate. And so he says, look, you are commissioned in this world. You ought to be beyond struggling yourself. Grow up so that you can not only get beyond that hang up, but that you can be a reprover of others, and you can be one who exposes evil.

Thank you for joining us in this exploration of reproof. Until next time, remember to keep the faith, stay strong, and continue to shine your light in the world. To hear these daily devotions of your daily bread, please log on to goddessgovernment.com. Goodbye, and may your faith always lead the way. [tr:trw].