As a person in full-time ministry, my mission is to tell everyone about the Kingdom of God. There is a Bible Verse that reminds us to do good works. The Bible is the word of truth and will lead us to eternal life. The Bible says that we will face a second death, and the work of the flesh and evil is what we call sin.
Sin is what separates us from God. But God in his mercy made a way for us to be reconciled to Him. He gave us his son Jesus Christ.
When we put our trust in Jesus we are rescued from the penalty of sin. But even as Christians, we can find ourselves caught in the power of sin. Satan will continue to send us evil thoughts trying to convince us to break the ten commandments, testing us with sexual immorality.
When this happens, we have to turn to the word of God and remember the promise we made to Christ Jesus that we should do all in the will of God. Here are some verses to remind us of what God calls sin.
Leviticus 11:44-45 We are called to be Holy.
“For I am the Lord your God. Consecrate yourselves, therefore, and be holy, for I am holy. And you shall not make yourselves unclean with any of the swarming things that swarm on the earth. For I am the Lord who brought you up from the land of Egypt to be your God; thus, you shall be holy, for I am holy.’”
The word Holy means separate, set aside. The word of God tells us that God is Holy. But it also calls us to be Holy. There are things that we have to keep ourselves separate from. Such things as lying, stealing, adultery, and other sins are laid out in the Bible.
We are called by God to be a woman or man of God. Laying aside the lust of the flesh and following after God. When we follow after God and try to be set aside and holy as he calls us to be, then we will see every part of us changed.
Matthew 5:48 Our goal is perfection.
“Therefore, you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
It is impossible to be perfect. However, we are to be working toward being perfect. God calls us to try our best to do what is right. We are to do what is our moral responsibility and live with good conduct. When we live with perfection as our goal, we will aim high.
It is true that we will not reach perfection here on this earth. But if we live our lives trying to always do what is right, we will live a very pure life.
At the same time let’s remind ourselves to be patient and kind with not only others but with ourselves as well. We know that we will make mistakes. This is ok. When we sin, we confess that sin to God and we try to not make that same choice again.
Matthew 5:43-44 We are called to love our neighbors even the ones that are unkind.
“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,”
The Christian worldview calls us to love our enemies. This is hard to do. It means we are to love those who have done moral wrongs to us. But the steadfast love of the Lord reminds us to not only love thy neighbor but to love the neighbor is cruel and unkind. This can seem impossible. But it is a good thing.
There are times when I have had people in my life that were very difficult. In full-time church ministry, there are many different people who can be unkind. We can be attacked from both inside and outside the church. But God calls us to love those people.
When we love others the way God commands us to love them, then the world will see his love, and people will worship God.
1 Corinthians 15:33 Keep good company.
“Do not be deceived: “Bad company ruins good morals.”
As a parent, this is a very important lesson. If I want my children to have good morals and good manners, then they must spend time with others who also have good morals and manners. If they spend time with those who lie, they will also begin to lie. But if they spend time with those who have good character then they will also have good character.
I have seen this in my own life. There is a saying in the business world that you are the same as the five people you spend the most time with. Even in the business world, they know that if you spend time with people who are corrupt you will become corrupt. If you spend time with people who put their families last, you will put your family last.
But if you work with others who have integrity and put their family first you will do the same thing.
Mark 7:20-23 Our hearts are evil.
“He went on: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, those evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance, and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.”
The Bible tells us that the heart of men is deceitful and so wicked that we can not imagine just how evil it can be. There are people who give the advice “Just follow your heart” This is terrible advice. We should never follow our hearts. That will lead to destruction. The heart of man is full of sexually immoral thoughts and the love of money.
When we follow our heart, we will start to call good evil, and evil good.
Matthew 12:35 Evil people will do evil things.
“The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil.”
There is a person I know who was able to fool many of us. For a long time, the acted like a good and moral person. But this person was living a double life. They were able to keep the lie for a while, but eventually, the truth came out. Because we can only hide what is in our hearts for a short time. Eventually, it will spill out into our actions and words.
This is why God calls you to the renewing of your mind. That means we are to keep our mind pure and clean and make sure our heart is pure and clean. This way we don’t have to work to try and keep our true selves a secret.
Luke 6:27-28 Love your enemies and be good to hateful people.
“But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.”
If there is a person in your life that you have a hard time feeling positive about the best thing you can do is pray for that person. The spirit of our god will not only change them but will change us as well. For that very reason, we are to pray for our enemies.
This is one of the hardest things we are called to do as Christians. What we want to do is to hurt our enemies. Our natural self will want to seek revenge. Show them who the is boss. But God tells us to pray for our enemies. That is because God knows that praying for our enemies will change us and help us to grow as a person. We will begin to stop hating them and maybe even start to love them.
Galatians 6:7 God will not be mocked.
“Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.”
Some call this concept Karma. God calls it the sow what you reap principle. If you sow an apple seed, you will not get an orange tree or a grapevine.
If you sow ignorance and bitterness, you will not reap a life of peace and love. This is most evident in our parenting. I have seen people take their children and give them no discipline. Do everything of them, and never hold them accountable.
Then they are shocked when their children are adults, and they are undisciplined and unable to do anything for themselves. Their children have what is called failure to launch. Parents asked where did I go wrong? Well, you are reaping what you sowed.
I have also seen parents who raised their children to be respectful and hard workers, independent and caring. And those parents later in life are proud of the children they have raised into adulthood.
1 Timothy 6:10 The love of money is evil.
“For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.”
This verse does not say that money is the root of all evil. I often hear this misunderstanding about this verse. The truth is the verse says the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. As human beings, we are all drawn towards money.
That is natural. However, we have to be careful. Because if we love money then we will make bad choices. We will steal or be unethical in our business dealings. Loving money will cause us not to be charitable and help others.
There are so many evil things that come from the love of money and that is why God’s word has this warning. If we instead use money to further the kingdom of Christ, then money can be a tool for good. One way to make sure this happens is to have an amount set in our personal income that is set aside for charity.
1 Thessalonians 5:22 Stay away from everything evil.
“Abstain from every form of evil.”
There is a verse in the Old Testament that says people started to do what was right in their own eyes. They stopped doing what God said and did what they thought was right. Today we see this idea in our society and also in our churches. So often I hear people say, well you do what is right for you, and I will do what is right for me.
But God says we must abstain from every form of evil. That is a very strict line we are not to cross. What does it mean to stay away from every form of evil? We are supposed to avoid all that is evil. That means not getting close to crossing the line. Whatever the line is stay far away from it.
Matthew 12:34 Call good… good and evil… evil.
“You brood of vipers! How can you speak good when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.”
The problem we have in our society today is the same problem as from time past. In our world today we are calling good evil and evil good. The good in the world is facing cancel culture while the evil in our world is celebrated on the big screen and on the smallest screens on our phones.
Tick Tock videos and Reels all call out people of God as bigots, and then at the same time celebrate the people who are living impure lives. When Jesus was here on earth, he was very clear about how he felt about this. We do not want to be in the category of a brood of vipers.
One thing to remember is that Jesus was talking to the religious people here. Not just the religious people, the ones who lead the religions.
Unfortunately, I am seeing today even in our churches that people are starting to call good evil and evil good. But we can stand tall against this culture.
Matthew 7:12 The Golden Rule
“So, in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.”
This is the golden rule. We are to treat others the way we would want to be treated. This simple rule should be our moral compass. We will make good moral choices if we treat each person the way we hope they would treat us.
This is an important lesson for marriages. If we treat our spouse, the way we want them to treat us then we will have a wonderful marriage. There are so many relationships like this. I think if teachers treated their students the way they wanted teachers to teach them there would be happier students.
At the same time if students treated their teachers with the same grace and kindness, they want the teachers to treat them the classroom would be a better place.
In our work, our schools, and our homes. If we all followed the golden rule our lives would be a better place.
Galatians 5:19-21 The list of evil things to avoid.
“The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions, and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.”
This list is what we find celebrated in our society today. But God calls us to stay away from these things. That is not a popular choice. People will mock you; they have mocked me. But in the end, you will have a happy and successful life if you do not take part in anything on this list.
In my life, I have seen many lives ruined by sexual immorality. I have seen families torn apart by fits of rage. I have seen people isolated and left alone because of their selfish ambition and envy. The reason God warns us about these things is because he loves us. God wants what is best for us.