• Dene's Blog
  • About Dene
  • Contact Dene
  • Dene's Recipes
  • Dene's Books
  • Dene's Classbooks
  • Gallery
  • Recommended Sites
  • FAQ & Tutorial
  Flight Paths

The Tipping Point

1/26/2017

0 Comments

 
After six months, working 20-30 minutes at the time, I finally finished stacking that woodpile.  When it became apparent that I was near the end, and I hoped “this” would be the last load, I stacked the garden cart just a little too high. 

            Have you seen those old Garden Way carts?  A large wooden three sided box sits on two bicycle tires, with two props in front (instead of two more wheels) and a tubular handle that comes straight out from the bottom of the cart.  You lift on that handle and pull or push the cart at an angle to the ground.  Basically, it’s one giant lever. 

            Since I was hoping to finish that day, I started stacking the wood into the cart from the back, behind the wheels.  Instead of laying the whole first layer, which would have been so much smarter, I kept stacking the back higher and higher.  Then as I turned around to grab a log for the first layer on the front end of the cart, I heard a sudden WHAM!  I was almost afraid to look, but when I did, I saw that the cart had tipped and fallen on its back and all that carefully stacked wood had tumbled out onto the ground.  Instead of balancing the weight on, behind, and in front of the wheels, I had put it all behind the wheels.  What should I have expected?  God doesn’t ordinarily change the laws of physics when his children act in a less than intelligent manner.

            We all have tipping points and we are often just as brainless about them.  God warns us over and over that sin can enslave us.  It isn’t something we can dabble in and then step out when we’re ready to.  Peter says we reach a point when we “cannot cease from sin” (2 Pet 2:14).  Paul says we can become “past feeling” at which point we will “give ourselves over” to unrighteousness (Eph 4:19).  He also talks about people who have their “consciences branded” (1 Tim 4:2). 

            Slaves were branded in the first century.  When, having sinned over and over, we reach the point that we have become “obedient slaves of sin” (Rom 6:16), our consciences become branded.  We may think we are free, but that is part of the entrapment.  Somewhere along the line we have become addicted to our sin and we cannot stop, cannot cease, have given ourselves over to this master.

            And when that happens God “gives us over” as well (Rom 1:24).  Whatever we want to do, He will allow, however we want to live, He will not stand in the way.  “There remains no longer a sacrifice” for us (Heb 10:26).

            When do we reach that tipping point?  I do not know.  I do know that the thought of it scares me to death.  If anything will keep me righteous, maybe that is it—the idea that somewhere along the way I can reach a point where even God gives up on me.  Maybe that will make me stay away from that balancing act altogether. 

            Does that make me yet another kind of slave?  You bet—a slave of righteousness.  But tipping over in that direction will bring an entirely different result.
 
Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the form of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.  For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification… But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life.  Rom 6:16-19,22.
 
Dene Ward
 
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Picture
    Author
    Dene Ward has taught the Bible for more than  forty years, spoken at women’s retreats and lectureships, and has written both devotional books and class materials. She lives in Lake Butler, Florida, with her husband Keith.


    Categories

    All
    A Wives Series
    Bible People
    Bible Study
    Birds & Animals
    Book Reviews
    Camping
    Children
    Cooking Kitchen
    Country Life
    Discipleship
    Everyday Living
    Faith
    Family
    Gardening
    Grace
    Guest Writer
    History
    Holiness
    Humility Unity
    Materialism
    Medical
    Music
    Prayer
    Psalms
    Salvation
    Trials

    Archives

    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    June 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    August 2012
    July 2012

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly