This week's theme is Loving God. We won't have a theme every week, especially after we start adding in the other writer's work around July 1st.
In the ministry here at America's Keswick, we deal daily with people struggling with addiction. We know that addiction comes in all shapes and sizes, and is no respecter of persons. We understand the Bible to indicate that addiction is a form of idolatry, a form of false worship. Addiction is being devoted to something or someone more that we are devoted to God.
As we consider that perspective, it basically includes most people I know, as well as, myself. According, to Dr. Ed Welch, in his book, Addictions: A Banquet in the Grave, "The list of addictive substances and desires is limited only by our own imagination, as we see here.
Alcohol, anger, love, weightlifting, sleep, nicotine, pain, TV, exercise, gambling, nose drops, cocaine, work, sports, sugar, people, sex, caffeine, shoplifting, lying, chocolate, risk, success/winning, pornography." In every one of these instances and many others, our love
for God takes second or third or lower place. We have become devoted to something other than the One True God.
I often tell people that our goal is to create an environment in which an individual falls so deeply in love with Jesus Christ, that the things of the world will pale in comparison. We cannot rip an addiction out of someone's hands, but we can show the far surpassing glory of Christ, so that the addiction is dropped from their hands as they reach for The Far Greater One. Colossians 3:2, "Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth."
Your challenge for today is to ask God to give you a heart of passion to love Him.
Diane
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