How To Escape Corruption

Why is it important to think about what your nature really is and what the real you is really like—maybe at the start of the day? To answer that, here’s another question: How do we escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires? Have you got any of those? Do we escape corruption by exposing it? Do we escape corruption by becoming a nation of whistle-blowers—everybody ratting on everybody else? Do we escape corruption by imposing penalties and prison sentences? Evidently, no. Not really.

Besides, corruption isn’t the primary problem: it’s the sign of another—evil desires. Right? And that’s where you and I are set up for God with us.

Corruption is the process of bribing you or of luring you into doing something unlike you, something crazily different from your true and genuine design. You’re going to feel that! James alluded to this when he wrote in the first chapter of his letter that fleshly, evil cravings begin to drag the real self, the one made by God, toward something unnatural, which then gives birth to corruption and sin—the terrible twist of our design. So how do we interrupt the process?

We escape corruption by participating in God—which is where we are—because we have been given His nature now as our own. Don’t miss that because that’s the plan of redemption; not only to make you “good with God,” but to share Himself with you in your day, every day, redeeming the moments, especially the ugly, corrupting ones with you. He is with you in those! You needn’t be embarrassed or shy away from Him during those evil desires. In fact it’s vital that you don’t.

2 Peter 1:3 His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate (partake) in the divine nature, and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. (Italics mine.)

Talking with or at Jesus, thinking about what He did at the cross and resurrection, asking Him questions—and listening!—singing or taking a walk Jesus, complaining or whining to Jesus in the midst of junk, these are all ways of participating with Him in everything you experience. Don’t hold anything back, because that’s the set up for Him with you, participating with you, and seeing to it that you escape the result of nasty desires. The desires aren’t the problem! The problem is that we go quiet with God or try to corral them on our own. But that’s not the set up for God and you—God with you.

I know that this is crazy stuff for some people because they don’t see themselves as God sees them. They’ve got a dispute with their own Creator. They think they’re right—right-er than He is. “I know who I am! You’re wrong about me, God!” But on the chance that He might see and know them correctly after all(!) and be able to win that argument, there are a whole lot of us who will keep offering the great gospel because we love Who and what we’ve found: God and our uncorrupted selves. It’s one of the ways we participate with Him, too, and escape the fleshly desires that lead to our corruption, the twist of our perfect design. So we’ll keep serving up the gospel, and I hope you’ll serve it to me, because I’m going to need it too.

Okay?

(This is a transcript of yesterday’s video, “How To Escape Corruption,” and is for those who might rather read than watch. To see the video, click http://youtu.be/apcZrC_WOQg.)