Something so small.....


Psalm 32:2
Blessed is the man whose sin the LORD does not count against him and in whose spirit is no deceit.


Yesterday my husband and I were working in our yard when I heard him utter some unusual words (at least for our family.) I looked back and he was sitting down stairing at a huge red lump on his skin. He had unknowningly brushed up against one of those cute fuzzy caterpillars and was now suffering the consequences. Some caterpillars have a defense mechanism where they inject those who dare to touch them with their irritating and sometimes poisonous spines. The spines are so small that you cannot see them, but never the less they cause great pain. It only takes a few and your arm will feel like someone is jabbing needles into it and the only thing to do is use masking tape to take the spines out and rubb on cortisone cream, but the pain, well, must be ridden out.

I thought as I doctored his arm, how much like sin those small spines in his arm were. It only takes a bit and suddenly you're feeling the immense consequences. It only takes one act of premarital sex to make a baby, it only takes one lie to damage your character or lose you friends, it only takes one breach of trust to errode a relationship, it only takes one lie or inner vow to hurt your heart and affect your beliefs. And even if you turn to God and are forgiven, many times we must walk the consequences out, because like any good father, He lets us learn our lessons.

God hates sin because God is good and sin is evil. But I think He also hates it because He wants the best for us. Sin is always painful, and no good Father ever wants to see His children in pain. It's amazing to me how one small spine on a caterpillar can cause so much pain, but it boasts a great lesson to us about how small things can affect the big picture. Many of us think our sins are 'small.' We're not struggling with addiction, drugs, alcohol, porn or any of the 'big' ones and so we feel a bit better, patting ourselves on the back that our sins are smaller than someone elses. What we forget is that God hates all sin, and that it only takes the small ones to damage our lives and cause pain both to ourselves and anyone around us.

I know one thing I've gotten out of all of this though. When working in the garden wear gloves ;-)

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