March 16, 2025
Greetings and blessings to all of you. When we see or hear evil, whether it be on TV, in the movies, in a book, in our friend’s dirty jokes or when we go to a social event like football or ice hockey, how do we respond? Do we turn away and ignore it? Do we compromise/rationalize and learn to live with it? When we see a dirty scene on TV does it make us feel dirty inside? How do we respond to evil? Have we been conditioned to what God sees as evil such as operating on little kids to change their gender or killing babies in the womb and/or until later. And let us not forget about the sin of sodomy referring to homosexual behavior…or “the acceptable sins” we tolerate. Do you recall in Exodus 32:19. “When they came near the camp Moses saw the calf and the dancing, and he burned with anger, he threw the stone tablets to the ground smashing them at the foot of the mountain. He then took the calf they had made and burned it. Then he ground it into powder threw it into the water and forced the people to drink it.” Moses was done! Are you done when you hear and see the behavior and the ideologies that are being proposed to our nation; to the next generation? Do you care like Moses cared? Let’s talk about what Jesus did? In Matt.21:12-13 when Jesus saw the Jewish merchants making it impossible for the Gentiles to worship in the only place where they were allowed to worship, He actively showed his displeasure. How? “Jesus entered the temple and began to drive out all the people buying and selling animals for sacrifice. He knocked over the tables of the money changers and the chairs of those selling doves. The Scriptures declare ‘My temple will be called a house of prayer, but you have turned it into a den of thieves.” Did Christ speak the Truth in Love during this incident? The church (the people called out) today is in real danger of losing its hatred of sin. Being called out means leaving behind sinful attachments to this world and instead being joined to the “Body of Christ”. Being the church means that we must leave behind any worldly motives or practices that are rooted in trendiness and pragmatism. It means putting the worship of God above all else. The lost need to be in our ministries where their particular sins and struggles are addressed. How? In Truth and in Love and our opinion is not part of the equation.
With the Love of Christ
First Lady Vivian C. Currie
Pastor ALC