Deuteronomy 8:11
“Beware that you do not forget the LORD your God by not keeping His commandments and His ordinances and His statutes which I am commanding you today.”
God is ever present. Yet, we forget Him. Why do we do this? We have competing wants. Something surfaces that’s against God’s ways. Giving in to those is ignoring Him.
We all do this on occasion. We confess it and turn away. Many of these are temptations. We’ve allied ourselves with God and something contrary comes us. We rarely have intentions of abandoning God. We justify it by thinking, “I’ll be right back.”
Giving in can lead us astray. I don’t think anyone thinks that giving in is abandoning God. Yet, it can lead to that. It involves second and third steps into sin. God will tap us on the shoulder, our conscience also is active, other people might point it out. We probably think that it’s still a pause with every intention of going back to God.
James 1:21-25 addresses this. He compares being a hearer of the Word verses a doer of the Word. The hearers “deludes themselves”. When we sin we are deluding ourselves. We minimize it and tell ourselves we’ll be right back.
Verse 21 of James tells us to put aside all filthiness. This is certainly part of what leads us astray. We should see these contrary ways as filthiness. Doing so keeps us from deluding ourselves and further keeps us away from them.
Be proactive; avoid thoughts, places and people that will bring up temptations. If on a diet, don’t pass by the donut shop. Go another way. This will keep us away from evil. Unfortunately, it still comes us. If we fall, confess it and move on.
Lord, help us to remember You always. Keep us from evil