05/13/2026
Do we read our Bible, and say a prayer every morning before walking out of our homes feeling faithful, only to close the door behind us as we pick up the mantle of a worldly citizen once more, and repeat the same sins we committed yesterday? Well friends, reading and hearing the Word of God is a wonderful habit each morning, but it is nothing more than emptiness unless we obey and do what it says. Otherwise, it is a mental exercise in futility and meaningless vapor.
“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like.”
James 1:22-24 ESV
I love to watch documentaries on television about faraway places. It excites me to learn about the various different cultures and see wonderful new sights portrayed, but seeing them on a television or movie screen in a show that depicts the experiences of someone else is not living them. I am simply participating in someone else’s reality... while in my own life it is pure imagination and fantasy.
Many of these travel shows have nothing to do with wandering the world; some, like a series called “Tennessee Crossroads” on Public Television in my hometown of Nashville, tell of interesting places, people, and sights that are close to home. Yet, even so, I might get inspired and fascinated by watching this weekly broadcast, only to turn off the television and in a few short minutes find that my mind is back in my everyday life... none of the amazement of those people and places having been lived, or visited; they remain just another interesting show on television. This is like reading the Bible, and praying, without living them out in our lives; without actually visiting Heaven, God, or Jesus Christ, and living there among them. We are not changed people until we do those things, and go personally to those righteous places every day in our lives.
There are many reasons why we do this, and I have read about a few of them, but one that I feel is the most pervasive is our feeling of futility as we try to become righteous and pure, but are told day after day, and Sunday after Sunday, how sin is inevitable... that it places all of our hope on forgiveness, and removes all but God’s grace by forgiveness from the equation. It ignores Christ’s words that tell us to go and sin no more.
“Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.””
John 8:10-11
“Another cause of this delusion is the pervasive doctrine that we are incapable of doing any good. The grace of Christ that can enable us to obey, keep us from sinning, and make us a holy people is rarely embraced.” – Pastor Andrew Murray
Jesus tells the woman to not only hear the commandment regarding adultery, but to obey it… to do as it says. Why would we need to try if we were doomed to failure, and in the end it was only grace, and forgiveness that must save us... right? Well, if that way of thinking was all there was then the Word of God, and the life of Jesus, could have been cut much, much, shorter. Instead, we are told throughout the Bible how to live the Word and to become righteous, holy, and perfect in our actions. Forgiveness is a valuable part of what we need as we continue to perfect ourselves. This is not to be confused with our redemption from sin by the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ; which is about His grace. Our daily forgiveness involves our confession, remorse, trying to perfect ourselves, and gaining forgiveness as we get better at living righteously.
“You therefore must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
Matthew 5:48 ESV
Faithful perfection isn’t futility... it is a goal. This is something we should do every day when we leave our homes. It is about taking heaven with us into the world of sin, and using God’s Word, and our faith in Jesus, to shield us against temptation and sinfulness. Living in this way is so different from watching a documentary on television and then turning the television set off and finding that we have instantly returned to our mundane world... unchanged, unaffected by any real-life experiences.
Likewise, I have had a couple of surgeries in my life, but I can tell you that before each one of them I found the best surgeon I could find to perform the operation! I wanted someone who had successfully performed many of them... not someone who had read a book, or watched a YouTube video and who thought they might be able to do this now! If we are reading the Bible, but never practicing what we have read then we too could be calling ourselves Christian surgeons... without ever having performed a spiritual operation.
Yes, being a Christian is being faithful and believing in God, and Jesus Christ, but it is also about doing those things they have taught us to do. It is about loving, obedience, and striving to live our lives in perfection. Are we going to fail along the way? Yes! Will we be forgiven if we are penitent? Yes! But we are expected to come away from that forgiveness with the Words of Jesus ringing in our ears... “go and sin no more.”
“What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?”
Romans 6:1-2 ESV
Last year I went to Scotland and England. I had watched many documentaries about the ancient castles and Stonehenge there, but until I actually went there and saw them with my own eyes, and toughed them with my hands, they were simply thoughts. Touching them and walking about in them made them real to me… sure they were always there and certainly they were real, but not to me… not until they became part of my life… are we ready to make the Gospel and God’s Holy Word real to us? Are we ready to touch them and to make them real in our lives?
Prayer:
Father, thank you for your Word, and for the grace we have received through your Son Jesus Christ. Thank you for your forgiveness when we stumble, but more-so for your instruction in how to live without sin. I receive assurance of my success from your Word, just as I receive the promise of forgiveness. Help me Father to live more perfectly each day, and to need your forgiveness less as my days unfold. Show me the way I must go, that I might travel the good and narrow road, and cross the narrow bridge that traverses the chasm of sin in this world. Lift me when I stumble Father, and encourage me to proceed on. Open the gates of heaven to me, and let me enter from time to time as I pray so that when I exit my prayer closet a bit of its dust will be on me... to remind me of the perfection that is my destination. Bring me into your presence Holy Father, and don’t let me be satisfied with knowing you from afar, or by reading, and by word of mouth, alone. Beckon me to come so that I might be where you are, and praise you with the heavenly host, saying, Holy, Holy, Holy, are you my God who was, and is, and is to come! Let me know your Son Jesus by much more than reading about Him, but by picking up my cross and following Him.
“And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say,
“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,
who was and is and is to come!””
Revelation 4:8 ESV
“Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”
Matthew 16:24 ESV
Amen! Amen! Amen!
Rich Forbes