The Insanity of Sin

My wife, Myndall, and I were talking in the car about something she had heard recently about shepherds. Apparently, when a sheep wanders away from the flock, the shepherd retrieves it and breaks its leg. He then carries it back to the flock on his shoulders and nurses it back to health. We commented on how dumb sheep were that it took this level of pain to keep them from wandering off again in the short term, and Myndall commented on how that might be how God sees us.

I think she nailed it on the head. The Scriptures are certainly loaded with sheep analogies when it describes the “people of God.” I recently heard a philosophy professor from Boston College talk about how every morning he wakes up, and he gets attacked by a thousand “thought soldiers” screaming, “Think about this!” “Think about this!” “No, Think about this!” He said he knew that without fail if he chose to begin his day with prayer and setting aside some time in that first hour to turn his focus in prayer and worship to Jesus that his entire day will inevitably go smoother, be more efficient, be filled with joy, etc. However, most of the time he does not do that and pays the consequences of less joy, less efficiency, and a more troubled day in general. “What is that?!” He cries, and then answers himself. “We’re insane!” This is the insanity of sin.
May we all choose to cry out to God as we recognize this in ourselves in humility and brokenness. May we, by the power of His Spirit working in us, begin to tell the thought soldiers to shut up and say yes to the call of Christ each morning. I believe it was Timothy that Paul told to remember that we were not given a spirit of fear, but of “power, love and clear thinking (sound mind).”