{"id":21371,"date":"2017-04-30T00:10:35","date_gmt":"2017-04-30T07:10:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lccredding.com\/lcc\/?p=10678"},"modified":"2017-04-30T00:10:35","modified_gmt":"2017-04-30T07:10:35","slug":"april-30-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/2017\/04\/30\/april-30-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"April 30, 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\u201cAnd to the man He said, ‘Since you listened to your wife, and ate from the tree whose fruit I commanded you not to eat, the ground is cursed because of you. All your life you will struggle to scratch a living from it.’\u201d<\/em> Genesis 3:17<\/span><\/p>\n

Entropy<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n

Raise your hand if you have a self-cleaning house. What about self-laundering clothing? Does anyone reading this have naturally non-sticky children? What about self-cooking groceries? If you are a gardener, does your garden weed, water, and harvest itself? Though I cannot see you through the screen of my computer, I know that no hands are raised. Mine isn\u2019t raised either. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I spent three hours cleaning my house on Saturday. This isn\u2019t even a very big house. It\u2019s actually quite tiny. Even after three hours, I know that there are hours more I could invest in cleaning. It\u2019s another set of tasks for another day. I was also washing, drying, and putting away the laundry, and when that was finished, I still had three family meals to cook.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I was very pleased with the good work I had done that day. I knew it was going to bring peace and order to my home. I also knew that I would have to do it all again very soon.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I find it interesting that a house will naturally make itself dirty and chaotic. But a clean, peaceful house takes time and effort to maintain. Ever since the fall of Adam and Eve, mankind has had to labor hard to make a living.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

But if we are in Christ, we are no longer under the curse of the law. We are visitors passing through this world, but our true home is in heaven. \u201cFor this world is not our permanent home; we are looking forward to a home yet to come\u201d<\/em> (Hebrews 13:14).<\/span><\/p>\n

Our true home can never become dirty. It is incorruptible.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

How then shall we live? While in fleshly bodies on this fallen earth, we can daily complete our work with an eternal mindset. \u201cSet your mind on things above, not on earthly things\u201d<\/em> (Colossians 3:2).<\/span><\/p>\n

God will use our lives and the way that we conduct them as examples to the people around us. As His light shines from within us, it attracts those who do not know Him yet. That light is unfamiliar to those who are still living in darkness. They do not know Jesus yet, but He desperately wants them to. He wants to save them from this world. He wants to forgive their sins. He wants to give them a new permanent address.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u2026\u201cand we have a priceless inheritance\u2014an inheritance that is kept in heaven for you, pure and undefiled, beyond the reach of change and decay\u201d<\/em> (1 Peter 1:4).<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cDear heavenly Father, thank You for redeeming our lives from every curse. May our lifestyle reflect the hope of an incorruptible eternal home, and may they draw people to your salvation. In Jesus\u2019 almighty Name, Amen.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cAnd to the man He said, ‘Since you listened to your wife, and ate from the tree whose fruit I […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21371","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-women"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p92wjD-5yH","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21371","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21371"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21371\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21371"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21371"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lccredding.org\/church\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21371"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}