The Consumption

    Going on a missions trip, for me, is part of spiritual survival. I live in a world of people who are financially well-off, and what I experience in that world is talk of hairdos, clothes, vacations, things to buy, the latest fitness or health craze, and spa days, for example.
     I heard a sermon once and remember the title of it, which is also an acronym-E.G.O.-"Edging God Out." With everything everyone, in my world, is consumed with, it feels like God is being edged out of it all.
     In times past, when someone had tuberculosis it was called "the consumption" most probably because it consumed everything in it's path, so to speak, in the body. (especially the lungs) With the same description, "the consumption" or, in this case, T.B. of the soul, is happening in those around me. And, as TB, can be highly contagious!!!
     I know how Lot felt, living in Sodom. 2 Peter 2:7-9:


7and if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men 8(for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), 9then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment,


     I don't really like using this Scripture totally in how I am feeling, because I don't want to call myself righteous, and others in my world, unrighteous, but this comes closer to how I feel than anything. I see the things others are doing with their lives, seemingly being consumed by this present world and it's trinkets and values, (just like the world) and it grieves and torments my soul, and I desire to not be in the midst of it all. I want to get out.
    In this Scripture, it describes the actions of others as "sensual conduct." While I know in Sodom,  this referred to sexual misconduct so prevalent there, I believe "sensual" can also refer to anything that lures a person, with the purpose of catching that one in it's grasp, whatever it is. (one of satan's modes of operation)
     In my world, people are being lured and caught with the "pleasures of this world," which is none other than worshipping the "god of self." I can see it, and it grieves me, especially in those I knew were once consumed by Him.
     And, it calls out to me, too. Especially when everyone around me is either sucked in, or in the process of being sucked in, and they don't even see it. "If it feels good, do it" the mantra of the 70's, seems to be coming to pass before my eyes.
     I purposely avoid lavishing too much on myself so that satan cannot get a stronghold in me too. I know that if I catch the fever, my focus on the Lord and His Kingdom, will fade overtime. I do trust Him to keep me, but I have to agree to be kept of Him, by not putting myself in dangerous territory.
      God help us, your people, from the traps of the enemy to ensnare us with his deadly pleasures and consumerism which is ever snapping at our heels.