June 18 – Never Be At Peace With Sin

Hope for Today: A Daily Devotion from Reasons for Hope*Jesus

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“You shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you…. But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall be that those whom you let remain shall be irritants in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall harass you in the land where you dwell.” Numbers 33:52, 55

“Manasseh did not drive out the inhabitants of Beth Shean.… so that they could no longer stand before their enemies.” Judges 1:27, 2:14

The very same is to be observed in the holy and spiritual battles of the Lord. He who fights only against outward sins is but very little, if at all, acquainted with the dangerous enemies in his heart or the deep corruption of original sin. And so the tempter may easily gain an advantage over him.

Experienced Christians guard more against the inward assaults of wickedness. They are at peace with no sin — but keep up a constant war with all their most subtle and darling lusts. However, though the Canaanites, our inbred foes, must be conquered, they will dwell in the land and cannot be wholly thrust out of the bosom, which makes the Christian warfare continue until death.

Yet give me grace, O Lord, never to spare my sinful lusts or tempers — but to look unto You to destroy them without delay, that I may not be destroyed by them. Give me deep inward sanctification; so shall my lips be holy.

Devotion by Karl Heinrich von Bogatzky (1690—1774)