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“I can’t take it anymore!  I don’t care if I ever see your face again.”  These words were spoken by a husband to his wife, one gentle Spring evening.  He walked out the door vowing to himself to never speak to her again.  Three days later, he spoke to her.  But she didn’t answer.  The last conversation he had with her was as she lay on a slab in the coroner’s prep room.  He had to go identify what remained of her after a violent car accident.  His vow broken, along with his heart, was a vow that should never have been made.

Mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, friends, and enemies make vows of silence toward others every day.  And it is a rare thing when those vows can’t be broken.  But these situations are avoidable.   I could go into great detail about what to do to avoid using words you will surely regret.  But how useless would this post be?  Who would read a 10,000 word post?  Instead, I will go our relationship with God to make the point necessary.

The ultimate relationship anyone can have is that of himself and the Lord who made him.  How often this relationship is broken by the human alone.  We decide we will chase after a sinful path we knew well would not end in the pleasure of our God.  But we did it anyway.  And isn’t this what causes all human discord?  We want something the other doesn’t.  So we willingly break the bond of love and trust between us.

We can avoid every possible break in our relationship with God if we love Him more than those things which tear us apart.  It sounds simple when I type it here.  But in practise we find ourselves pulled into sin by a lack of love for His ways.  “. . . Do you love Me more than these?”

When was the last time you found yourself loving God more than the pleasures of sin?  Perhaps you’re stuck in a cycle of sin, confession, and restoration.  Retrospect tells us plainly how we define the word sin.  Hind sight is very clear when we find the relationship between God and ourselves broken.  We all have a weakness which we allow to trip us up and rip us from the loving and powerful prayer life.  This can be avoided if we train ourselves to love God.

We can’t conquer the sinful nature without a distinct and vibrant love for God.  What Jesus has done is to open the door for us into this relationship.  But He leaves it up to us to decide that this relationship with His Father is worth forsaking everything sinful.  My only hope is that those who read this will consider their love for God in a very deep manner.  There is a place where most will end up like that husband.  They will speak to God with a deep and overwhelming grief.  But it will be too late.

By His Grace.