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APPETITE : THE MOST POPULAR KILLER TEMPTATION (Part 4)
We can never defeat whatever “enemy” there are “out there” or within us unless we know it is an enemy, then know how to defeat it according to “the truth as it is in Jesus.” Everything else will fail, miserably and terminally.
I only became acutely aware of this “enemy” that has been “hiding in plain sight” all these time because of “unnumbered schemes” which include failure to “call it out” by calling sin by its right name, without any sugar-coating of hesitation.
God’s last-day messenger stated it not bluntly but in the love of the light of truth: “INTEMPERANCE OF ANY KIND IS THE WORST SIN OF SELFISHNESS.” Now read on:
“The race is groaning under a weight of accumulated woe [see Rom. 8:19-22], because of the sins of former generations. And yet with SCARCELY a thought or care, men and women of the present generation indulge intemperance by SURFEITING [partying|feasting] AND DRUNKENNESS, and thereby leave as a LEGACY for next generation, disease and enfeebled intellect, and polluted morals.
“Intemperance of ANY KIND is the worst form of selfishness. Those who TRULY fear God and keep His commandments look upon these things IN THE LIGHT OF REASON AND RELIGION.
“How can any man or woman of the present generation KEEP THE LAW OF GOD, which requires man to ‘love his neighbor AS HIMSELF,’ and indulge intemperate appetite, which benumbs [his] the brain, weakens [his] intellect, and fills [his] the body of disease?
Intemperance inflames the passions and gives loose rein to LUST. And REASON and CONSCIENCE are BLINDED by lower passions [opposite of enlightened by loftier convictions and ambitions].” – Vol. 4, Testimonies for the Church, p. 37.
So we got a more profound meaning of what it means “to love our neighbors as OURSELVES,” a summary of the last six of Decalogue defining our duty to man, after God. Again, “spiritual things are spiritually discerned” and treasured.
Those who sadly choose to cherish a “carnal mind” instead of the “mind of Christ” only because it appears to allow for “enjoyable intemperance” and other “works of the flesh”’will become intolerant towards the unpopular truth and “at enmity” with those who faithfully present and courageously defend the present, testing truth in word and deed. So wisely “Choose ye this day.”
(To be continued). Bless all. NMF
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APPETITE : THE MOST POPULAR KILLER TEMPTATION (Part 4)
