1 Kings 15

(July 28, 2014)

                I was struck by this chapter once again by the complete and all-encompassing nature of the commandments of the Lord.  They applied to the kings on both sides of the war, and they applied to Asa, and Asa even correctly applied them to his mother.  Sometimes, I think that there is a temptation within each of us to believe that for some reason the law does not apply to us.  We become a ‘special circumstance,’ because of what we have been through.  Maybe this has happened that provokes us, or that has happened that hurts us.  As a result, the general rules of the Gospel do not apply to us in these circumstances, as we suppose.

                This is a great deception that we pull on ourselves.  The Lord’s commandment to be perfect is not limited to only a class of people (‘Be ye perfect, unless you are kings in which case sin some but not too much’), or people with only certain life experiences (‘Be ye perfect, so long as you grew up in a happy home and are part of a nuclear family’ or ‘Be ye perfect, so long as no one has done anything to hurt or offend you’).  We must escape the desire to believe that we are the exception rather than the rule – Satan works with this desire to pull us into his clutches.  It is best to always believe that we are not the exception – that each of the commandments applies to us and the counsel we receive is meant for us, no matter how difficult or how much it may hurt.