What They Don't Know Won't Hurt Them

Today's Three-minute Bible Study
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Title: What They Don't Know Won't Hurt Them ------------------- Date: 3/16/2003
Keywords: "justifying" "lying" "premarital sex" "reap"
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Passage: Mark 7:9-13*

9. Then he said to them, "You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God in order to keep your tradition!

10. For Moses said, 'Honor your father and your mother'; and, 'Whoever speaks evil of father or mother must surely die.'

11. But you say that if anyone tells father or mother, 'Whatever support you might have had from me is Coban' (that is, an offering to God) —

12. then you no longer permit doing anything for a father or mother,

13. thus making void the word of God through your tradition that you have handed on. And you do many things like this."

Questions

1. Have you ever justified lying in order to protect someone else from "getting hurt"?

 

2. If you answered "yes" to question 1, was there also some self-protection in your actions? In other words, how much of the pain you were protecting was actually your own?

 

3. Is God's silence an endorsement of bad behavior?

 

Practical help

To justify ourselves, at times we will rewrite laws. If our parents seemed too restrictive and imposed too many rules, then we feel justified to "think for ourselves." We come up with a hundred rational arguments to justify our behavior.

But maybe it wasn't our parent's rules after all. Maybe they were just repeating what they had been taught. If you really want to know where the rules for sexual purity come from, read the Bible. God is very clear what behaviors he approves of and those he does not.

But God doesn't really mind, does he? After all, you have never been struck by lightening when surfing Internet porn sites in the past, have you? Is God's silence an endorsement of bad behavior?

May I suggest to you that God does not need to punish you by direct intervention from heaven. You will punish yourself because he has designed life to only work well when we follow his rules. Lest you seem doubtful, let me give you a painfully personal example.

I had sex before marriage. It was no big deal because, after all, didn't everyone? Because we were "careful" there was no pregnancy and no parents ever found out. How could God teach me a lesson here? It's seems life was showing me that I could get away with this little slip-up. Maybe because I am a clever person, nothing will ever expose me. Do you think?

So now — the rest of the story…

Eventually I got married and became the proud father of two little girls. All of a sudden, I have this strong desire to protect them as they grow. Eventually these little girls grow into teenagers. Guess what they now want to know? "Dad, you tell us that sexual purity is important. Were you sexually pure?"

Either I believe that God's laws are for my protection and the protection of my children or I don't. I swallowed hard and told the truth. You need to do the same before it's too late.

Galatians 6:7-9*

7. Do not be deceived; God is not mocked, for you reap whatever you sow.

8. If you sow to your own flesh, you will reap corruption from the flesh; but if you sow to the Spirit, you will reap eternal life from the Spirit.

9. So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up.

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*"New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved."