Sin’s Deceitfulness

This is Joni Eareckson Tada and welcome to Joni and Friends. 

You know, looking back over the places I’ve visited, Africa remains the most vivid, especially considering the plight of its disabled people. Diseases we don’t hear much about here in America – like polio and leprosy – they’re prevalent over there in Africa. I would venture to say that many, if not most of the people we give wheelchairs to, have polio. And then there’s leprosy. That’s when people lose the sensation of pain. With no pain to warn them, they badly damage their fingers or feet to the point that they destroy almost that entire part of their body. I remember one young African woman named Ama. She had no hands. She dragged her legs behind her kind of like walking on the stumps of her wrists. She had built up calluses from pulling herself through the dirt, and her skin had become hardened. She sat back on her haunches, Ama did, and lifted her arms with no hands so that I could see. And oh, my heart went out to her; this young woman could not feel the bruises and the sores on the stumps of her wrists, and Ama had no idea the damage she was doing to her body. And I wondered how much more damage she was going to do to her body.

Now, you might think I have nothing in common with that woman, Ama from Africa, but I do, and I think you do, too. And it doesn’t have to be a physical kind of leprosy, but the kind described in Hebrews chapter 3. Listen to what it says; it says, “See to it, brothers, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily [now here it is, listen up] so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.” Did you get that last part? Sin causes a soul to become hardened and tough and dry and callused toward God, and that is spiritual leprosy. And it is one of the chief things that happen when you get into the habit of sinning. You spiritually lose all sensation of pain, especially things that pain God. You end up ripping your soul apart, and you don’t even realize it – just like Ama. White becomes black, black becomes white. Righteous living begins to look prudish, and worldly things no longer seem harmful; they in fact seem enticing. You think that what others call your backsliding isn’t all that bad. And you scold other Christians for being rigid or unyielding; so you end up preferring the company of the world rather than the church.

I tell you what, leprosy is something you don’t want to fool with, and that’s why Hebrews chapter 3 gives us the remedy when sin deceives us. And what is that remedy? It’s listening to the encouragement of other Christians, listening to their warnings, their cautions, their concern for you, because they can detect something that you cannot. They can see something in your soul that you are spiritually numb toward. But hey, don’t wait until you get to that point. If you have lied, go back and make it right before you become calloused. If you harbor a fantasy, shelve it! If you are watching a certain TV series you know you shouldn’t, turn it off. If you are seeing somebody you shouldn’t be messing with, then cut the relationship off. Don’t risk hardening your conscience. Don’t turn away from the Lord, and please don’t turn away from Christian friends. So my closing words? Well, may I encourage you today to double-check to see if you have any leprous spots on your soul? Because I would never want you to move so far from God that you lose sensitivity to what moves him.

© Joni and Friends

Originally aired on 4/20/10 as “Spiritual Leprosy.”