Session 19

What if I like my sin?

From 2 Chronicles: A 28-Day Devotional

If you’ve ever built a house, you know nothing in a house is done by accident. Every beam has a purpose, and every finish — from counters to floors to light fixtures — is carefully planned and executed.

The same way that home building decisions are made after carefully weighing all the options, Solomon seems to make a deliberate decision to marry Pharaoh’s daughter.  

Solomon knew he could not allow his wife to live in David’s palace as it was a holy place that could not house an unholy marriage. So, in 2 Chronicles 8:11, Solomon builds a separate house for his pagan wife.

Though the marriage secured a military alliance, Solomon had deliberately ignored God’s command and married a woman who worshipped other gods. His solution was not to repent and ask for forgiveness, but to place his sin as far away from the holy city as possible.

The intentional way in which Solomon housed his shame ultimately led to his downfall because unrepentant hearts, like houses, are not built by accident.

No matter our effort, we cannot separate ourselves from our sins. Though Solomon was repentant in most areas of his life, his refusal to surrender this one area eventually led him away from the Lord.

“...[Solomon’s] wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been. He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molek the detestable god of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely, as David his father had done” (1 Kings 11:4-6).

Lack of repentance is nothing more than sin allowed to simmer. We can cover it with all the righteous acts in the world, but at some point, it will boil over and begin to affect every area of your life. We can serve, tithe, and keep perfect attendance at church, but if we harbor unrepentant hearts, the only thing we achieve is a murky faith, clouded by a lack of surrender.  

God is not blind to our sin, but our sin can make us blind to Him. If we want to experience the fullness of God’s grace and healing in our lives, we have to understand repentance. We're not giving up something good. Repentance is turning toward something better. 

Reflect:

• What’s one area of your life that is not fully surrendered to God?  Why?
• Have you ever used your accomplishments to distract you and those around you from the unsurrendered areas in your life?
• How would you define what repentance is?