Sin is such a pain

Yesterday I was weeding my garden and saying some not-so-nice things about Adam. In Genesis 3:17-19 the Bible says:

Then to Adam He said, "Because you have listened to the voice of your wife, and have eaten from the tree about which I commanded you, saying, `You shall not eat from it'; Cursed is the ground because of you; In toil you will eat of it All the days of your life. Both thorns and thistles it shall grow for you; And you will eat the plants of the field; By the sweat of your face You will eat bread, Till you return to the ground, Because from it you were taken; For you are dust, And to dust you shall return."


As I bent over the plants and sought to make sure I was grabbing only weeds and not some of my tomatoes, I was struck with the thought of how ugly sin really is. And it was Adam's sin of eating of the forbidden fruit that introduced sin into the human race. Of course, weeding a garden is the natural time to blame it all on Adam, but we need to be careful. We choose to sin. We decide that, at least for the moment, sin is more appealing than the alternative. We choose a quick thrill right now over our relationship with God.

I suppose I should tell you about those weeds I was pulling. From business to laziness, I had not taken care of those weeds yet this year. I went up to start working and those weeds were as tall (sometimes taller) than my tomatoes. They had big, thick stems on them. Those weeds were trying to take over. And they won at least one of the battles. I found a tomato cage completely empty after I started pulling out the weeds. The tomato had been choked and died from the weeds. These weeds were nearly overwhelming to look at as well as keeping the tomatoes from ripening. So I pulled them out. 5 wheel-barrow loads later, the tomatoes were free.

Sin is just like those weeds. If left alone it grows and flowers and ultimately chokes the life out of a believer. Jesus never intended for us to become overgrown weed-beds of sin. His desire is that we would be free from all of the junk and able to produce good fruit for Him. Is there sin in your life right now that is starting to choke your relationship with almighty God? Perhaps it is time for us to do some weeding so we can bear more fruit.

Now that my tomatoes are free, I need to get back to it and free my squash........