Some Species Never Learn
"And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, "You
may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall
surely die." Genesis 2:16-17
"Rest in peace."
Basically that is what Connecticut Light & Power spokesman Mitch Gross said
about the squirrel who nibbled on some electrical equipment in Greenwich,
Connecticut.
According to the autopsy, the squirrel's desire for things electrical caused him
to be zapped by tens of thousands of volts of electricity. That zapping caused a
piece of equipment in the community's power station to malfunction and half of
Greenwich woke up without power. That is, they woke up as long as they weren't
depending completely on their electric alarm clock.
That Greenwich squirrel, along with Scripture's Adam and Eve, remind us that we
ought to think twice before we bite into some tempting, forbidden tidbit.
Now, to be honest I don't know what temptation looks good to you. As unique
individuals, we have unique longings for that which is forbidden. An electrical
wire which looks tempting to a squirrel leaves me unmoved, while my yearnings
probably strike him as being ridiculous.
Still, the point is made and the advice is good: we shouldn't ever try to nibble
on a temptation that looks tasty but is wrong, sinful or forbidden. We shouldn't
nibble, or get close to nibbling or even think about getting close to nibbling.
That's because when God says, "the wages of sin is death" (Romans 6:23a), He
means it.
It doesn't make any difference what the sin is. Before God it is a sin and, as
we have seen, the wages of sin is constant and consistent.
This is why we must give thanks that God also means it when He says, "... the
free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Romans 6:23b).
The Lord knows that no matter how hard His children try, they are still going to
take an occasional bite of the forbidden fruit. To carry and cover our sins
Jesus entered this world and gave His life so we might be assured that a sinful
nibble doesn't mean the end of our spiritual road.
THE PRAYER: Dear Lord, forgive my sinful heart which finds temptations so
alluring. Grant that from this day on my life better reflects the joy I have
been given through Jesus' blood-bought forgiveness. This I pray in my Savior's
Name. Amen.
Pastor Ken Klaus Lutheran Hour Ministries
http://www.lhm.org/ all rights reserved; not to be
duplicated without permission.