"The Reckoning", by Pastor Kevin Lynch

People deal with their problems differently. Some enjoy, even thrive, on confrontation. Others are more willing to try to wait things out and see how they develop.

Jesus appears to be a person who went right to the source of the problem and hashed it out as soon as possible.

Perhaps even preemptively.

Check out the verse from Mark 1: 12-13:

"Immediately the [Holy] Spirit [from within] drove Him out into the wilderness (desert), (13) And He stayed in the wilderness (desert) forty days, being tempted [all the while] by Satan; and He was with the wild beasts, and the angels ministered to Him [continually]."

Jesus has just embarked upon His earthly ministry, and has just been baptized by John, and then filled with the Holy Spirit.

The verse says "immediately" He was driven into the desert.

Driven. Holy Spirit driven.

He was driven and He did not resist.

He would spend the next 40 days and nights being tempted and harassed by Satan himself.

It was a reckoning. It needed to happen. Jesus was just the person to do it.

He was always the One. He still is the One.

He won't stand for injustice and sin.

When He found the temple turned into a flea market He immediately confronted and reckoned with it.

He has been our role model. He attacked and conquered sinfulness and unrighteousness the same way we are supposed to...by the power of the Holy Spirit.

This is how we live.

Our temple is our body and we are to keep it righteous. Not religiously in our own strength, but through the power of God.

By submitting to Christ we are allowing all the power of God to be released into us by the Holy Spirit.

Don't waste any time. Don't think things are just going to straighten out on their own.

If God's not at work in you, if you have grieved the Holy Spirit away by your poor choices, it isn't happening for you.

Grace works as God pours it out. It fails as we refuse to receive it.

Perhaps you need a reckoning. Maybe you need to have your desert experience where you confront and conquer all your demons and temptations the same way Jesus did.

The Holy Spirit is a mighty force and power whom we cannot afford to live without.

He was the power in Jesus and He is the power in us today!

Why prolong it? How much more will you stand for? Draw your line in the sand.

Keepin' it Real,

Pastor Kevin <><

From the archives 2009.