Five Minute Friday – Compromise

I wonder how often I damage my spirit by compromising God’s truth. I also wonder how it affects the lives of others surrounding me when I rely on my feelings more than stand on His Word or allow my doubts to temper my prayers of faith.

Time and again, I compromise the power available to me through the blood of Jesus when I either neglect it or willfully choose to ignore it. And that is heartbreaking to consider.

No wonder we are encouraged to “take every thought captive” and fill our minds with what is “true, noble, right, pure, lovely, and praiseworthy.”

Satan knows if he can sway us from believing the truth, our selfish natures will naturally lead us to compromise it, stringing us along a pathway of sin. And if we fail to turn from that pathway, we stumble after the masses, blindly following a world gone awry.

Despite what today’s culture would lead us to believe, neglecting truth is not tolerance.

It is sin.

Compromising Scripture does not do us, or our neighbors, any favors. A truth that is continually shifting and morphing is no truth at all. It is simply a means we use, attempting to remove our guilt by redefining right and wrong at the whim of cultural fads.

When we laud tolerance as the end-all of friendship, or deem kindness the only acceptable Christian witness, I can’t help but wonder at the legitimacy of that relationship. A true friend cares enough to risk my anger or disappointment if it means saving me from death.

Compromising truth leads us toward forgetfulness. Forgetfulness leads us to neglect God. Neglecting God leads us toward ungratefulness, which leads us toward selfishness and carries us away from the heart of the Gospel. A Gospel that tells us eternity is at stake in how you and I respond to Jesus.

Yes, Jesus loves sinners.
Yes, Jesus dined with sinners.
But He did not sin with sinners.
He loved them and told them the truth.
He called them to turn from sin.
And He did it without compromise.

The world would have us believe there are many ways to enlightenment and life. Jesus says there is only one.

I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.

The world needs Jesus more than social justice, equality, or betterment. We need the authentic extension of God’s grace, not a reinvention of it.

The Gospel is not a feel good and do whatever makes you happy stamp of approval on life. It is an invitation to a NEW life. One thoroughly overtaken by Jesus.

God so loved the world that He gave Jesus so that whosoever believes in Him shall be saved.

God loves the world enough that He sacrificed His Son.
His given love is a given.
But we must choose to receive it.
And to let it transform us from the inside out.

May we choose wisely and embrace His love with repentant and grateful hearts, yielding to His Spirit and becoming more like Jesus.

For His glory and our good.

Without compromise.

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This post is written in conjunction with https://fiveminutefriday.com/2022/10/13/fmf-writing-prompt-compromise/ Teaming up with an online group of writers who encourage others to share the words God has given them. The gist is to write for five minutes on a one-word prompt, then post your writing and link up with others who do the same — no overthinking, no deep editing, just free-writing in a short amount of time.