"The Pain- Part 2"

"And David said unto Nathan, I have sinned against the LORD. And Nathan said unto David, The LORD also hath put away thy sin; thou shalt not die." 2 Samuel 12:13

Yesterday we talked about how pain makes us aware that there is something not right in our body that needs attention, and if we ignore it it won't go away. We used this as an analogy to sin. Conviction alerts us to the fact that there is sin in our lives and we should not ignore it but give it our attention. I left you with this closing thought, "Ignoring pain won't make it go away. Ignoring sin won't make it go away either."

Someone replied with this statement, "You can even mask both temporarily, but that doesn't make them go away." That is so true. I finally wound up at the doctor with my hand. After giving me a diagnosis, he decided to treat it with an injection. May I tell you that the next day my hand was almost 100% better- the pain was gone, I had back full range of motion, I could barely tell I had an injury. But then two days later, the pain started coming back, the movement was limited and today it hurts.

The point? The injection "masked" the pain. The problem was still there even though it did not "feel" like it was. Masking it only "temporarily" deals with it. It's the same way with sin. You can "mask" it too. You can try to justify it, try to reason it away, try to make excuses for it, but it is still there. You may not "feel" it for a while. You may feel that you have peace in that area. You may feel that because it is "out of sight" that it has been taken care of, but it is still there. Don't think so? Ask King David.

David tried to "mask" it by sending Uriah to the front lines, by marrying Bathsheba, by raising their little child. He tried to hide it under the "crown"- he thought his "position" would take care of it. But it didn't, it was still there. How do we know it was still there? God sent the prophet Nathan to tell him so.

Two questions this morning: Are you ignoring your sin? Are you trying to "mask" it? Either way, it's still there, it hasn't gone away. It may "feel" like it has. It may "feel" better. But that "feeling" is false, it's just a mask. It hasn't healed it, it hasn't washed it away, it hasn't taken care of it. Only repentance- as was in the case of David- will take care of it. Repentance brings true healing. Stop ignoring your sin, stop trying to hide it under a "mask" because eventually it's "pain" will come back and you will have to deal with it sooner or later. Why not sooner?

Have a great day. A mask only covers up what's really there. Take the mask off and deal with the sin, then it will go away.