Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry. Colossians 3:5
“Now what was the sort of ‘hole’ man had got himself into? He had tried to set up on his own, to behave as if he belonged
to himself. In other words, fallen man is not simply an imperfect creature who needs improvement: he is a rebel who must
lay down his arms. Laying down your arms, surrendering, saying you are sorry, realising that you have been on the wrong
track and getting ready to start life over again from the ground floor—that is the only way out of our ‘hole’. This process of surrender—this movement full speed astern—is what Christians call repentance. Now repentance is no fun at all. It is something much harder than merely eating humble pie. It means unlearning all the self-conceit and self-will that we have been training ourselves into for thousands of years. It means killing part of yourself, undergoing a kind of death.”
C.S. Lewis (1898-1963) in Mere Christianity (New York: HarperCollins, 1980) 56.
In today’s Scripture, greed falls at the end of the list because money is the thing that most competes for the place of God in our hearts. Those who live according to the earthly nature are slaves to money.
We need to put this old thinking to death. But, frankly speaking, the longer a person lives according to the earthly way of thinking the harder it is for unlearning to happen.
As Lewis puts, such people are imperfect creatures in a “hole.” He also describes them as one “the wrong track.” They need to “start life all over again.”
You don’t add Jesus to life, you surrender and change directions. Most people, sadly, stay stuck because they remain slaves to money.
At Generosity Monk, we are building a new website. Take a moment to pray for our team as we work on this.
It will have a chatbot feature called, “Ask the Generosity Monk.” All my books and blogs have been uploaded to an AI tool powered by Chatbase. You will be able to ask it a question and it should answer how I would answer. Why do this?
I get asked questions every day. But often people say they are hesitant to ask questions because, in the words of Lewis, it reveals the “hole” in which they find themselves. This feature will cost me upwards of $1400 per year.
Why spend that money? If I can help tens, hundreds, or thousands of people unlearn slavery to money and go “full speed astern” by making money their slave as a faithful steward of God, it will be worth it.
To invest in this and other features, make a gift today to the Generosity Monk Fund at this link. Deploy me and my fellow servants at Generosity Monk to help people put their earthly ways to death. Thanks in advance for your support.