Filtering software, such as that offered by OpenDNS or Safe Eyes (among others), can block a myriad of different kinds of sinful sites that we might be tempted to visit. Send Reports Now- Get reports anytime you choose, as often as you want.Every Christian family that uses the Internet, seriously needs to consider filtering and accountability software. Single Report for All Devices- Data from laptop, desktop, and smartphones merged into one report. Accountability Groups I Have Been InUp to 10 Accountability Partners- Choose as many as 10 people with whom to share reports on your Internet use.
And we plunge headlong into the sin and gorge our fleshly inclinations. And then when we do stumble, we often feel so guilty for our failure, that we think to ourselves, “Well, I’am already sinning, I might as well make the most of it. If we set our mind on things of the flesh, even if we are setting our mind on not doing things of the flesh, we will face the constant struggle of falling into fleshly things, and will frequently stumble. This is essentially what Paul is saying in Romans 8:5-7 when he talks about the mind set on fleshly things. When we walk around all day thinking, “Do not look do no taste do not touch” (Col 2:21), we will constantly struggle with urge to look, taste, and touch. Until you put up a sign which says, “Do not touch! Wet Paint!” Then every person walking along the wall feels the strong urge to touch the wall and see if the paint is wet.So also with our sin.
Accountability groups actually “work” for some people. And we commit to trying harder.And for some people, it actually works! But this is the biggest trap of all! The Biggest Trap of Accountability GroupsLet me be honest. Do not touch.” Then we do look, or we do taste, or we do touch, and once we do, we feel so guilty, we can’t face God, we feel like death, and so we decide to just enjoy the sin while we’re in it, but that only makes things worse on us in the long run, until eventually, we feel so filthy and disgusting, and get so angry at ourselves for the way we behaved, we come slinking back to God, begging and crying for forgiveness, and we confess our sin to our accountability group, and they forgive us, and tell us to try harder. We walk around repeating the mantra to ourselves over and over. We try and try and try to not sin.
Christian Internet Accountability Free From Sin
The successful person become self-righteous about his success (which is by far the worst sin of all), and often looks down on all the pitiful failures who just cannot gather together the resolve to keep themselves free from sin. And week after week after week, they announce “success” to their accountability group, and everyone else looks up to them and thinks, “Someday, somehow, I will be just like him — free from sin and temptation.”Do you see what happens when someone is successful in an accountability group? It turns into self-righteous pride for him, and idolatry for everyone else. They write the books and preach the sermons and lead the groups. And they have all the secrets on how they changed their life and live free from sin. They can make accountability groups work.
He cannot love us any more. We just need to recognize that no matter what — yes, NO MATTER WHAT — God loves us. We just need to know that sin is already defeated because of God’s love.We don’ t need to strengthen our resolve.
WLet me put this dangerously. It is not as if God is saying, “Well, I love you about 90% of the time right now, and if you would just stop drinking too much, I would love you 91%.” No! He loves you 100% right now. No! He loves us NO MATTER WHAT!God does not love some future version of you more than how much He loves you right now. And it is not as if God loved us while we were sinners, but once we believe in Jesus to become His children, He only loves us while we remain free from sin. He loved us while we were still sinners (Rom 5:8).
He loves us simply because He is love (1 John 4:8).Here is a little exercise I have found to helpful when dealing with sinful tendencies in my own life. We think that the love God is showing us is because of our own goodness.But God doesn’t love us because of our goodness. You see, when we get caught up in our own self-righteousness, we think we have earned God’s love. No, what I mean is that when we recognize we are sinners, and take that sin to God, it is there, in the midst of our sin, that God can show His love to us.
So when you are sinning, invite God into it. As I’ve written previously, the reason God cannot be in the presence of sin is because sin burns away in the raging fire of His love, grace, and forgiveness. God can’t be near sin and all that. This sounds totally contrary to everything church teaches us about God and sin.
I’ve been down this road a thousand times. Did you see the steps you took to get here?“I saw it. You know, it’s kind of silly how you ended up here. I love you and will never leave you.Yeah…. I’m not going to abandon you to this sin. Hey God! Are you seeing this?”“You do? Don’t you see the filth I just walked into?”Yep.
I do appreciate the honesty, though. And I’ll walk this road a thousand times more if you want. I’ll be honest, though, I kind of wanted to go down this road.”I know.
And I love you.You see? All God really wants is to let us know how much He loves us. I have already forgiven you. And hey, I’m sorry.”I forgive you. I like that.“I like that too. At least now you are beginning to recognize it and admit what happened, and talk to Me about it.
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