A Bible Study for Young Moms (part 3)

I've been struggling over this post. We are entering the darkness, entering the brokenness of this world and the things that are written in Romans are not socially acceptable or politically correct. Deep breath.

Romans 1:18-32

  The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
  For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles.
  Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator - who is forever praised.
  Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exhanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.
  Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant, boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.


Whew.

This is not a soft, easy passage. When I come across passages like this one it is sobering. I don't like to think about the wrath of God. I don't like to think of all of these things as sin. I have committed some of these sins and it's not pretty to look at. I don't get warm fuzzys with this passage.

Lord, Your Word is inerrant. If I am to accept it as true I need to accept all of it. I trust that You are good. You are sovereign. You are black and white truth in the area of sin. Thank You that there are no gray areas. More than anything, thank You for pouring out Your wrath against me onto Your precious Son. I have been an adulterer, I am boastful and arrogant, I am a gossip, I have been a God-hater. I have been full of envy, I have hated, I have been deceitful. I have disobeyed my parents.

But You... You bore all of it on the cross. You took all of the shame. You paid the penalty.

2 Corinthians 5:21 "God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

 Again, I do not claim to be a theologian. I am simply a believer and a mom as I read this passage.

I read this and I see our culture today. We live in a pornographic culture. I see it on billboards, advertisements on my computer, sex is everywhere. You can read about my struggle with sexual addition here. As a mom I want to be aware of this more than anything. I believe one of the factors of my own struggle was because of exposure to sex, a wrong view of it, at a young age.

I have been entrusted with these children and it is my job to guard them when they are young and to lead them and teach them how to filter the voices of the world. Now, I know I cannot protect them forever. They will eventually leave the nest, but more than anything I want to teach them to be discerning.

Lord, I feel like my parents were naive in this area. I don't want to be naive. Help me to be wise with my children and how I talk to them at what age I need to talk to them. You are the giver of wisdom, help me to know that I cannot protect them always and that we have an enemy out there who is crafty and would like nothing better than to cause my children to be trapped in deep sin. I understand that You can rescue them out if you choose, but Father, I want to stand in the gap for my children, the lives You have entrusted me with, make me wise as a serpent and as gentle as a dove. Holy Spirit, You are my leader.