How many kinds of salt do you have in your pantry?

I checked the other day, and I have six – probably five more than I need! I have table salt (with and without added iodine), coarse salt, grinder salt, sea salt and even grey salt.

You could say I got hooked on salt a few years ago when a friend gifted me a fancy salt grinder. The gift came with a small bag of chunky coarse salt. As the saying goes, I tried it and I liked it!

It wasn’t long and another friend gave me a bag of sparkling white sea salt for my new grinder.

And then one day at the local market, I found a bag of funny-looking grey salt and had to try it, as well. Grey salt looks like sea salt only dirtier and tastes more bitter. It’s an acquired taste, I guess.

I like salt a lot. Probably too much, but I love what it does to food. It takes away the bitterness of an eggplant and adds to the sweetness of a melon. It brings out the flavor of pork chops and turns even a bland hard-boiled egg into something spectacular.

Salt just brings out the best in things.

That’s probably one of the reasons Paul referred to salt when he was telling the Colossians how to behave around non-believers.

Season your conversations with salt, he told them. Remove the bitterness, enhance the sweetness. Give the things you say more tang, more texture. Turn the average into the unforgettable!

In other words, bring out the best in others – and for others.

Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. (Colossians 4:5-6 NIV)

Be kind, Paul reminds us.

Lift others up instead of running them down. Let your words reflect Christ in your life.

Show consistency between what you believe and who you are, and follow the advice of James 1:22: Don’t let the word of God go in one ear and out the other. Do what it says.

Act on what you know to be pleasing to God and, as my favorite recipes all say, salt to taste.

Paul’s advice to “season with salt” hits equally hard on two different Biblical principles, Be Kind and Think More Praiseworthy Thoughts.

Be Kind tells us: And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. (Ephesians 4:32 KJV). Be Kind is exemplified in the Beatitudes, and it reminds us to treat others the way we want to be treated.

Thinking Praiseworthy Thoughts encourages us: Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things.(Philippians 4:8 ). Thinking Praiseworthy thoughts is all about staying positive – in the things we think and say, and the things we pay attention to.

These two principles together help us to keep a positive mental attitude toward others as well as ourselves, and form the basis of a God-pleasing life.

For more information on these principles, as well as the other 15 Biblical principles for creating Christian success, pick up a copy of book And God Was Pleased by Ava Semerau. The book is available online at amazon.com in both paperback and Kindle versions, and is also available at fine booksellers around the globe. To learn more about Ava Semerau, visit her sit at www.avasemerau.com, or simply send her an email.

“Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. As men moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there.

They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves and not be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”

But the LORD came down to see the city and the tower that the men were building. The LORD said, “If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let us go down and confuse their language so they will not understand each other.”

So the LORD scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city. That is why it was called Babel —because there the LORD confused the language of the whole world. From there the LORD scattered them over the face of the whole earth.”

What were the people of Babylonia trying to do? Build a tower to make themselves famous

Were they being successful? Apparently

What made them successful? A common language – the ability to communicate successfully

Was that good or bad? Why?

What did God say about them? “The people are united, and they all speak the same language. After this, nothing they set out to do will be impossible for them!”

Do you think God would say that about your church? Your family? You and your friends?

The people of Babylonia were united in doing something wrong, so God had to stop them. But what if a group of people could be united in doing something right? Nothing would be impossible for them – God said so.

So how does a group like that become so united together? How did the people of Babylonia do it? Look through the passage. They all spoke the same language – they talked – they understood each other. When their ability to communicate was stopped – they were finished. I think Satan has done a great job of keeping us Christians from communicating with each other because he knows that Christians who have that kind of communication – nothing will be impossible for them.

Think about it: When you’re at church, how often do you talk to someone about the things that really weigh on you heart? How often do you share your deepest hurts, how you really feel, what you’re really concerned about. The last time I was at church my conversations went like this:

Me: Morning.

Other person: Morning, Dave. How are ya?

Me: Hey, I’m doing great. You?

Other person: Real good. How’s work been going?

Me: Not bad. Keeping busy, anyway.

Other person: That’s good. How’s the kids?

Me: They’re good. Well, I better go find this kids. Nice to see ya.

Did we really communicate? Not really. Most of what was said wasn’t even true. That’s not communication – that’s not even fellowship. God doesn’t want us to only communicate with Him (although that’s surely important), He wants us to communicate with each other. The Christian life was never meant to be lived alone – God intends us to live life in unity with other Christians.

What would happen in your life if you had a small group of friends that you could really communicate with? A group of friends that you could share your biggest struggles with – no matter what they may be? People who ask you how you really are – how you day has really been. People who say they’ll pray for you and then actually do. Friends who don’t just talk about the weather, they talk about what God’s been doing in their life and what He’s been teaching them. I tell you, nothing would be impossible for a group like that.

Would you like to be a part of a group like that? I sure do. But it’ll require a change in the way we communicate. Casual conversation isn’t enough. Non-believers can have casual conversation. Christians need intentional conversations. Our natural tendency is to be very superficial in our conversations – even with close Christian friends. The “Hi, how are you? I’m great” kind of stuff. We need to intentionally make our conversations count.

Ephesians 5:16 – “Redeeming the time, because the days are evil” Or “Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days.” Ask the real questions. Answer questions with truth. Take the opportunities you have to encourage one another and build each other up. Don’t waste your time on weather and politics – talk about things that actually matter.

Exercise: Pair up with someone who you know fairly well and spend five minutes being real with each other. Have an intentional conversation.

—

Today I want to teach you guys something very important. The thing I want to teach you is pretty easy to do, but there are lots of grown-ups that still don’t know how to do it. In fact, the thing that I’m going to teach you is so important, that if you learn how to do it today, and you start doing it – you will never be the same! Do you want to know what I’m going to teach you? I’m going to teach you how to feed yourself.
Before you tell me that you already know how, I want to play a little game.

Game:

Three contestants blindfolded, guess what object they hold. If they are right, they win the object.(Pop, Smarties, and baby food)

Imagine that it’s Christmas time. Christmas day, actually. All of your relatives have arrived and it’s time for the feast. There’s a big turkey (or ham or whatever your family usually eats complete with all the trimmings. Name a few of the things you would have at your Christmas meal…
So there’s all this food just waiting to be eaten, someone asks the blessing on the food and everyone digs in – except you. For you, your mom or your dad opens a jar of baby food and starts feeding you that stuff.
How would you like that? No way! That would be gross. And besides, you’re not a baby anymore! You don’t need your parents to feed you – you can feed yourself!
But you know… you couldn’t always feed yourself, could you? When you were a baby, you had to be fed by your parents. You had no teeth and all you could eat was baby food. But aren’t you glad you grew up and learned how to eat regular food all by yourself?
Today, I want to show you how you can grow up as a Christian and feed yourself spiritually. If you don’t know what that means, that basically means that I want to show you how to be really good friends with God.
Like most of you, I grew up in a Christian family and did lots of Christian things as a kid.

• My family read the Bible and we did family devotions.
• I went to church every Sunday.
• I went to a Christian school – just like you guys.
• I even worked a Christian Bible camp in the summers.

I didn’t have to hardly do anything to be a Christian. Sure, I asked Jesus into my heart to take away my sin, but after that, everything was done for me.

My parents read the Bible to me. My Mom and dad both prayed with me at night. My Sunday school teachers told me the stories in the Bible. My principal read a devotional each morning – I didn’t have to do a thing!

Just like how a baby is fed baby food my their mom and dad and they don’t have to do a thing, I was learning about God only from what my parents and teachers told me, I didn’t have to do a thing. I was being fed Christian baby-food!

Now do you think someone would grow up big and strong if their mommy fed them baby food all their life. _________ is a big, strong guy… (call him up) _________, are you so strong because your parents feed you baby food everyday? You’re big and strong because you feed yourself real food – meat and potatoes and vegetables.

Just like kids need to learn to feed themselves real food to grow big and strong, Christian kids need to learn to feed themselves Christian food to become a strong Christians who really love God.

So what kind of Christian food am I talking about? Let me show you…

Acts 17:11 – “Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.”

These Berean guys read their Bibles every day. Every day. I tell you, if you want to grow to be a super strong Christian, you’ve got to read your Bible every day. That’s the kind of Christian food I’m talking about – things that will help you grow as a Christian.
Now could you guys eat the “Read-Your-Bible-Every-Day” Food? Let’s see, who hear knows how to read? You could eat the “Read-Your-Bible-Every-Day” Food! If you don’t know how to read, who here knows how to listen to your mom or dad read? You could eat the “Read-Your-Bible-Every-Day” Food by listening to your parents read the Bible to you! If you don’t want to eat Christian baby-food all your life, start eating the “Read-Your-Bible-Every-Day” Food!

Here’s the second food.

Psalm 119:11 – “I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.”

Do you know what it means to “Hide God’s Word in your heart”? It means to memorize verses from the Bible. So the second food is the “Memorize-God’s-Word” Food.

Do you think you guys can memorize verses from the Bible? Well, let’s do a test. Repeat after me. “Jesus wept.” Can you say it again? Again? If I asked you to tomorrow? There! You’ve memorize a verse!

How about a little harder one – Say it with me if you can… “For God so loved the world….”

You guys can eat the “Memorize-God’s-Word” Food. That’ll really help you to grow up to be a strong Christian!

So that’s the second food. What was the first food again? And what was this one?

Here’s the third food.

1 Thessalonians 5:17 – “Pray continually”

That’s the whole verse. And that’s the third food – the “Pray-Continually” Food.
Now in case you don’t know what it means to pray continually, let’s break it down. First pray. What does it mean to pray? Praying is just talking to God. It doesn’t have to be fancy. It doesn’t have to be long. It doesn’t have to be before lunch or during church. It could be as simple as…

• “Good morning, God.”
• Or “God, I’m having a bad day.”
• Or “God, help me not to punch that guy that’s bugging me!”
• Or “Thanks, God, for the Pepsi I just got.”

That’s prayer. Now that you know what it means to pray, what does ‘continually’ mean? All the time. Always. Without stopping.

Think about eating… since that’s what we’ve been talking about.

How many of you ate some food yesterday? How many of you have eaten food today? How many of you will eat food tomorrow? That’s eating continually. And God wants us to “pray continually”. We should talk to him this morning, this afternoon, and tonight – then tomorrow do it again.

One of the coolest things about God is that anyone can talk to Him at anytime and He’ll always listen. He’s never to busy to hear what you have to say.

So eat the third food – the “Pray-Continually” Food.

Recap the three foods. You guys aren’t babies anymore – the more you eat these three Christian foods, the more you will get to know God, and the more you will grow up to be a strong Christian who really loves God.

Game: Double or Nothing

Three contestants are blindfolded, and they try to guess what object they hold. If they are right, they win the object. Then if they correctly answer the bonus question about that object, they will double their prize. (Pop, Doritos, and a jar of baby food – for the bonus: What flavor?)

Imagine that it’s Christmas time. Christmas day, actually. All of your relatives have arrived and it’s time for the feast. There’s a big turkey (or ham or whatever your family usually eats complete with all the trimmings. There’s all this food just waiting to be consumed, some one asks the blessing on the food and everyone digs in – except you. For you, your mom or your dad cracks open a jar of Gerber’s “Broccoli, Potato, and Cheese Casserole” and start shoveling it in.

How would that make you feel? If that really happened to you, how would you feel?

For me, I’d first of all feel disgusted: Baby food really doesn’t taste that good. It doesn’t even smell good.

Secondly, I’d be humiliated. Here I am, a grown man, and someone else is feeding me baby food. It’s bad enough to be eating baby food, but for some one else to be feeding you – humiliating.

Are you thankful that you do not have to be spoon-fed by someone else?

My Story

One of my biggest struggles as a Christian has been learning to feed myself spiritually. I grew up in a Christian family and have been surrounded by “Christian” stuff since I was a kid.

• Christian school
• Christian college
• Christian camps during the summer
• Christian job

I was super-saturated with “Christian” stuff? Some of you guys can probably relate. And because I was always in a Christian environment, all of my nourishment for my spiritual life was spoon-fed to me.
My family had devotions every day, [spoonful] my school had devotions every day [spoonful], there was staff devotions each day at camp [spoonful]. At school I had to memorize verses in each of my subjects [spoonful], plus a 15 – 25 verse passage each month [spoonful]. At camp I got to hear fantastic speakers share God’s Word twice a day [spoonful] [spoonful].
I was being well-fed. My spiritually life was pretty good. But there was a problem. What do you think happened when I graduated from school, and moved out on my own?

• Family devotions – don’t have those anymore.
• Bible memory at school – don’t have that anymore.
• Fantastic camp speakers twice a day – don’t have that anymore.

The spoonfuls of baby food stopped coming – If I didn’t learn to feed myself, I would spiritually starve. My relationship with Christ would pretty much non-existent.

How About You?

I wonder about some of you? If you up and moved to L.A. tomorrow away from anyone you knew…

• …how much Bible would you read?
• …how many verses would you memorize?
• …how much time each day would you spend studying God’s Word?

Would you get spiritually fat and have an awesome relationship with Christ? Or would you spiritually starve?

Here’s a couple of tests to see if you’ve been feeding yourself:

• Test #1: How many verses have you memorized in the past year? Not because they were required for school – not for any church program – just because you decided to.
• Test #2: Have you ever been to camp or a retreat or some conference like Missions fest or Break Forth, where you got really spiritually built up and left on that “spiritual high”, only to find yourself back down in the dumps a few weeks later? Could it be that after such a spiritual feast, you went back to baby food?

Do you see what I’m getting at? You’ve got to learn to feed yourself. This is YOUR relationship with Christ – YOU’VE got to be the one to take care of it.

Feed Yourself

I sure don’t want to starve in my relationship with God. I’ve felt spiritually empty before. I’ve felt distant from God. I don’t like it.

I want to be super close with Jesus. I want to have a permanent “spiritual high”. I want to have a REAL relationship with the God. I don’t want spiritual baby food – I want Doritos! I want to be spiritually fat! And maybe there’s one or two of you guys that want that too.

If you’re one of those people, let me give you just four things you can do to feed yourself. This certainly isn’t an all inclusive list, but it’ll give you a good start. And to help you remember it just a little bit, think of each item as a Dorito.

Dorito #1. Read God’s Word

Acts 17:11 - “Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true.”

These Berean guys examined the Scriptures every day. Every day. These guys ate Dorito #1 every day.

Everyone stand up. Remain standing if you’ve read your Bible this year without anyone telling you to, because you wanted to. This Month… Week. Today. Every day this week.

I challenge you guys – if you don’t want to be spiritually starving – if you want to have a fulfilling, life changing relationship with God – starting reading your Bible every day. It doesn’t have to be 17 chapters – start with just a verse. How long does that take? (Time me reading Acts 17:11) Can’t you spare ____ seconds of your day to get to know God a little better? Dorito #1: Read God’s Word

And for you guys that already do read your Bible every day, can I challenge you to actually think about what you read – not the open, read, close, forget kind of devotions. I know about those. Be like those Bereans and EXAMINE the Scriptures – find out what God wants to say to you.

Dorito #2: Memorize God’s Word

Psalm 119:11 – “I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.”

How many of you have memorized that verse? How many of you do what that verse says? I memorized all kinds of verses in school, but I would bet that I haven’t memorized more than 30 verses since I graduated. That’s being spoon-fed. I need to work on Dorito #2: Memorize God’s Word.

Dorito #3: Meditate on God’s Word

Psalm 119:97 – “Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long.”

Do you guys know what it means to meditate? Cows meditate their cud. They bite it off, chew it up and swallow it. A little later, they bring it back up and chew it again. Then they swallow it. Then they do it again. That’s meditating.

The Psalmist chewed on God’s Word all day. He’d read a great verse in the Bible and then he’d think about it all day.

How often do you do that? I know I’m much more likely to read a great verse, say “That’s a great verse!” and then never give it a second thought. You and I gotta eat Dorito #3: Meditate on God’s Word

Here’s a couple of things I’ve tried to help me remember to meditate.

1. For a while, whenever I read a verse that jumped out to me, I’d write it out and stick it up on the wall of my office. Then throughout the day, I’d glance up and see the verse. Another good place to post them would be the bathroom. Put them anywhere that you would regularly see them.
2. Another thing I’ve tried is to write it on a little pice of paper and put it in my pocket. Occasionally when I’d feel that paper in my pocket, I’d pull it out and read it.
3. Be creative. Do what works for you to help you remember to meditate on God’s Word.

Dorito #4: Live It Out

James 1:22 – “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”

Let’s say you have a delicious burger bursting with goodness. You pick it up, take a big bite, chew it up, and spit it out. How much nourishment does your body get? Zip. Naughta.

The same thing applies to everything we’ve talked about. If you read a verse about ‘honoring your father and mother’, you memorize it, you think about that verse all day long, then lip off your mom when you get home from school – what’s the point? You have to live it out. Make it part of your life. Simple to say, but tougher to do.

So there you have it. Four Doritos to help you feed yourself. Four things you can do to keep from spiritual starvation. Don’t be content to be spoon-fed. Get eating some of those Doritos.

—

A rehashed version of this devotion geared for elementary students can be found here: Eatin’ That “Christian Food” 

The word ‘created’ here means ‘to form out of nothing’. God didn’t create the heavens and the earth from scratch – He created the ‘scratch’ too! (So to speak…) He took a bunch of nothing, a handful or zilch, a truckload of zero, and made the universe and everything in it.

I find it amazing enough that someone can take some wires and silicone and make my computer – but to think that God created everything that anyone has ever seen all from absolutely zero – that just boggles the mind.

So if God can create the entire universe from nothing, can’t He make something wonderful out of my life? Absolutely. God can take my weakness, my failure, my emptiness – all the nothing that I have to offer God – and make it into something completely wonderful that will glorify Him.

Was Peter something great? He was a stinky ol’ fisherman with a big mouth. He even denied that he ever knew Jesus! What a zero he must have felt like! But God took that zero and made him into a great leader in the early church.

Or what about Moses? He was a son of a slave – a murderer running from the law. But look at how God took his pile of nothingness and made him into a hero to millions.

The Bible is full of stories of people who have absolutely nothing to offer God, but when they surrender themselves to God, He uses them in great and powerful ways. So next time you feel useless, worthless, like a big fat zero – great! You’re just the kind of person God’s looking for. Give yourself to Him and let Him turn your nothing into something.

What do you remember about what God did through Elisha?

• He raises the widow’s son back to life.
• He made an iron axehead float.
• He healed Naaman of Leprosy
• He made the widow’s oil keep flowing.

1 Kings 19:19-21

Elijah calls Elisha to follow him – to one day be his successor. Elisha was an ordinary person. The Bible give no qualifications why God should choose him. It doesn’t say he was talented speaker. It doesn’t say he was scholar. It doesn’t say he was a man of great influence. It doesn’t say he was any kind of a great leader.

In fact, he was on the end of the line – plowing with the twelfth team of oxen, eating the dust of the other eleven plowmen in front of him. Elisha was just an ordinary guy, but God choose Him to be the man who would do extraordinary things for God.

God likes to choose ordinary people to do His work – people like you and me. He wants to use them in His church, in His ministries, in your home, at your work place – everywhere.

Think of an expensive painting: What makes it so expensive? Is it a special type of canvas that the artist paints on? Perhaps special paint? A unique type of brush? No. It’s the talents and the skills of the artist that give the painting it’s value.

Just as the artist uses ordinary paints, ordinary brushes, and ordinary canvases, so God uses ordinary people like you and like me to accomplish extraordinary things for Him.

Think of the 12 disciples. They were just ordinary, run-of-the-mill fishermen – but look what God has done through them! Think of Billy Graham – he’s just another ordinary guy. God has used him in an extraordinary way – reaching thousands, even millions of people with the Gospel.

So is it possible that ordinary people like you and me can do extraordinary things for God? Can you and I live lives like Billy Graham, Daniel, Joseph, Moses, Abraham, or Elisha? And if we can, how do we do it?

#1. We need to know God.

I don’t mean we need to know about God – I mean we need to KNOW God. Knowing all the typical Sunday School Bible stories does not constitute knowing God.

If I were to go to the library or on the internet, I could learn a lot of things about Abraham Lincoln. I could learn his birthday, what his pet dog’s name was, what he liked to eat, what he liked to do for fun. I could learn all that stuff about Him, but I still wouldn’t be able to tell you that I know Abraham Lincoln. Why? Because I’ve never met him. I’ve never talked to him. I have never had any kind of personal interaction with him at all.

Sadly, that describes many Christians’ relationship with God. Sure, they know the stories about God. They know that He is powerful and loving and all that stuff. But they’ve never met Him. They’ve never had a personal meeting with the Living God.

Do you know God? Have you met Him? Do you meet Him every day in your Bible, in your prayer time, in your fellowship with others? Do you know God?

There’s a test you can do to find out if you really do know Him. You can find it in 1 John 2:3-4. You can tell that you really know God if you obey Him.

#2. We need to be willing to obey.

God asks people to do some pretty strange things.

• He asks Joshua to march around Jericho.
• He asks Abraham to kill his own son Issac.
• He asks Ezekiel to lay on his side for 390 days straight as a sermon illustration.

But everyone of those people were willing to obey God.

What is God asking you to do – and are you willing to obey?

• Maybe He’s asking you to change your priorities.
• Maybe He’s asking you to talk to your co-worker about a personal relationship with Christ
• Maybe He’s asking you to take on a greater role in the church
• Maybe He’s asking you to lay on your side for 390 days!

I don’t know what God’s asking you to do – and really, it doesn’t matter. What matters is – are you willing to obey Him? Are you willing to make that hard decision and do what you know God wants you to do?

In order for us to do anything for God, we need to be willing to obey.

3. You have to be alive.

To explain what that means requires a science test. Which of the following things are alive?

• A rock
• A fish
• A popcan
• A tree
• A telephone
• A key
• A spider

We can tell what things are alive and what things are not alive by three things. Living things grow, change, and reproduce themselves.

Ephesians 2:4-5

We are made alive. That means we need to grow, change, and reproduce ourselves.

At the Bible camp I work at, we give the kids a list of four things they can do to grow as Christians.

• Read the Bible
• Pray
• Fellowship
• Tell Others

How have you been doing with that list of four? Have you been growing? Because as you grow – you’ll change. That’s the tell-tale sign of a growing Christian; they change. If you’re exactly like you were two years ago, maybe you need to review that list of four. If you haven’t been changing, then you haven’t been growing either.

But as you grow, and as you change, there’s something that will naturally follow that. You will begin to reproduce yourself.

Matthew 28:19 – “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations”
In other words – reproduce yourselves – reproduce disciples of the Lord Jesus

How well have you been reproducing yourself? What have you been doing to make disciples? Are you alive – growing, changing, and reproducing yourself?

Because those are the keys:

1. If we know God
2. If we are willing to obey
3. If we are alive

That’s how you and I (ordinary people) can do extraordinary things for God.

Proverbs 5

Read Proverbs 5:1-4

Although the verses are specifically talking about the temptations of an immoral woman, they clearly lay out some basic guidelines in dealing with temptations.But first, a question: Why do people sin? Because it seems like it’s a good thing.

• Cheat on a test and get a better grade.
• Punch someone who’s bothering you and you’ll feel better.
• Lie to your parents and get out of trouble.

Read Proverbs 5:3-5

Sin seems appealing – read verse 3

Humans by nature want what they think is best for them. If I offered you iced tea or used oil to drink – which would you choose? If I offered you a teaspoon of used oil and ten thousand dollars to drink it or iced tea for a nickel – which would you choose? Why? Because you think in the long run, the money is worth it.Sin seems worth it. It seems to benefit them in some way. People don’t lie to try to get INTO trouble – they lie to get OUT of trouble. People don’t steal to LOSE what they have – they steal to GAIN what they don’t. Sin seems appealing.But what’s the truth? Verse 4-5

The lie to get out of trouble brings…

• guilt
• eventual punishment by God
• possibly more trouble than you were originally in

Does anyone have any examples of how sin seemed appealing, but in the end was terrible? [Personal Experience Story Goes Here] The truth about sin is “Although it seems appealing – in the end it’s very unappealing.”So how do we deal with temptation?

Read verse 8 Run away! I’m not talking metaphorically – I really mean to run away!

Read Genesis 39:6-12

Joseph actually RAN AWAY! He physcially fled the scene. If you’re tempted to steal something – don’t hang around whatever it is that you’re tempted to steal! Run away! Leave the room or the building. If you’re tempted to punch out your brother or sister – go away. Don’t just wait there until you give in to the temptation.

The second part of verse 8 says not to even go near her house.

• Don’t put yourself in a position where you are likely to be tempted.
• If you’ve got a problem with swearing – don’t hang around people who swear.
• If you’ve got a problem of cheating on tests – sit at the front of the class where the teacher can see you.
• What are some other examples?

The last point I want to make is in verse 21.

God sees everything CLEARLY.

• The store might never know you stole that item – But God does.
• The teacher might not ever know you cheated – but God does.
• Your parents might not ever know you lied to them – but God does.

God is always right there with you.Application: You’re certain to be tempted this week. How will you deal with it?