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Unintended Consequences


           
            A news headline this past week read, “Cellphone call limits suggested by Health Canada”.  The story went on to say that, though more study is needed, parents should encourage children to limit the time that they spend talking on their cellphones.  The concern comes from the radiation that cellphones emit and the thinking that it may harm children whose brains, skulls and immune systems are still developing.

            In church on Sunday, I asked, “Have any of you done anything differently in light of this warning?”   Interestingly, though most people had seen the story (or others like it), not one person said that they had changed their actions.  Why?  

            I think it has to do with the fact that the consequences are not immediate.  The issue, if there is one, is going to surface, not now, but 30 years from now, so we just keep doing what we do.  If the consequence was immediate, if you burned your ear every time you used your phone, you would likely change your actions immediately.

            I think we often apply the same thinking to sin.  In fact, we have come up with lists of what we think are “big sins” (such as murder and adultery) and “little sins” (such as gossip and “little white lies”) based, mostly, on the immediacy and severity of the consequence.  If I cheat on my wife, for example, I lose my family, my house, my money and maybe my job (that is a big deal).   If, on the other hand, I gossip about someone, generally speaking nothing really visible happens (so I am less concerned about it).

            But what if, ultimately, all sin is rightly understood as a rebellion against God and, therefore, has the same consequence?  Sin, “big” or “small”, puts distance between God and me. 

            “This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin” (1 John 1:5-7)     

            While I will never be perfect, my thoughts and actions are important, not only because of what happens now, but because they are ultimately forming my character and, therefore, affecting my relationship with God.   That is worth some thought.

“Just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy’” (1 Peter 1:15-16)

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