Sniff, Sniff, Gag, Gag
Fall is in the air! I love this time of year. There’s something heavenly about the myriad of bright colors dotted across the landscape. The cool, crisp air is inviting and invigorating. I even enjoy watching the leaves as they float to the ground, creating a crunchy blanket of foliage. Yes, it’s the perfect time of year except for one thing—the cinnamon.
That stuff is everywhere! The stores boast cinnamon brooms and pine cones, pumpkin spice candles, and apple spice air fresheners. (And for those of you who are not aware, if it has the word “spice,” it contains cinnamon.) It’s hard to go anywhere, including churches. After all, everyone wants to display the scent of the season—everyone except this girl.
Honestly, cinnamon makes me gag. It irritates my eyes and throat. My lips swell. My head throbs. My stomach convulses. Over the past week alone, I was exposed to enough cinnamon in varying doses that I spent the week on allergy tablets and herbal teas. Two of the past churches we’ve visited have included ginormous pumpkin spice candles in our gift baskets, both of which are currently in an outside bay of the RV because I can’t handle the smell. The real blow was on the last night of this past mission conference when a young girl brought us a HUGE pan of pumpkin spice cookies she had made. I felt so bad! It was such a sweet gesture, and she had no idea I’m allergic to cinnamon. To quote the great wordsmith, Charlie Brown, “Good grief!”
Are you ready for the kicker? Jason loves cinnamon. His favorite cereal since childhood was Cinnamon Toast Crunch. His favorite PopTart flavor is Brown Sugar Cinnamon. He enjoys the smell and relishes the flavor. But I’ve discovered he loves me more. How do I know? Because he doesn’t allow cinnamon in our home. Despite his love for the spice, his love for me moves him to avoid it. Sure, he’ll have some at events when I’m not present, and I encourage him to. But, he turned down the cookies (that, according to him, smelled heavenly) because he knew how they would affect me. He cares enough about me not to bring something into our home that will make me sick. That’s love!
As I thought on that recently, I was forced to ask myself a tough question: Do I love God that much? Do I love my Lord enough that I will keep out anything that makes Him sick? Bad attitudes. Hateful thoughts. Selfish actions. Willful disobedience. Are there things that I cling to because I like them or they make me feel good, knowing all the while that these same things disgust God? Like cinnamon does to me, sin makes God gag. It’s revolting to him. It makes Him ill. He can’t even bear to look at it. So, why do I do it? Why do you?
I’m tempted to make excuses. After all, my sins aren’t “big sins” like murder or theft, and I’m not hurting anybody, right? But, amid my justification, the Lord brings to my mind the church of Laodicea.
“And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God; I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth. Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see. As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. ”
Ouch! Talk about making God sick! But notice what it was that made God so ill. It wasn’t “great sin,” as we tend to think of it, but rather self-sufficiency, apathy, and lukewarm living. They weren’t evil, but neither were they good. They weren’t serving Satan, but neither were they really serving God. They were riding the fence, toeing the line. They thought they had it made and weren’t bad people, but they didn’t realize how much they made God sick. They didn’t view their sins as God did.
The Laodiceans said, “We’re rich. We’re good. We don’t need anything else.” But God said, “You’re wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked.” But the best part is, He didn’t stop there. He told them of a remedy and His love, and He urged them to change their ways.
How would I feel if Jason brought a huge cinnamon candle into the RV even though he knows how it would affect me? I would be hurt (and not just by the candle). I would be offended. I would think he didn’t care about me.
I wonder how God feels when we continue to live in sin even though we know how it affects Him. It’s something worth thinking about today.