Amaziah was the king over Judah. He went to war against the Edomites and was victorious. Upon his return he sent a message to the king of Israel challenging him to a fight. Jehoash, the king of Israel, sent a message to Amaziah, “You have defeated Edom and now you are arrogant. Glory in your victory, but stay at home! Why meddle to your own hurt and cause your own downfall and that of Judah also? The sins of arrogance, greed, and desire for power caused Amaziah to suffer a humiliating defeat (cf. 2 Kings 14:7-14).
There are many people today who are meddling to their own hurt with various forms of sin. There are some that meddle with alcohol. It has been reported that 81 percent of the young people in high school are drinking alcoholic drinks on a regular basis. It makes you wonder about the future of our nation. There are a myriad of evils that have resulted from alcohol abuse. There are thousands of men and women killed and injured every year on the roads of America because of alcohol impaired drivers. There are thousands of wives and children that are abused every day by a drunken husband or boyfriend. There are thousands of men and women in prison, mental institutions, nursing homes and other addiction centers because they took that first drink of booze.
The Bible speaks of the dangers of meddling with alcohol, “who has woe? Who has sorrow? Who has fights? Who has quarrels? Who has complaints? Who has wounds and doesn’t know how he got them? Who has bloodshot eyes? They that hang out in bars and spend their time drinking. Don’t let the smooth taste of wine, beer or whisky deceive you; they will sting like a scorpion and poison your body like a poisonous snake bite. Your eyes will begin to see strange things and you will say stupid things that would embarrass you if you were sober. You will do stupid and dangerous things that you would not do if you were sober. And you will say, “They have beaten me up and I didn’t even feel it and when you sober up you will just go out and get another drink of booze” (Proverbs 23:29-35, my paraphrase). Every year over 100,000 men and women in the USA suffer premature death because of alcohol abuse.
Just as bad as meddling with alcohol, or even worse physically, is meddling with drugs. The insidious thing about drugs is that one of the first things they attack is your brain, destroying your ability to resist drugs and your capacity of rational thinking; it’s like putting your brain in a microwave for a few minutes and usually the harm done to your brain cannot be repaired. You soon find yourself doing stupid things that at one time you swore that you would never do. Honesty, truth, integrity and character are destroyed by drug abuse, as you become a con-artist and a habitual liar. It can cost you your job, your family, and your freedom. Over 15,000 people die from drug abuse every year in the USA.
There are some that meddle around with extra marital affairs. It may have started off innocent enough, but now you are like a fly that has been caught in the spider’s web and you find yourself trapped by your fleshly lusts. You find yourself in the torments of hell because of the approach-avoidance conflict in your mind. You feel so guilty as you look at your sweet innocent children and your wife, and you realize the pain that you are bringing into their lives. You know what God’s word says about these things, but your fleshly desires become stronger than your love for your wife and children. Your sin not only brings you into misery, but it often brings suffering to so many others.
The drugs of power, greed and pride are insidious; most people never realize that they are a captive of these sins. There have been millions of men and women slaughtered in the wars that were caused by these sins. All the wars in human history were caused by greedy, power hungry and prideful men and women. There are political leaders today who starve, torture and murder their own people because of the sins of power, greed and arrogance. Someone has said, “Arrogance makes everyone sick except the one who has it.”
The Greek philosophers had come to the conclusion that once a person had become trapped by sin, then redemption for that person was impossible. That conclusion is correct from a human point of view—even the Bible says, “The evil deeds of a wicked man ensnare him; the cords of his sin hold him fast… everyone who sins is a slave to sin… they themselves are the slaves of depravity—for a man is a slave to whatever has mastered him” (Proverbs 5:22, John 8:34, 2 Peter 2:19). And the Bible also says that we don’t get away with our sinful ways. Paul wrote, “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life” (Galatians 6:7-8).
But the Greek philosophers didn’t know about the wonderful message of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Only God’s plan of redemption through faith in Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior can set us free from our slavery to sin. Through Jesus Christ God has provided salvation for anyone that desires to be delivered from their sinful ways. The Bible says, “He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay and set my feet upon a rock and established my goings” (Psalm 40:2). And God wants to do that for you today; He wants to lift you out of that miry clay in which you are sinking. “You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness… God made Him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God” (Romans 6:18, 2 Corinthians 5:21). We live to satisfy the lusts of our flesh, or we can live to please God—it is our choice.