The matter of SIN, the act of it, to a child of God who is redeemed and sanctified by the Truth, is a matter of personal spiritual hygiene. Yes, it is a matter of hygiene, it is no longer a matter of nature. Having believed in the Gospel, the finished work of Christ that altered our old nature, forgives all our sins, took away our SIN nature, and impacted a new life, new nature to us, we have become the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus, the kind that God so much cherished and desired from us. (See 2 Corinthians 5:21.)

 

The same way a natural being maintains good hygiene for the sake of enjoying good healthy condition that's same way a child of God won't go near sin because he/she knows sin will make him sick. Sin could cause anyone severe consequences in the form of permanent deformation to struggle and suffer from. But will God forgive all sins? Yes, he will, but the consequences are the scar that might remain to chastise anyone either for a time, or for a life time.

 

God didn't reject David for sleeping with the wife of Uriah, but the consequences on David's throne was so heavy that he lost some of his sons due to his poor spiritual hygiene. He ran out of Jerusalem in a very hot afternoon from the attack of a son that was born unto him (like he once carried in his womb). If any of his sons was a known warrior, he was because David taught him to fight. But just imagine, David, that mighty warrior ran away from his son who lacks experience of war. Of course, harmful organism doesn’t inflict people according to sizes. The day his beloved son, Absalom, died, David wept like a baby like he had never done after a very long time in his life. He didn't die because God hated him, but from the consequence of the sin of the father, David's poor hygiene.

 

God didn't kill or reject Samson permanently for sleeping around, but sin grew up in him till his anointing was ruin and a permanent consequence was inflected on him by his enemies. He suffered the damage all through his lifetime. And later pleaded to die with his enemies. That was so much to bear! You won't make such terrible mistakes with your life in Jesus’ name! Of course, no one drinks sour soup because he/she doesn't want to waste it. Even if the cost of losing the soup is too much to bear, it is no longer healthy for consumption. It will cause malfunctioning for the body system, same way a child of God ought to keep himself/herself from sin, because sin will cause him to malfunction, to weaken his new life, weaken his confidence in his authority, and exposes him to Satanic attack. Yes, severe consequences. Good hygiene is good living.

 

No man rejects his son on the ground of poor hygiene, yet there are severe consequences the father won't help the child with. The father may help the child with money to treat infections, but the child will have to bear the pains that comes from it. God won't reject anyone because he/she has made mistakes (or sinned), but there are consequences. Remember, Judas Iscariot couldn't come back to plead for Mercy, that was how his years and days of following the Lord was wasted. The Grace upon his life was wasted, he helped others when Jesus sent them out two by two, but he couldn't help himself. Don't think that God won't have been able to forgive Judas, no, Judas Iscariot couldn't obtain or receive Mercy because he didn't ask for it. Even if he were to be forgiven, he won't have been able to remove the guilt and handle the pains of betraying his Lord, the same thing that couldn't make him come asking for Mercy.

 

God forgives all sins, but that doesn't always take away the consequences of all sins. Take heed to yourself, and maintain sound spiritual hygiene so you are not opened to afflictions and avoidable pains. God loves you, and wants you to keep your confidence and head high in enjoying your Dominion at all times without guilt. Keep Good hygiene to keep your confidence and sound spiritual state. When we keep sinning after that we have been shown Mercy of Divine redemption, we won't be able to love God the same, neither can we grow in love for him.

 

Just like infections will weaken a natural life due to poor hygiene, same way our confidence and authority as believers will be weakened. Anything that is not of our Father can't make us grow more in the likeness of the Son to exercise the authority of the Son. According to John Gospel chapter 14 verses 12, Jesus says, “Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father". This is the authority that's in the new life for us. But when we begin to abuse the Grace of God for us, it weakens our confidence to reign in our authority.

 

God won't love us less, but we won't love God the same when we go about playing irresponsible life with sin. He loves us before the foundation of this world. His WORD makes it clear to us in John 3 verses 16, It is not that we bargain for it, no, we didn't, His love for us is unbiased from His heart, nature. His love is not just given us, but poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit. The Word of the Lord also added that, "while we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly so that the ungodly should become the righteousness of God".

 

Do you see that we didn't merit all we have come to share in Christ Jesus? We didn't work for them. But our hygiene is necessary for us to keep in good health spiritually, and to maintain our confidence in the authority and glory that has been bestowed upon us by Christ Jesus. Your hygiene is your confidence. Your hygiene is your key to loving Him more. When your hygiene is POOR, your confidence and love for Him will definitely decline and suffer much deformity. Having become the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus, we are rightly admonished to bear fruits, to conduct our lives, pattern our lives after the nature that we have come to share in God through Christ Jesus.

 

That's why the Scriptures say, “I am the holy God, and you must be holy too.”   (1 Peter 1:16, CEV). God expects that our characters should portray, depict His nature that we now bear. He is our Father. We are being born again, recreated by the power of His Spirit. Having been adopted as His, He is not in away asking us to go get a nature that's holy, He knows there is no way we can do that by our power, not even the strongest of us can do so. But He has commanded that our manner of life must correspond with the manner of Spirit that has given us new life. According to Romans chapter 12:9, the Holy Spirit shows us things that aren’t compatible with us, things we should abhor, things that are taboos to us, things we shouldn't demote ourselves to have contact or fellowship with: "Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor [detest, dislike, touch not] what is evil. Cling to what is good."

 

Abhor evil (sin). Keep yourself from sin. Don't touch it. Don't let it have contact with you. You are no long of that order of life. Sin is contagious to you. It will make you sick. It will weaken your authority. Your hygiene must not be taken for granted; you must watch against it. Same way a natural person will abhor the touching of fungi, bacteria, or virus. He/she detest unclean clothes, and will not wear rags. A woman will not want to easy herself on toilet seat that is not properly cared for — looking rough and dirty — that is same way a child of God, or a believer must abhor sins — maintain healthy spiritual hygiene — in order not to be come inflected with spiritual dizziness, slumbering to sustain fatal injury on the battle field of life.

 

We are reborn or born again in God's nature through the love that He has manifested towards us. Whoever He is that's who we are. We have His DNA running in us. Whatever He hates we hate. The same way love is natural for God, and He loves both His enemies and friends (when it rains, God does not tell the rain not fall on the roofs of the wicked. The same way His children benefit from His general Mercy, favor, and provisions that's how the wicked won't get less rain, sun, moon, or air than the righteous), the same way love is meant to be reproduced in us except if we are not yielded to spiritual growth and personal spiritual hygiene to keep ourselves unspotted from the world system and forms.

 

Fruit bearing is natural to natural plants, no plant is ever forced to bear fruits in any season likewise is fruit of holiness, righteousness to us as children of God. The only hindrance we might experience in this is if we ourselves refuse to grow up steadily into the full image and likeness of sonship in God, to become just as Christ is. The same way growth is critical for fruit bearing in plant kingdom so is our reality in Christ Kingdom. Our fruit bearing is premised on our spiritual growth. Poor spiritual hygiene can shrink our growth. It could hinder us from growing up steadily in the fullness of the Son. There is no way anyone will carry coal of fire in his/she garment that he/she won't be hurt by it. Spiritual infections through poor spiritual hygiene could cause us distorted growth, even though it seems we have grown numerically, we have been in the body of Christ for years, since Adam, we are just dwarf, naive in things of the Faith, Life that we have come to share in God through Christ Jesus our Lord.

 

Apostle John, the beloved, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit admonished us on how we should conduct ourselves to be prevented from the reach of the rebellion man, the man of sin, in keeping ourselves from things that are produced in him (Satan, the prince of this world), same way bacteria are produced by some harmful organisms. According to first John chapter 5 verses 18, he said, "We know that whoever is born of God does not sin; but he who has been born of God keeps himself, and the wicked one does not touch him." Let's read same verse of the Bible in the Passion Translation. It reads, “We are convinced that everyone fathered by God does not make sinning a way of life, because the Son of God protects the child of God, and the Evil One cannot touch him."

 

To keep sinning as a child of God is doing a forbidden thing, it is touching filthy things, despicable things, and abhorrible things. Touching things that we should abhor is equivalent to taking our soundness, healthcare for granted spiritually. Having been committed to the guidance of the Holy Spirit by our chief Shepherd, our advocate, regardless of His love for us, He won't keep the Truth from us, as a matter of fact, He tells us the Truth not for any other sake but for the sake that He loves us. Natural infections due to poor personal hygiene could cause serious abnormalities in natural growth, development, and functionality of a natural child.

 

This is similar to what the Holy Spirit is pointing out to us on the essence of self-denial, daily dying to the flesh, fleeing from all appearance of sin in all its forms or expressions: the pride of life, the lust of the eyes, and the lust of the flesh; if this matter is ever taken lightly in the life of a believer, it will either weaken or hinders his/her spiritual realities even though there is so much he could do or should have done. King David made a confession in the Book of Psalms, He said, "Before I was afflicted [infected] it is because I put my hands to sin [I touched what I shouldn't touched, I was poor in hygiene, not because God hated me]." (Writer’s paraphrased, Psalms 119:67)

 

In the love that the Lord God demonstrates towards us, it speaks in thuswise in Romans chapter 5 verses 8: "but God commends His love to us, in that, we being still sinners, Christ has died for us." This is a reality that nobody can ever reverse again. Not even the Devil himself or sin or religion can make this benevolence of our God towards mankind to malfunction, that He won't love us the same forever, except we have denied the faith and call Jesus accursed, nothing can change the mind of the Father towards us forever that He won't love us the same forever. The Fatherhood in God is an eternal Fatherhood. God didn't learn or borrow to love us. He loves us freely in Himself, in His nature. He was/is not forced to do it; He loves us the same always. It is His eternal Will to do and He won't change His mind.

 

One deception we must never buy or allow ourselves to accept from men nor the Devil is thinking that God loves us more because we are able to stop committing sin. Keep the religious laws and rituals. No, it might sound unreasonable, and a dysfunctional truth, but it is not at all, that is exactly what it is. The same way God is living and there is no turning of shadow with Him, that is what His love is always. It is living and powerful same as the Word. (See Hebrew 4:16.)

 

God is in no way asking us to stop committing sin so he may love us more, no, that is not it. As a matter of fact, there is nothing any of us can do to make God loves us more than He had already loved us. God won't love us less because we sin neither will he love us more because we don't sin. But the fact of it is that, we won't be able to love Him more when we keep sinning. Sin kills our chances of loving God the same, and loving Him more. Meaning, we will become less and less of His fullness, weakened like ordinary men. Prey and plunder like every other man. Diseased like every alike.

 

Our love for God grows when we abhor sin, when we bear fruit, when we walk and work in dominion, living out the life of the nature that we have come to share in Him. The more sinless we become the more love grows in our heart for our father. And the more our characters become like His, and His life and power flow through us. The more we are conformed to his likeness in deeds, speech, and walks, the more of His authority and fullness we exercise.

 

The love that God has shown us from the day He sends His Son Jesus to die for us, has never decreased or declined before. It has remained the same ever since. We can't pull it apart. It is eternal. When will neglect to keep our proper hygiene from sin, to abhor sin, evil, hatred and all the shameful and filthy deeds of the flesh according to Galatians chapter 5 verses 19 to 21, the effects don’t make God to grow less in love for us, nor weaken His Fatherhood and care, not at all? But it has great negative effects on us.

 

When the Devil came to contaminate (or to defile) Jesus in the wilderness tempting Him, Jesus kept Himself from the pollution of the lust and pleasure the devil advertised before Him. He was focused on the Counsel of the Father for His life. The Father won't have rejected Him for eating, neither did His refusal not to eat it made Him more righteous. No, but that He should faithfully be committed to the one that has sent Him in purpose, passion, and will, He won't obey His flesh nor the Devil to defile Himself by the desires and deception of the enemy, the ancient tempter.

 

Jesus kept Himself by the Help of the leading of the Spirit, maintained sound spiritual hygiene till the day that He was lifted up on the pole from the earth. As He is, so are we in this world. It is only when we have perfected obedience, when our own obedience is made complete that we can punish all the disobedience of the powers of darkness both in the day, noon time, and night time. Our power is in our nature, it is not in drinking anything called holy, nor in the laying up of hands. Our authority is in our nature, and healthy hygiene will make us rightly equip at all seasons in Dispensing light and Dominion as kings and priests of the Most High God on the face of the earth.

 

The world may not know us, of course, but our identity is true, it is not they say kind of thing, it is what we are sure of. We have been bestowed our life and authority from on high. Only if we want lesser result of our life, while we walk about malfunctioning as slaves instead of sons, walking head low, then we can take issues of our life spiritual hygiene for granted, and we keep seeking after things for self-aggrandizement.

 

Sir/Ma, nobody as life is concerned has been able to hold unto dividend of sin for so much as beyond this material world. We met sin here, same way all that sin can give or offer will be left at same place we met sin. Stay true to your new nature, the righteous order of life, and stay unspotted from the pollution that is in the world. Spiritual life is meant to be enjoyed right from this earth not just when we have gone home, but a sick person has little things to enjoy, or perhaps, nothing at all to enjoy. No matter how much Christ has made available for us to enjoy, if we refuse to walk in Him, remain in Him, and allow His life to constantly flow through us, we will be deprived of the fullness of the new life we have.

 

Our Father, the Lord Almighty, is not expecting us to do anything as far as this kingdom we have come to share is concerned all by our strength, except we are seeking to break down again. We must be dependent on the Help of His Grace, the Spirit of Grace, to help us through. Until we are ready to be vulnerable in the hand of the great Teacher, the Holy Spirit, we will keep making shipwreck of our lives, and instead of being helped to grow into spiritual giants to legislate against the wicked man and his kingdom, we ourselves will be brought under the control of the elements of this present world, becoming prey to the wicked one, because we won't take spiritual responsibility for our living in maintaining sound spiritual hygiene.

 

Infections have ways of causing distortion in growth and functionality in life of all living organisms. POOR spiritual hygiene could cause permanent malfunctioning in believer’s life even though he/she has been in Church for years. God won't send us packaging from Him but if we refuse to grow up into responsible and profitable sons of the kingdom of our God, we will just be there redundant, benefiting nothing from our New Creature Life.

 

Spiritual hygiene is necessary for you (and I) to grow well, and function according to our order of New Life, as kings and priests of God on the face of the earth. Commissioned to keep it and tend it from the foundation of the earth. We are not ordinary people, we are people of authority, a special breed, a royalty, a people of high honor and Glory. Please, let's never joke with sin, it causes deformity and break down of life, instead, let's constantly grow up in love. We must not look down on ourselves. Abhor sin, and keep your proper place, be hygienic, keep your life unspotted from the pollution that is in the world.

 

You are not a beggar, you are beloved of the Father, a representative of the government of Heaven on the earth. You are a law giver on the face of the earth, be hygienic and keep your confidence in Him tall and sound 27/4, powered by the Spirit of Grace to diffuse His fragrance everywhere you go; No limitations no boundaries!

Thanks for the gift of your time, I am John Ojoagbene!

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