Spiritual Responsibilities Placed as Last

It is a method of Satan and of the world, to sway us from the responsibilities of the spiritual path of righteousness and truth of God. This method is called "lust of things". To lust (tempted) by sexuality, money, worldly importance or status, worldly opportunity, yea even by pride. This also exists in its opposite. Where lust of things exist through the (carnal) fear of loss, even in fear of need to defend, causing the person to react to the fear in order to "gain something", or keep from loosing something. All of which are temporal things, mostly relating to money. This is placing worldly things as first and God last.

This method pulls the Christian Saint away to choose "outward" temporal, carnal, sensual things over inward spiritual things. For all goodness and truth must emanate from within our hearts and minds for it to be spiritually good. This is why it the phrase -"lust of things" is used, as lust pulls away our hearts and minds from God.

When this method succeeds, through the free choice of the Saint, he/she will find they make corrupt & wicked choices, and as such, things will go wrong in his/her life. The Spirit of the Lord will leave him/her, and all previously attained blessings will leave. For the blessings to remain with us requires the support of the Lord’s Spirit.

Things go wrong because people cast responsibilities aside for the allure of the lust or for the cause and benefit of carnal fear, even though people do not consciously think of it that way. When we cast aside responsibilities, we loose sight of them and loose the spiritual good focus gained from them. As the Lord says, we are to have him foremost in our minds and hearts (the first commandment). His percepts, ways, commandments, prompting, guidance, sayings, and patterns, all exercise spiritual responsibilities of goodness and truth. In addition, these spiritual responsibilities are life itself, it is what brings us balance, peace, direction, stability, and prepares and sustains us for salvation, while keeping us sure and true during affliction and storms.

When we cause our spiritual and righteous responsibilities to be last or place them aside (no matter the reason), that is when we loose control of ourselves. We also loose a spiritual connection to the Holy Ghost, causing an inner door to open to sin, transgression, iniquities, strife, which leads to a fall from the priesthood of the Lord. By loosing self-control, this inner door becomes wide open for Satan to enter and gain control or greater influence.

These spiritual responsibilities are what keep us on the path to salvation, and allow us to gain protection from the temptations of the world and from dark subtleties used by the world and the father of all lies, Satan.

Placing our spiritual responsibilities as primary, is the same as placing the Lord first. This is because our spiritual responsibilities are of the Lord, and glorify the Lord because they are of him. That is worship in accordance to the Lord's first commandment.

Amen
Mark Warbinek