Sin Is Crouching at the Door in All of Our Lives

1/5/2007

We have spoken of Adam, and Jacob mentioned Cain and Abel. They were the first Family of God, true? Do you remember that God said to Cain, “Sin is crouching at your door”? Do you remember that?

What if Cain and Abel had fifteen brothers and sisters around them? It’s not a surprise when sin is crouching at the door because satan is alive. But the shame and disappointment is that Cain didn’t have fifteen brothers and sisters around him to tell him that sin was crouching at the door. Cain didn’t have five hundred brothers and sisters around him who loved him enough to see when sin was crouching at the door. If Cain had had older brothers and sisters who knew him very well, they would’ve seen that sin because of his attitudes. A loving big brother or sister of Cain who saw sin crouching at the door by his attitudes would have tackled him before he killed Abel.

If we live like the Family of God, as brothers and sisters, we will see when sin is crouching at the door in our other brothers and sisters. If we only come to meetings and then live our separate lives in our little homes, we’ll never notice when our brothers and sisters are in danger. We must decide to put into practice the Word of God and engage in each other’s lives. We do this by deciding to go to the market together rather than alone. We decide to be involved in each other’s homes, and in the fixing of houses or other projects. We have to decide to call brothers or go to brothers’ houses and get engaged. We must put into practice the Word of God. Abel died because sin was crouching at the door, and no one stopped Cain before it happened.

Let’s talk about something very practical. I want to ask you a couple of questions. Do you ladies know all of these children very very well? Or do you only know the one or two that are yours? Do you men know all of these children and what their struggles are? Do you know their eyes, their hearts and their attitudes? Are these all of your children, or do they each just belong to one or two of you? If you just go to meetings, then it won’t be a hundred mothers, brothers, sisters, and children. It will just be attending a meeting.

If you don’t know all of these beautiful children, then you won’t be able to help them very much. If you don’t know your own children, you won’t be able to help them very much. Sin is crouching at the door in all of our lives. If we don’t surround each other and love each other every day in our practical lives, sin will win many victories. But if we know each other as we should know our own children…and we know others’ children as our own—because they are—then we can help push back and defeat satan.

All the talking about it in the world won’t help our children. And it won’t help us as a Family unless we do something about it. That means each of us needs to take the time to know these children and know what’s important to them and what’s difficult for them. All of you, please look at these children right now. I’m serious, look! Do you know their hearts and what makes them happy and sad and which sins are crouching at the door? Do you love them all and know them all as your own? Because you should!!

Where we live, we know many, many children as if they are our own. We know their names and their struggles. We know what makes them happy and what’s special for them. We know what their temptations are and which sins are crouching at the door. We know many, many children with the intimacy of a father and a mother. But that didn’t happen by going to meetings and talking about it.

•  Sin is Crouching at the Door in All of Our Lives