Perils of Isolationism

"A man who isolates himself seeks his own desire; He rages against all wise judgment.

A fool has no delight in understanding, But in expressing his own heart." (Prov 18:1-2)

Our heart - we are told by society to "follow our hearts". It is a common theme. Even Christians sometimes rationalize decisions as a "burning of the heart".

The Lord is really illuminating the wisdom of Jer 17:9, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?". This verse really struck me because the world and even the church at times asks us to follow our heart and our desires.

The verses in Proverbs however, shows the foolish effects of doing exactly that type of thing. When a man pulls back from the body and isolates themselves they are primarily stewing in their own intellect and their own ideas of the world. God's Word becomes less and less meaningful and is supplanted by that man's sin nature because unless we work to maintain our faith, our faith will atrophy and backslide. Left unchecked, it will lead to apostasy.

Sin is sometimes (but not necessarily) a key part of this trend. One of my favorite Christian singer-songwriters abruptly left the industry several years ago to my great dismay. I loved her voice, her music and her songs. After effectively disappearing, she has recently resurfaced with a brand new non-Christian album. The reason for this is because she has been in a same sex relationship and has been living isolated from the church. Essentially, she didn't want to follow the scriptures against homosexuality and ceased fighting against this sin. She mentioned that life is better now because she no longer considers homosexuality a sin to be struggled against. She no longer sings most of her old songs - songs which were about Jesus and redemption. In her case, the desires of her heart were more important than following scripture and she has isolated herself from the church and from any contrary advice to her personal opinion.

That is precisely why we need to have the body of Christ. The Word of God is not convenient. It isn't something that is easy to follow and that is precisely why Jesus said that "narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it" (Mt 7:14) Our sin nature rails against the Word. Speaking personally as a man, left unchecked my own desire to fornicate would run rampant. As men, we are tasked to rein in our physical desires by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is not impossible because men do it everyday.

The job of Scripture is to convict us. It is supposed to hurt. Hebrews 4:12 likens Scripture to surgery - it is living and active, sharper than any doubled edged sword it penetrates to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow, it judges the attitudes and thoughts of the heart. The Word judges us and helps us to see our areas of improvement. It humbles us, but at the same time it strengthens us to become better, living a life of goodness.

We are not to run away from the conviction of God. Yes, we might feel bad and it might be difficult to overcome the specific sin that we are prone to commit, but if we isolate ourselves we are only headed down the path of ultimate destruction. We may feel good that the weight of the struggle is done, but we are no longer walking with the Lord. We will turn to find that we are only walking with ourselves - the voices of wisdom from the Lord have been shut out.

There is one perspective shift that is necessary to make however, and personally I realize that it is quite useful. Traditionally, it has been the church's position that we need to focus on the fight against sin, but I think that makes it a negative thought process. It makes it seems as if we are missing out on something. Instead - I believe we are called to walk in God's path. We must choose to forego sin and to follow Him. We are no longer losing the chance to sin, but we are replacing those actions with righteous behavior and the goodness of the Lord's ways. We have not lost, but we have replaced.

Lord Jesus, I never really knew how twisted our thinking is in our modern world. We stand in direct opposition to You because we desire the easy route where we no longer fight our sin natures, but instead cave in to our personal desires. Sometimes it is a struggle, but let us not consume ourselves with our sins, but instead choose to walk in obedience to You. Let us fill our minds with thoughts of goodness and righteousness and let our behaviors match that intention. Help me to replace any sinful desires with Your good ways. In Jesus' name, AMEN.