Christian Living

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Have you ever watched a show like Law and Order or CSI where the child abuser gets out of jail after serving their time only to be assaulted by an angry mob in their neighborhood.

And I’m thinking “he paid his debt to society so leave him alone already.” So why does the mob come after the sex offender, why aren’t they satisfied that he did his time? (As a dad I know why, but I’m trying to ask this objectively).

Here’s why (I think).

Because jail punishes the offender, but does not change his heart. He’s done his time, paid the debt he owed for his crime, but that does not mean he will not do it again once out of jail. Thus the mistrust. So what can be done? I don’t know, but I’m sure smarter people than me have wrestled with this quandary.

Of course, as believers in an enormously smart God, we know the answer (because He told us). God changes the heart. And until the heart is changed no person will ever get out of jail and be safe from the mob.

The theological term for this is “regeneration”, and I know of no other verse that illustrates better the spiritual surgery that God performs on us than in Ezekiel 36:25b-26.

“…I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you. I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” (NIV)

And until this happens, which can only be done by the criminal accepting the free gift that God offers to everyone in His Son, Jesus Christ…until God replaces your wicked heart with a brand new one…the mob is waiting.

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