What's the Point?

On Saturday morning, I barely noticed that the cuticle on my right pointer finger was starting to hurt. I went about my busy day and didn't pay much attention to the fact that the pain was increasing. By Saturday night, I noticed that my cuticle was starting to swell so I put some neosporin on it. I also noticed a slight pain in my right armpit. Again, nothing about this threw up any red flags ... until I woke Sunday morning. By then, my cuticle was swollen, red, white, and very painful. My right armpit was also in a significant amount of pain. By pain, I mean, my finger and armpit hurt really, really bad, but let's face it, I've given birth three times so when compared to those events, the pain was minimal. So, I put neosporin and a band-aid on and we went to church. I ran into a friend at church, who just happens to be a nurse, so I showed her my finger. She confirmed that it needed to be looked at and that the pain in my armpit was more than likely a sign that the infection had spread from my finger to the lymph nodes in my armpit. Good grief!

So, I went to the doctor this morning. By the time I got to my appointment, the pain had increased and I had a low grade fever. Because there was no visible wound on my cuticle (except what was caused by the infection), he said that it was more than likely something as small as a superficial paper cut that happened to get infected. Just my luck! I was prescribed an antibiotic and told to soak my finger in a cup of hot water multiple times a day to help draw the blood to my finger tip to fight the infection. Again, good grief!

For those of you that just have to see a picture, here you go...

So, this leads me to the title of this blog. What's the point? What lesson can I learn from this? Then it hit me, this tiny spot on my finger that caused so much pain to my body, is like the sin in our lives. Often times, we commit the tiniest of sins and we think that we "get away with them" because we see no immediate punishment. However, over time, the tiny sin is slowly doing damage to our bodies as a whole. It starts to grow, it takes over, it leads to more sin. Just like the barely noticeable pain in my finger that led to an obvious infection and eventually caused pain in other areas of my body. That's how sin works. It's sneaky. It comes on when you least expect it and it slowly spreads. By sin, I'm talking about a multitude of things such as, alcohol abuse, cheating, lying, idolizing possessions, money, etc. Sin can come in all shapes and sizes and it's often times unnoticed or unrealized until it becomes a problem.

What tiny sins are you committing in your life that need to be changed? What big sins are you committing that need to be changed? Think about it. You can even can ask God to reveal your sins to you, but be ready to open your heart to change if you do. Once a sin is revealed then work on fixing it. If multiple sins are revealed then choose one. Fix one at a time. For the record, this post is just as much for me as it is for whoever out there is struggling with something and is intended to read this. I hope that you were blessed by this message (minus the gross picture of my finger).

I leave you with this good news...

Romans 3:22-24 - "This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all (that's you and me) have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all (that's also you and me) are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus."