In all of my life, I have yet to stumble across a person’s yard without seeing weeds. The fact is, weeds are a part of life. But they haven’t always been. Before the fall of mankind, there was no existence of any types of weeds in the ground. It wasn’t until Adam and Eve disobeyed God that weeds began to sprout up. The Bible called these types of weeds thorns and thistles.
To Adam he said, “Because you listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which I commanded you, ‘You must not eat from it,’ “Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat food from it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field” (Genesis 3:17-19 NIV).
Notice how these thorns and thistles came about in their life. God had explicitly commanded them not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, and they did it anyway. Why on earth would they deliberately do something God told them not to do? That’s a great question.
The Lust of the Flesh, the Lust of the Eyes, and the Pride of Life
So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate (Genesis 3:6).
1 John states that everything the world offers can be placed into three categories: The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.
The Lust of the Flesh
The lust of the flesh deals with desirable things to satisfy our flesh. Eve saw that the tree was “good for food.” In other words, it could fulfill what her body was craving or wanting. Sometimes, we think a certain pill or a one-night stand will satisfy our flesh. It might work for a moment, but eventually, you’ll have to satisfy it again.
Every time you are hungry, your body is lusting to fulfill what it’s missing: food. When Jesus was in the wilderness for forty days, Satan came to tempt Him with bread. Satisfying our flesh isn’t always a sin, but all sin is designed to satisfy our flesh. Eating because you’re hungry isn’t a sin. But becoming a glutton is intended to keep satisfying your flesh until you become unhealthy.
The Lust of the Eyes
The lust of the eyes has to do with what’s pleasant to our sight. Things that we lust after. In Matthew chapter 6, Jesus said that the eyes are like the lamp to the body. We can’t make sound judgments if our vision is skewed or blurry.
Notice how Genesis describes Eve, seeing that the tree was “pleasant to the eyes.” These things are very deceptive devices that the enemy uses to take our attention off of what’s good for us. In a real practical example, pornography can draw someone’s attention by what it displays on that screen.
King David was enticed to have an affair with Uriah’s wife, Bath-sheba, because he saw her bathing from his rooftop. He was drawn away from what he could see.
The Pride of Life
And finally, the pride of life. This specifically deals with one’s status. Eve saw that the fruit could “make one wise.” The desire to be more wise was at play.
These are the reasons why thorns and thistles–weeds–exist. Although Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us (Galatians 3:13), every time we are distracted by the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, or the pride of life, we are allowing weeds to enter into our ground.
Now these are the ones sown among thorns; they are the ones who hear the word, and the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things entering in choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful (Mark 4:18-19).
These thorns are designed to choke any fruit in your life. The devil doesn’t want you to make a difference in this life, so he’ll try to get you as distracted as anyone else living a mundane life. But here is the key to overcoming life's challenges.
We must acknowledge that dealing with life's challenges (weeds) is inevitable. It's important to find a healthy balance between work, family, relaxation, and the Word, although this balance will naturally shift as we go through different stages of life.
The best way to maintain your yard and remove weeds is by constantly surveilling the ground and uprooting weeds when you notice them. If you wait, sooner or later, they will overwhelm you.
Similarly, with the weeds in our lives, the only way to maintain the proper balance is to maintain a vibrant relationship with the Lord. Constantly be in the garden with Him, and He will reveal to us whenever we become too focused on something other than Him.
Live in the victory, my friend.
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