Going back to an earlier post "Call it what it is SIN" I would like to continue with some thoughts on the same strain. 2 Peter 2:19-22 " While they promise them liberty, they themselves are the servants of corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage. 20 For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning. 21 For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them. 22 But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, The dog is turned to his own vomit again, and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire."
I believe this could be a good picture of where today's road to Christian "liberties" is going down. In those verses mentioned above Peter was not talking about those who do not know Christ, but to those who have known him and have turned once again unto the world and the satisfaction of their flesh. Earlier in the chapter God tells us of false teachers and their heresies, then He progresses to how they have entangled the believer with "while they promise them liberty, they themselves are servants of corruption.". They promise liberty, but not in Christ, because these liberties are a bondage, once again unto sin, where the absolute definition of liberty in Christ is to be set free from our bondage of sin. God says that it would be better for us not to have known the way of righteousness then to have known it and turned back to bondage of sin. You see sin doesn't look like a bondage when you are in it. It looks pleasurable, it is pleasurable, it is deceitful because its father, Satan is the Deceiver.
Our liberties in Christ aren't to establish a better life for us here on earth, but are to set us free from the sins of these world and its strangle hold on us, so that we may have something to offer in eternity to Christ who set us free! Satan wants us fixed on now and how we can feel good on earth, he fixes our eyes on today " eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die" that is his mentality. But for a Christian we must set our affections on things above, our joy is in Christ we should be longing to be with Him and to enjoy the treasure with Him in heaven that we have stored up while here on earth. You see our home is not this world, our conversation/citizenship is in heaven with Christ, we are a new creation, aliens to this present world to this present estate. Our lives should be spent like Paul said, to live is Christ but to die is gain. This is our calling as new creatures not old creatures.
When we start coveting what the world has we start slipping into the state that Peter was talking about "they are entangled again therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning.". We forget where we came from, the things that Christ saved us from and we slip into the old nature again. You see the very word "saved" means that we need someone to take us from the old things, it was a drastic state, we were in bondage to those things, why would we go back to the things that wanted to destroy us? Why?
