guarded

Above all else, guard your heart, for it affects everything you do. Proverb 4:23

We live in a world where “anything goes”.

The only thing that doesn't “go” is to ever say or imply that not everything or anything “goes”.

It's kinda odd that that is part of the paradigm – do you sense the irony in that?

It's like saying “there are no absolutes” - but that “there are not absolutes” is an absolute.

Anyway, we live in a world that is a gajillion times more sin soaked that when I was a kid. (& yes, I can remember that far back!!!)

Advertising, politicians, special interest groups, new or radicalized religions, and dozens & dozens of other influences bombard & assault us from every turn.

Think not?

Try this – turn your TV off for a week, don't get on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Netflix, Instagram, or any other social media.

Then jump back in.

Yeah...

We live in a world where anything goes.

And somehow, we have to walk through that world & not succumb to it wiles & Sirens' songs.

Somehow we can't let all of that stuff get into our minds & hearts.

How?

Walk away from it.

Don't listen to it.

Don't look at it.

Don't buy it.

Don't accept it as “just the way it is”.

Don't even consider if what is being said or done is ok.

The longer I live & the more I see, the more I think that there is significant truth in the statement that this world is not our home.

(Check out Hebrews 13:14 or 1 Peter 2:11-12 to get a feel for that thinking.)

Because of who we're hooked up with, because of who we follow, & because of who God is transforming us to be like, we are people who don't “fit in” in a lot of situations & in relation to a lot of current thinking.

That doesn't mean we go around flaunting our uniqueness – like we're better than everyone else.

At the same time, so much of the stuff that's flung at us from every corner is stuff we don't need to absorb.

Perhaps that the operative word for all this – absorb.

We just make the conscious effort to not take in all that is thrown at us.

We just say no to it, every day, without fail.