When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the obligation to do right. And what was the result? You are now ashamed of the things you used to do, things that end in eternal doom. But now you are free from the power of sin and have become slaves of God. Now you do those things that lead to holiness and result in eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 6:20-23 NLT) Most of us have heard that the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life. How many of us have actually read the previous verses? We WERE slaves to sin - having absolutely NO obligation to do right but choosing quite frequently to do whatever it was that gave us satisfaction or a thrill. The result was an overwhelming load of guilt and shame. A burden we weren't designed to carry! Slaves don't really cater to the 'obligation' to more than one master, do they? They serve one, following whatever desires...
Albert Pike said, "We have all the light we need, we just need to put it into practice." We might think we need more of everything, including knowledge, but the sad truth is that many of us don't even use the knowledge we have been given! What is missing is the 'practice' behind that knowledge. God's Word reminds us, "So get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives, and humbly accept the word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls. But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. For if you listen to the word and don’t obey, it is like glancing at your face in a mirror." (James 1:21-23 NLT) We must 'humbly accept' God's word into our lives, doing what it says - putting it into practice, not just gaining knowledge about what he says. Therein is the rub - we read and read, but the words on the pages of the book just don't seem to draw us into c...