The Comfort Trap

'One person dies in prosperity,
completely comfortable and secure,
the picture of good health, vigorous and fit.
Another person dies in bitter poverty,
never having tasted the good life.
But both are buried in the same dust,
both eaten by the same maggots.'
Job 21:23-26

One of my favorite music groups of all time is a little-known group, House of Heroes.  I had them in for a fundraising concert several years ago.  Early in the show, they performed one of my favorite songs; The Comfort Trap.  Here are just a few words from that song:

I'm gonna get nice things and get my way
Even if it means there's hell to pay
I'm gonna have my cake and eat it too
And what I don't eat I'm gonna force feed you
I'm not looking for consolation
Maybe I can settle for compensation
Have my cake and eat it too
And if it's all a lie, I'm gonna say it's all true

It seems to be a universal state of our world that if what we think is a lie but comfortable we will say it's true.  Truth has become relative.  This has infiltrated the church.  Seeing truth as real is not comfortable.

We have strife and struggle in our lives, and our prayers are ineffective.

We wonder why?

We believe that we are beyond what the Word says, and we must look to interpret the Word in a way that meets our need, but it doesn't.

And we still wonder why?

We water down the Gospel to make it more palatable to the people, but in reality, all we are doing is harming ourselves.

We wonder why?

People stop coming to church.  They see and know our hypocrisy.

And we wonder why?

Truth is truth and lies will never be the truth.  The Lord says of people who replace the reality of who He is with a lie: "'The poor, deluded fool feeds on ashes. He trusts something that can’t help him at all. Yet he cannot bring himself to ask, “Is this idol that I’m holding in my hand a lie?”'(Isaiah 44:20)  We make God comfortable.  Even in the church, we have become like Judah.  We have created an idol.  Only our idol isn't a piece of wood.  Our idol is a form of God, but a god we can grasp and control.  This god isn't God at all.  This god is the god of comfort.  The god of comfort provides the same result for those who are comfortable and those who are not. (Job 21:23-26)

Comfort is a god of lies.  Comfort promises much but delivers nothing but "the same maggots."  We must not change the truth of God into a lie that makes us comfortable.

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