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When Jesus was asked to identify the greatest commandment, He said it was to "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength." (Mark 12:30). God wants ALL of our love - He has no desire to share our love with any of the little "gods" of this world. "For the Lord your God is a jealous God." (Deuteronomy 4:24).

We are called to live Holy lives: "But just as He who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do." (1 Peter 1:15). This means that our love must be purely set on the things of God - not focused on the things of this world. If we allow our love for the "Godly" to mix with our love for the "ungodly," the ungodly love will eventually overtake us.

James 3:11-12
"Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? My brothers, can a fig tree bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Neither can a salt spring produce fresh water."

Are we trying to walk on both sides of the fence? Do we maintain our "Godly" activities along side our "ungodly" activities? Do we praise God and discuss deep theology during certain portions of the week and then lust after the world during the other? If so, beware! The ungodly will soon overtake and totally consume the Godly - and we won't even be aware it's happening.

The good news is that we have been given the Holy Spirit as the Great Purifier. If we listen very carefully, He will "guide us into all truth." (John 16:13). If we are obedient to His leading, He will strain, sift, distill, and refine until all that remains is the fresh and the pure.

Purity does not come by separation from the world - it comes as our heart is wholly separated unto God. We have been planted amongst the weeds of the world and we will remain among the weeds until the day of harvest (Matthew 13:24-30). But while we must live and minister among the things of this world, we must "not love the world or anything in the world." (1 John 2:15).

Jesus has made us into a new vessel and asked that we fill this vessel with what is pure and Holy. Let's stop mixing fresh water and salt water - Godly and ungodly. Let's commit every area of our life to God and maintain a vessel of purity.

Copyright 2001, Steve Troxel. All Rights Reserved. Used by permission.

About Steve Troxel: Steve Troxel is the President of God's Daily Word Ministries. Steve was trained as an Electrical Engineer and received his PhD in 1994. After working as a researcher in a laser laboratory for several years, Steve felt the call from God to leave his trained profession and enter into full-time ministry. His devotionals are now sent around the world via email as well as distributed in book format. More information about this ministry as will as a "sign-up" page can be found at: http://www.godsdailyword.org

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