God in the Bedroom
“Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.” Romans 6:12-13
“I don’t want God in my bedroom,” a man told me once. He believed in Jesus Christ and called himself a Christian. But he was emphatic that he only wanted to give God entrance into some areas of his life. The bedroom was definitively out of bounds. Maybe you can relate to this man. Maybe not. But before you jump too quickly to saying you cannot, and that you’re perfectly okay with God being in your bedroom, ask yourself this. Are there ANY areas of your life, any rooms in your house so to speak, any places in your heart, mind, and actions, any days and hours in your calendar, anything at all, in which you have hung up the sign when it comes to God that says, DO NOT ENTER? How quick I was to judge the man who didn’t want God in his bedroom. It took God’s Spirit to convict me and lead me to repentance some years later concerning where I myself had hung up the DO NOT ENTER sign. There were multiple areas, in fact, but the most prominent was my heart! How quickly I would have declared to anyone that I believed in Jesus Christ as Lord. How tragically, and sinfully, I had my arms crossed over my chest barring God’s Spirit from my heart – the place I most needed Him and for Him to set me free!
Some of us are walking around our lives professing to believe in God, calling Jesus our Lord, all the while refusing to genuinely, consistently, submissively, thankfully, humbly yield our whole hearts and lives to the Lord. The man who said he didn’t want God in his bedroom was mired in sexual immorality, refusing to repent, and cleaving to his wickedness. I didn’t want God to have free entrance into and reign in my heart because I had been sexually abused as a child and was afraid I would be violated if I let anyone – even God – into the place where I was most vulnerable. My broken heart. Little did I realize in my pride how despicably ridden I was with my own wickedness! I needed to repent! And still do – daily!
I believe we all have areas of our lives in which we need to do a whole lot more yielding to the lordship, the will and ways, of God almighty. Some of us haven’t repented and given our lives to Him at all. Some of us have given parts of our lives but are vehemently, rebelliously holding back others. And some of us who believe we’ve totally surrendered to Christ need to humble ourselves and confess we all as humans have more yielding to do as God by His Spirit through His Word conforms us to Christ.
Time to get honest, isn’t it? Yield to Him, oh yield!