Spiritual Transitions from Scotch Tape to the Gospel

As many of you know, this is where we try to do our Spiritual Transition Game before each one of our

Striving for Eternity Academy classes. The Spiritual Transition Game is where we're training ourselves to transition from the natural to the spiritual.

So when we're sharing with individuals about any topic, we're training ourselves to be able to get into gospel conversations or spiritual conversations.

The topic that was given for me to transition to today is

Scotch Tape. Now, how would you transition from Scotch Tape to the gospel?

Well, there's actually a couple of different ways I'm thinking of it. But unfortunately, the thing that's come into my mind, as horrible as the thought of this is,

I just can't help it. Because I was watching America's Funniest Videos, and one of the videos was kind of where they took some...

Well, you know, you just hate guys that actually are dumb enough to video this. But a guy that was letting his...

a woman, maybe his wife, remove his chest hair. And so they put some chemical on it and stuck this

Scotch Tape and just kind of put layers of it on and just ripped it right off.

I don't know if the hair came off, but he definitely came out of his chair and was falling on the ground, kicking his legs.

It was very funny to see. But the idea is that it's probably not what

Scotch Tape was designed for. But you see, that's what people tend to do.

They try to make one thing fit a solution for everything, don't they?

They want to take Scotch Tape and make it the answer for everything. I mean, some people are going to use it for hair removal.

Yikes! Some people put it on their eyebrows and rip those hairs off, maybe.

I don't know. Some people actually use it for what it's meant for, like taping two pieces of paper back together.

Or you rip something and you want to tape it back. But the reality is that a lot of people use things like Scotch Tape for things it's not meant for.

You know, that is exactly the problem that many people have with religions because they use works like Scotch Tape incorrectly.

Do you know that God commands us to do good works? But the problem is,

He doesn't command us to do good works to earn righteousness. No, He tells us after we have been given righteousness, then we do good works.

Those good works are after we're already in a right state with God. But many people use works incorrectly because they try to use works to earn righteousness.

And good works do not earn righteousness. In fact, when someone argues for good works, it is one of the most disgusting things to God because they're saying, here's

God who came to earth, died on a cross. Almighty God, Eternal God, dying on a cross for a payment for sin.

And someone's going, ah, but look Lord, I walked an old lady across the street. Really?

You think that the good works that you do aren't any comparison to the good work that God did?

No comparison. It's even more disgusting than the picture of putting Scotch Tape on your chest hair and ripping it off.

As disgusting as that thought is, someone trying to offer their good works to God in place of the work that God did is even more disgusting.

That's why in Isaiah it says that God looks at your good works like filthy rags.

That's how wicked God sees it. That's how we're going to transition that one.