Self Denial by Jobin Daniel
“God saw all that he had made, and it was very good…” - Genesis 1:31
God made everything in this world. So then why abstain from it. When God made the heavens and the earth, he looked at all of it and said it was good and was pleasing to his sight. “God saw all that he had made, and it was very good…” - Genesis 1:31. Jesus in the New Testament told his disciples “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me..” - Matthew 16:24.
As Christians, our desires comes from what we see in this world. But it is God himself who created everything, so why is God asking us to give that up? When sin crept into our lives. The enemy found a way to turn every good thing into a bad thing. He perverted the sacred. He turned self-respect to pride. Love to lust, knowledge into arrogance.
When we are living in this world, it is very easy to give more importance to the blessings that the one who blesses. And also equally as easy to pervert the blessings. If God blesses us with money, we will likely be overly attached to it and eventually forget about God. Financial blessings, and material blessings can come from God, but because of our nature, we put all those things as an idol over God. This is why God calls us to deny the worldly pleasures and let God himself be the only source of joy. Following God will mean for us to give up all those things that we placed above God.