"Serious sport has nothing to do with fair play…it is war minus the shooting."
No distractions
Just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live your lives in him. Colossians 2:6One of Stephen Covey’s quotable quotes is: “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing”. When Paul wrote to the Colossians one of his concerns was that they were allowing themselves to be distracted from the main thing.
The main thing is that the gospel is believing that Jesus has died for my sins, accepting his forgiveness and knowing that I will be with him forever. It is about what Jesus has done, not what I am trying to do. It is by faith in his grace.
For those of us who have a strong faith, we are unlikely to give it up or fall away. Therefore our greatest danger is being distracted from the main thing. In Colossians 2, Paul warns the Colossian Christians, not of the danger of giving up their faith, but of being distracted from the main thing.
The first distraction was religious observance:
Therefore do not let anyone judge you by what you eat or drink, or with regard to a religious festival, a New Moon celebration or a Sabbath day. Colossians 2:16 Sometimes Christians get really uptight about Sunday observance, drinking wine or not drinking wine. Paul would say that theses are secondary issues.
The second distraction was religious experience. People who had had visions, special revelations, words of knowledge, spoke in tongues etc thought they were more special than others. And these experiences were a distraction from the main thing.
The third distraction was observing religious rules: “Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!” Colossians 2:21.
As Christians we love to add rules on to grace. You cannot be a Christian if you do A or B. You cannot be a proper Christian unless you do C and D.
The error of the three distractions is that they all miss the point that Jesus has done it all for us – his death is sufficient.
Are there any things which are distracting you from simple faith in Jesus?