My Grandpa on my Mom's side of the family, worked for his brother's bakery ...doing deliveries.

As the story goes, as a traveler was passing through town ...he stopped at the bakery.  Within a friendly business, conversations usually ensue ...covering basic information like where they are from and how they happened by this small town. 

All this information was not shared with me by Mom, though the baker, her Uncle Paul, likely got a very interesting and more complete story ...inclusive of the fact, that the traveler was broke. 

I am going to tell the story, from this point on, not as I would of a distant relative, but as Mom told it ...of her Uncle Paul.

Uncle Paul gave him some money to help the traveler out, and to show his gratitude the traveler gave the baker a secret recipe for doughnuts.

Every morning, from that day forward, Uncle Paul would leave home with the secret ingredient mix and take it to the bakery. And everyone always said they had never tasted a better doughnut.

Dad and Mom still live in that little community of 3,500 people ...that had begun as a mining town, mining a high grade of iron ore.  And my parents still contend that no doughnut has ever come close to what was made in Uncle Paul's bakery.

In the Book of Psalms, we read, "Taste and see that the LORD is good."

God does not keep it secret who He is ...and we are all supposed to be delivery persons.

But often we try to make our own batch, and we leave out important ingredients.  The Lord is surely good ...and it is His character we are to nourish ourselves with..

We need to stop mixing our own.  Or perhaps we glaze over the truth ...or try to cover it with too much frosting.

Perhaps we didn't knead enough ...or truly feel we need to believe.

If we either don't believe, or feel we don't need Him ...then we cut ourselves off from our source of wisdom and understanding. We then can claim only of our knowledge, and the knowledge of others we look to ...but in not looking to God, we separate ourselves.  Separation from God is not wise, not only because it is sin ...because we know Jesus gave Himself for us, to forgive us of our sin.  We know we all sin ...and we know we are not saved by works, therefore nor would we be condemned by works. 

The slippery slope comes in ...more like a steep cliff with jagged rocks below. We all can fall ...and we can all sin. The way we often view sin, hurts us and hurts others too.

We often view two absolute truths ...like standing on two solid rock foundations.  We stand on solid ground with one issue, and across a huge steep chasm, a gulf breaching our understanding ...is someone else standing solid on another issue.

What is ignored, is what has been done for us ...perhaps not seeing what is between.  There is a bridge.  

Sometimes we try to step out where there is no bridge.

Or we immediately turn to go the other way ...not acknowledging the other side at all.

Many people believe there is actually two sides, but there is not. Speaking of the absolute truth of something, there is only one truth.  What we actually look at is a mirror ...and we see half of the way, and the other half is what is reflected back to where we stand.  In essence, we see what we want to see.

Many of us don't want to look at how we reflect, so we turn around.

Many people believe the bridge is built by compromise and committee.

But the bridge is Jesus ...constructed of His character.

The two solid grounds of God's character is His love and His righteousness.

Some people stand solid on God's love, but ignore His righteousness.  And some people stand on the other side of righteousness, forgetting how to walk in love.

A woman was about to be stoned when that bridge I mentioned appeared.  She likely didn't even know of what was going to save her, but Jesus suspended everything by saying, "He who is without sin cast the first stone."

With all the righteous demands, they couldn't face true righteousness.  And in being saved from certain death by true love, the woman knew she needed to accept the love by responding in a righteous way of repentance ...as Jesus told her, "Go, and sin no more."

And it'd be a good guess to think that she knew Jesus may not be standing there ...if she ignored the advice, and allowed another time.  I imagine she happily took the advice of Jesus.

There is a much bigger danger that we don't see.  And that is, we don't really see clearly what often happens when sin goes on ...unchecked, and without consequences.

What actually happens is ...that the sin is ignored, rationalized, denied, or covered over.  There can be a diversion ...pointing the accusing finger elsewhere.  And it's like a very prolific weed, growing quickly while unattended ...and other weeds appear.

We often look at sin from the perspective that we are forgiven of sin, but we are not immune to it.  It can breed rapidly, and there are many mutations ...some of which grow unnoticed.  Our sight can be blinded so we can't clearly see God's leading ...and it robs us of the wisdom that we can only have by coming to God in repentance.

It is good for a homeowner to forgive a thief for robbing his home, but what benefit has the thief gained if he accepts the forgiveness as he leaves with the money and jewelry.

The only thing the thief would gain is the money and jewelry ...and whatever false comfort he obtains from thinking perhaps he wasn't caught.

He deceives himself if he believes it is of no effect.

The more we refuse to acknowledge sin as sin ...we can become just like those whom we would have stood against, perhaps not investing our denial in the same area ...but robbing our spiritual account to make a payment for a debt of sin that cannot be met by turning away from Him who has already died on our account.  

When sin enters in, it does no good to deny we are infected ...we need to deal with it, not spread the virus.

Spread His Word ...

It's no secret.