Reaping What is Sown

​Wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same excess of riot, speaking evil of you:  Who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead. 1Pe 4:4,5

These verses hold some valuable wisdom that needs to be unpacked. When we do, we will come away encouraged, and strengthened, to go on with God, and leave those who like to go from house to house, causing trouble, and "riot" in the streets.

1. They do not appreciate the motives which influence those who leave them. They feel that it is proper to enjoy the world, and to make life cheerful, and they do not understand what it is to act under a deep sense of responsibility to God, and with reference to eternity. They live for themselves. They seek happiness as the end and aim of life. They have never been accustomed to direct the mind outside of themselves, to another world, and to the account which they must soon render at the Judgment seat of God. Unaccustomed to act from any higher motives than those which pertain to the present world, they cannot appreciate the conduct of those who begin to live and act for eternity.

2. They do not see the folly of sinful pleasures. They are not convinced of the sinfulness of the human soul, and they think it strange that you should abandon a course of life which seems to them so absurd.
 
3.They do not see the force of the argument for walking with God. Not having the understanding of the  importance of the truth and duty that Christians now have, they wonder that you should break off from the pleasures and gaiety of the world, and separate from the mass of their fellow-men. They look at the conduct of Christians as a form of weakness; sometimes as superstition; sometimes as sheer folly; sometimes as madness. They can't comprehend the separation, because they are still in love with the world, while you have set your gaze on the things above, and left them behind, and the world.

4. Their conduct reveals their wicked hearts. Their lives are lived in all excess, meaning, all forms of disorder, troublemaking, mischief with no restraint. They gather others like themselves, to run the streets, in their reckless, meaningless abandon. They target those who live in peace, making them their objects of sport. They like doing much of their trouble in the night hours, but when they run in mass-any hour of the day, they can be seen running the streets and looking for trouble.

These rioters will gather in houses, because they are also busybodies, and will persecute and gossip about the Christian who won't join them, and have shunned their behavior. You'll be called all manner of insults and foul profanity. You will be accused of pride, hypocrisy, every evil thing they can contrive. They'll use every excuse, and twist the truth to paint you as an evil doer. If you won't join with them, they will work to destroy you, and gather other's to help them in doing it.

This is where spiritual warfare-knowing how to pray for the aid and strength to stand against this, is the direction to take. Learn to stand your ground, and gain the spiritual strength to walk on with God, and strengthen your spirit against the evil coming from them.

Peter goes on to describe these types further:
2Pe 2:12  But these, as natural brute beasts, made to be taken and destroyed, speak evil of the things that they understand not; and shall utterly perish in their own corruption; 
2Pe 2:13  And shall receive the reward of unrighteousness, as they that count it pleasure to riot in the day time. Spots they are and blemishes, sporting themselves with their own deceiving's while they feast with you; 
2Pe 2:14  Having eyes full of adultery, and that cannot cease from sin; beguiling unstable souls: an heart they have exercised with covetous practices; cursed children: 

These people resemble irrational animals which are made to be taken and destroyed. They are like fierce and savage beasts that exercise no control over their appetites, and seem to be made only to be destroyed. These have  fierce and ungovernable passions, headed for destruction, and rush blindly on to it. They exercised no more restraint over their passions than beasts do over their conduct. Their children are taught to behave the same-and grow to be another generation of beasts, like themselves.

Man has reason, and should allow it to control his passions; the brutes have no rational nature,  they will act out their emotions and conduct without restraint. If a man sinks himself to the level of brutes, he must expect to be treated like brutes; and as wild and savage animals.

Paul adds to what Peter teaches, and what their future holds:
Gal 6:7  Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. 
Gal 6:8  For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. 

Paul's reference here teaches that those who live in the flesh and indulgence, will reap the consequences through the passage of time. Time-is used by God, to produce the reaping harvest the soul has produced; whether it be good, or bad.

The punishment of licentiousness and intemperance in this life commonly produces a loathsome and offensive disease; and when long indulged, the sensualist becomes haggard, and bloated, and corrupted, and sinks into the grave. Such, also, is often the punishment of luxurious living, of a pampered appetite, of gluttony, as well as of the drug addict, or drunkard. But if the punishment does not follow in this life, it will be sure to overtake the sensualist in the world to come. There he shall reap ruin, final and everlasting.

(1) By disease. When I cared for the elderly, there were many who had lived the wild life of drink and excess-who could no longer even turn over in bed, and disease racked their bodies.
(2) In the grave - the home to which the sensualist rapidly travels.
(3) In the world of woe-hell, where there will be no end of punishment, the reaping will be for eternity.

There all shall be corrupt. His virtue - even the semblance of virtue, shall all be gone. His understanding, will, fancy - his whole soul shall be debased and corrupt. No virtue will linger and live on the plains of ruin, but all shall be depravity and woe. Everything in hell is debased and corrupt; and the whole harvest of sensuality in this world and the world to come, is degradation and defilement.

In summary-if you find yourself in the midst of this kind of rioters, and troublemakers, let the word of God give you comfort. Their end is sure, and God knows those who belong to Him. His eyes are on the righteous, and will be their shield and buckler. One day, all will reap what they have sown.
Lorna Couillard