Tolls

Then a dispute arose among them as to which of them would be greatest. And Jesus, perceiving the thought of their heart, took a little child and set him by Him, and said to them, “Whoever receives this little child in My name receives Me; and whoever receives Me receives Him who sent Me. For he who is least among you all will be great.”

Now John answered and said, “Master, we saw someone casting out demons in Your name, and we forbade him because he does not follow with us.”

But Jesus said to him, “Do not forbid him, for he who is not against us is on our side.”

(Luke 9:46-50)

Doing evil so that good may come is like paying a toll to the devil and expecting him to let you into Heaven.

Preventative sin is a myth. Indulging in a “small” sin in order to avoid a “greater” sin leads to a false sense of holiness. Committing a “small” sin makes us just as much a sinner as committing a “great” sin (James 2:10-13). In 1 Samuel 24, David, who had already been anointed king, refused to harm Saul who was seeking to kill him. Even though God had declared it was good for David to become king, he refused to pay the toll of killings God’s anointed to make that happen quicker and easier for himself. Doing the work of the kingdom, makes us part of God’s kingdom. Trying to do the work of the kingdom with shortcuts makes us wolves in sheep’s clothing, trying to enter the sheep pen by a way other than the gate. We cannot do evil so that good may come;if we do good, we will be good. 

Speak less, say more.

Communicating the most we can in the shortest amount of time is the most effective way to communicate. Actions speak louder than words, so the fastest and most effective way to communicate is by our actions. Good words are a good place to start and an essential element of communication, but much more is said by our good actions, or lack thereof. We say more about what is good and what we believe in by what we do than what we say. God communicates to us through words from His Word but He communicates just as loudly to us by the things He does in our life and by the messages He gives us from what He is doing in other believer’s lives. The fastest way to communicate that we trust God more than ourselves is to stop paying Satan the “tolls” we think will speed up our process of serving God.

Life only goes forward; it doesn't go backward. Learn from your mistakes; don't relive them.

We all have made mistakes in the past, but the greatest mistake we can make is reliving those mistakes. We may have paid a toll to the devil in the past, but we can move on from that moment. We can forfeit the toll we paid to Satan and stop paying compound interest on those tolls by allowing it to consume us. As we move forward with our life, we let go of our losses and focus on communicating how rich our God is who can restore us when we have forfeited so much. The way we communicate about our mistakes demonstrates how we will be affected by them. We can speak less about our losses and say more about our opportunities in Christ or we can speak more about our losses and we will have less to say about opportunities. We will find more losses and opportunities depending on where we spend our time and attention.