The Traitor
- Joe Palmisano
- 16 hours ago
- 3 min read
Theme: ...and The Surrender of the Will
One of the craziest ideas for a hotel was the Flagship in Galveston, TX. The Flagship was built on a pier one hundred yards offshore in the early 1960s, and it survived until 2010 after finally taking its last blow from Hurricane Ike.
Since the balconies were directly above the ocean, management decided to place signs in the room stating, 'Do Not Fish on Balcony.'
When the hotel was completed and ready to open, guess what started to happen? Guests began to fish off their balconies. Hotel guests tie large lead weights to their fishing line to reach the ocean floor several stories below. Some guests would cast their line and miss the ocean altogether, and the line would swing back towards the hotel, along with the heavy lead weights. Unfortunately, there were large picture windows in the first-floor dining room, and hotel management had to replace several broken windows. “The crashing sound of windows breaking was common among dining room guests,” one report stated.
The solution??
After evaluating their predicament, management wisely removed all the “Do not fish on the balcony” signs. This immediately resolved the problem of guests fishing on the balcony. Guests did not even think about fishing until they read the sign.
Paul lamented this same dilemma as he wrote what now is Chapter 7 of his letter to the Romans. In this case, it was very personal yet universal and involved the reality of our inherent sinful nature and God’s Holy Law. When God posted the Law on tablets for Moses to give to the people, He defined what they were doing and awakened humanity to the reality of who we are. Like the owners of the hotel, God posted the prohibition signs.
Pastor Dan spoke of this reality as “the traitor within us.” Paul wrote about the same dilemma, “What shall we say, then? Is the law sinful? Certainly not! Nevertheless, I would not have known what sin was had it not been for the law. For I would not have known what coveting was if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of coveting. For apart from the law, sin was dead.” (Romans 7:7-8 NIV)
Because of our fallen nature, the Law can work like an invitation to sin. It can twist something good and holy, like the Law, to promote evil. Sin warps love into lust, an honest desire to provide for one’s family into greed, achievement into arrogance, ambition into bloodthirstiness, and the Law itself into a promoter of sin.
To paraphrase Paul, “Oh, what a wretched lot we are.” How can we escape?
As we learned this past Sunday, we must acknowledge who we are, be real and vulnerable in our fallenness, and support each other. Like wounded on the battlefield, we must pick up the fallen and never leave a brother or sister behind, knowing that it could be us next time, as Satan continues to twist Holy Laws to wound us in our flesh.
Scripture: Romans 7:8 NIV, Romans 3:20 NIV
“But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of coveting. For apart from the law, sin was dead.”
“Therefore no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin.”
Prayer:
Lord, I know that the Law being outside of me awakens in me the desire to see what I am missing and disobey, but when I remember that it is written on my heart and in my soul I follow it not as a Law to be obeyed, but out of who I am and the love for you created in me. So, my Lord God, please remind me through your Holy Spirit to surrender my will hourly to yours and to deny myself, die to myself, and allow you to be my life completely. Also, Lord, please allow me to see my vulnerabilities and to accept those in others so as not to discard them when they fall, but embrace them, knowing that “there but by the Grace of God go I”. Amen.
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