Self-Inflected Wounds

Galatians 6

7Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.

2 Corinthians 9

6Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously.

· God set up the Law of Sowing and Reaping.

· If you sow corn you’ll reap corn.

· If you sow potatoes you won’t reap Carrots.

I. God gets blamed for many things he had nothing to do with.

· Satan even gets blamed for things he only wishes he planned.

· God promised: 1 Corinthians 10

13No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it.

· Proverbs 18

24 A man of many companions may come to ruin,

but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

II. There are many things that happen that are nothing less then “Self-Inflicted Wounds”.

· There are many that walk around misses fingers, or a hand, or a leg because of “self-inflicted gunshot wounds”

· They are scares that remind them of past failures and mis-haps.

· They are painful and embarrassing, yet no one else can take the blame because they did it to themselves.

· If you abuse your body it is not God’s fault when it breaks down.

· Try to go several days without sleep. Your body will get sleep one way or another.

· You can’t complain about your Liver that’s shriveled up if you drank like a fish for 20 years.

· You can’t complain about lung cancer if you smoke cigarettes all your life.

· You can’t complain about sugar diabetes or heart trouble if you don’t eat right and exercise.

· OUR BODIES ARE TEMPLES OF THE HOLY GHOST.

· 2 Corinthians 6

16What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: "I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people."

· 1 Corinthians 3

16Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit lives in you? 17If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy him; for God’s temple is sacred, and you are that temple.

III. Child Baring is a result of what was sowed by Eve.

· Genesis 3

16 To the woman he said,

"I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing;

with pain you will give birth to children.

Your desire will be for your husband,

and he will rule over you."

17 To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, ’You must not eat of it,’

"Cursed is the ground because of you;

through painful toil you will eat of it

all the days of your life.

IV. Eli the High Priest was punished because of what he aloud his sons to sow.

· 1 Samuel 4

1 And Samuel’s word came to all Israel.

The Philistines Capture the Ark

Death of Eli

12 That same day a Benjamite ran from the battle line and went to Shiloh, his clothes torn and dust on his head. 13 When he arrived, there was Eli sitting on his chair by the side of the road, watching, because his heart feared for the ark of God. When the man entered the town and told what had happened, the whole town sent up a cry.

14 Eli heard the outcry and asked, "What is the meaning of this uproar?"

The man hurried over to Eli, 15 who was ninety-eight years old and whose eyes were set so that he could not see. 16 He told Eli, "I have just come from the battle line; I fled from it this very day."

Eli asked, "What happened, my son?"

17 The man who brought the news replied, "Israel fled before the Philistines, and the army has suffered heavy losses. Also your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead, and the ark of God has been captured."

18 When he mentioned the ark of God, Eli fell backward off his chair by the side of the gate. His neck was broken and he died, for he was an old man and heavy. He had led [2] Israel forty years. 19 His daughter-in-law, the wife of Phinehas, was pregnant and near the time of delivery. When she heard the news that the ark of God had been captured and that her father-in-law and her husband were dead, she went into labor and gave birth, but was overcome by her labor pains. 20 As she was dying, the women attending her said, "Don’t despair; you have given birth to a son." But she did not respond or pay any attention.