Have you ever noticed a lot of people get sunburned at the beginning of spring or summer? It’s like we forget what happened the year before and forget to take precautions to prevent it from happening again. There are many things you can do to prevent sunburn. You can cover your body with a powerful sunscreen before going in the sun and then reapply it several times while you’re outside. You can sit under an umbrella to keep the sun from hitting you. You can also make sure you are outside with others who will let you know when it looks like you’re about to burn so you don’t look like those poor people on the beach who fell asleep in the sun and no one was around to tell them to turn over. You just know it hurts to breathe when you’re burned that badly.
Once you get burned, you have to deal with the pain of the sunburn. You have to experience the discomfort of trying to rest with sunburn. You also look like you have some type of nasty skin disorder as the layers of your skin peel away at various rates giving you that lovely splotchy look.
Why am I talking to you about skin protection and sunburn? Because you can also get burned as a Christian if you aren’t careful. The enemy is constantly on the prowl looking for a Christian to destroy [1 Peter 5:8]. Just like with sunburn, there are ways we can prevent this from happening.
First of all, we can cover ourselves with the full armor of God [Ephesians 6:10-18]. We need to apply it through prayer before we go “outside” into the world. And we need to reapply it regularly.
Second, we need to take cover and come under the authority the Lord put in place. Authority is for our protection, not our harm. In the body of Christ, the Lord is your top level of authority [Leviticus 18:4]. He is our covering and He teaches us and covers us as we have relationship with Him through prayer and the study of God’s Word [2 Timothy 3:16].
And finally, we should never try and face life alone. We need someone to cover our back through prayer, accountability and support [Luke 5:19].
As Christians, we need to be careful out in the world. Don’t be naïve and believe it will never happen to you. Take precautions to protect yourself and make sure you don’t get burned. A burn can be painful, uncomfortable and ugly and most of the time it can be prevented.