Do you have snow today? We have a dusting of snow; however, school is canceled for the day. The school children are thrilled to have a day off, but unfortunately, they have no snow to play in outside. So why did they cancel school? There are small patches of ice on the roads throughout the county. It isn’t bad in most areas, but it only takes one slip on one patch of ice in a school bus to spell disaster. Sometimes when a vehicle starts sliding and spinning out of control, it takes a while to correct it even when it is out of the ice. Not only that, but one car sliding can run into another and then another causing a major accident which could cost a lot of money and physical or emotional harm.

The same is true about sin. Just like the ice, a little sin can spell disaster. It only takes a small amount of unconfessed sin in your life to put you in a tail spin. If you happen to run into the wrong crowd of people who are also in sin, it can create a massive mess in your life and theirs, causing harm to all involved. Sometimes, it takes a while to get your life moving in the right direction even after the sin is gone.

Leaven in scripture represents sin. The Israelites were directed to make unleaven bread when celebrating the Feasts [Exodus 13:7]. Jesus warned the disciples many times to beware of the “leaven of the Pharisees” in the scriptures [Matthew 16:6, 11-12; Mark 8:15; Luke 12:1]. Paul pointed out in 1 Corinthians 5:6-8 that a little leaven impacts the entire batch of dough, implying that a little sin can destroy the person.

Just as the little bit of ice on the roads is dangerous for anyone riding on them, sin is dangerous to us. We need to avoid it at all costs. Some people like to get right up to the edge of sin and live a little dangerous. My mother always said, “If you play with fire, you will get burned.” When sin comes knocking at our door, we need to flee immediately like Joseph [Genesis 39:6-13]. If we do, just like Joseph, the Lord will protect us.