Beautiful ? - Tract (1,000 pces)

The other day I was removing thistles from the meadow where our sheep and goat are grazing. It was a tough job and it set me thinking.

Thistles came after the Fall, when the first human beings sinned against the eternal God. Because of their sin, the ground was cursed and it would bring forth thorns and thistles (see Genesis 3:14-19). So there is a direct connection between thistles and sin.

Back to my thistles. I love the purple flowers and that is why I let them grow, although I knew I shouldn’t. They are weeds after all! I did that last year with only a few plants. Then they set seed, which was blown all over the meadow, so now there are dozens. And the bigger they are, the more difficult it is to root them up. And although it has been a very dry summer, they just keep growing!

Then I thought, “There is a nice lesson in this!” I have already mentioned that thistles and sin(s) are connected. Sometimes there are things in our lives we know are wrong but we don’t do anything about them because they give us pleasure (like the nice flowers on my thistles).We let the sins “grow”, which only results in more sins (more thistles to get rid of). When we finally realise we should get rid of them, it is a very painful job (think of all the prickles on a thistle) and a difficult one, especially when it comes to the more established sins (the older and thicker thistles) because they have had time to root well.

If we are honest with ourselves, we have to admit that there are “thistles” in our “meadow”–in other words, sins in our lives. And we need to get rid of them!

The only solution for this is Jesus Christ of whom it is said, He “takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). Come to Him with your sins! Tell Him that you are a sinner and need Him as your Saviour!

Yet, even when you have become a believer you can still discover some sin in your life–another “thistle” growing up. If so you should get rid of it by confessing it and not giving it any time to take root, which will only make things worse. The devil will tell us we can enjoy certain things, but he only makes empty promises and never really gives us anything because he is the father of lies as the Lord Jesus Himself said (see John 8:44). All that will happen in the end is that we will experience the pain of having to get rid of something deep seated that should never have been in our lives in the first place.

“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).