The HIDDEN Leaven. You probably know what at least some of it is and where it is in your life. Oh, physical leaven – bread, crackers, cookies, cakes – that’s all comparatively easy to find and toss out as we prepare for the days of Unleavened Bread. But then the real deleavening starts. The self-examination of our hearts, and not just our homes. Remember that our hearts and lives have become the home of God our Father and Yeshua (John 14:23). THAT’S the spiritual home Yehowah wants us to be sure to deleaven. Remember the physical things we do point to the real spiritual lesson. Don’t get so worn out doing the physical that you have nothing left to deleaven your hearts and homes.
OUR LIVES are the homes Father wants deleavened. That’s where He lives – in us, by His Spirit.
Deleavening a house is a piece of cake (pardon the pun) compared to deleavening the heart. We’ve heard of the “hidden manna” (Revelation 2:17). Well, we want to be sure there’s no “hidden LEAVEN” lurking in our lives. Frankly we all have a lot of hidden leaven left. Leaven (SIN) we’re protecting, hiding. So-called “respectable sins” or “acceptable sins”. In a moment I’ll list some of them and even discuss the worst hidden leaven that lurks in so many of us still, including me. Be watching for a short discussion/teaching soon on this website titled “the Hidden Leaven”. It’s a most timely deleavening-season topic to listen to.
Read the rest of this blog for more hints about “the Hidden Leaven”.
Actually I think we all have that hidden leaven. I speak of the secret sins we secretly either still enjoy in private or when we think no one is looking – or even sins we really hate but just can’t seem to give up. Either way, this is what I am calling “the hidden leaven”. But beyond that are the HUGE pieces of spiritual leaven that has set up camp in our hearts – the big monsters in our lives that many of us have accepted. That must not be. Our bodies are now the dwelling place of YHVH. We’ve been called to clean out His house, clean our hearts, and present ourselves as a living sacrifice. No living sacrifice goes happily to the sacrificial altar – and our “old man”, the old self, will not give up without a fight and a lot of tears and pleading to let it say in your life and heart. We live in physically deleavened homes for seven days, picturing completeness – completely removing ALL trace of sin.
Physically we have learned to look for leaven hiding secretly in the Grape Nuts cereal, or in the battered frozen fish or breaded chicken pieces. Some flat breads that look unleavened aren’t. Some Granola bars have baking soda in them. We’ve learned to check the labels. We’ve learned to pull out the fridge and stove and sweep up the crumbs that somehow got under there. We’ll remember to flush out the toaster and be sure it’s dry before using it again. And don’t forget the vacuum cleaner bag, the ice cream cones, leaven lurking in the glove compartment of your car and behind and under the child seats…. And on and on. You know all that.
But are we looking as carefully for the SPIRITUAL hidden leaven in our lives? There are big, big chunks, my siblings in Yeshua! One of the biggest chunks of leaven is our SELFISHNESS. SO much of our sin stems from our desire to do what we want to do, no matter the way it makes people feel. So our selfishness makes us divorce the father of our children without Biblical justification to do so. Our selfishness drives us to NOT let our big head do the thinking (guys) and we give in to lusts of the flesh that will ruin our marriage in adultery. Our selfishness makes us want to make the other person hurt – and so we don’t FORGIVE and reconcile. But without forgiving one another, we will not be forgiven either! Selfishness – a huge, huge piece of spiritual leaven that is at the root of so MANY of our other sins.
Vanity and pride is another huge chunk. Even people who seem so humble – probably aren’t.
More on all this in the sermon coming up and I hope you hear it soon. (I’ll also be giving a sermon soon about the 5 women mentioned in Christ’s genealogy and it’s bearing on Passover.)
Here’s another lesson: we CAN’T TAKE LEAVEN OUT OF THE BREADS AND CRACKERS. WE HAVE TO THROW IT ALL OUT. There’s no way you can salvage ANY of it.
Neither can we let go of SOME of the sin we still kinda like. So what parts of your life are you trying to pick some of the bad out of, without accepting the fact that the ENTIRE leavened sin has to stop, has to be thrown out? We can’t just give in to THESE CHERISHED SINS less often … that’s not good enough. We have to get rid of each one entirely. The baby sins we don’t kill in our spiritual lives will grow up to be giant problems later. The Israelites let the baby named Goliath live – and look how he taunted Israel later! Our giant problems have to be put to death as well. I speak of sin in our lives, of course.
We don’t give any quarter or leeway to the leavened loaf in the freezer – and neither can we give any quarter to the secret sins we allow in our lives. For many – it’s the SECRET SEX SINS of internet dalliance or flirting at work or worse. Come on guys, admit it. Many of us men who claim to be bought and paid for by our Messiah sometimes just can’t resist how easy it is to indulge our flesh and look. That’s got to stop. That’s got to be thrown out of our lives by the power of God’s spirit. Saying we indulge in certain sins rarely now means we’ve still left some of that leavening in our spiritual freezer! Several of you reading this DRINK too much and get drunk. No ongoing drunkard will be in the kingdom, but if you put that behind you, you and I will be there together. Still others will CHEAT on their trucking log books or income tax. That’s stealing and it’s gotta stop. Some of you reading this just can’t seem to be able to resist GOSSIP. That has to stop too. Gossip does so much harm and it is NOT the Kingdom’s Way. Some have made gossip an art form. Some have learned how to spread it rapidly by email, Facebook, Twitter and a myriad other ways. It’s like spreading manure with a commercial grade manure spreader. Others have a real problem keeping SABBATH day holy. We use it to do some work around the house on Sabbath, or we go out to restaurants and transact business on Sabbath, or we’re not even home and ready for it when sabbath begins. Are you keeping Shabbat holy unto Yehowah?
We could go on and on. My siblings in Christ, hear the sermon on “the Hidden Leaven”, coming soon.
My point here is: it’s ALL gotta go! We MUST get to the point with Paul where we can say, “I no longer live, and I’ve been crucified with Christ. The life I live now is Christ in me.” I can’t say that yet but I sure want to. I CAN say that some of my most hated sins ARE sins of the past. They are not being repeated in recent years. Now … the rest of the hidden leaven in my life has got to go too. I hope and pray by the power of God’s spirit that more and more of us can say with each passing year – "I’m so glad Yehowah has helped me overcome such-and-such. It’s gone. It’s been thrown out of my life."
I admit: I still recognize in this pre-Passover time, that I still have a lot of spiritual deleavening to do in the next couple weeks. But it’s ALL gotta go! I preach most harshly to my own self. Let’s pray for the body of Christ in the coming weeks and pray we will give no quarter to the sins still thriving in our hearts and minds and lives. I know this hasn’t been any “sweet talk” to you… but it might help you have a better reward in the Kingdom of our dear Father.
So – no more hidden leaven in the house of God, our hearts/our bodies. It’s ALL gotta go! Check out the far more in-depth short sermon coming on this.