2025 Lent Devotional – Day 11

Lent Devotional: Day 11
Three Sins of a Righteous Person
Rev. Dr. A. K. Lama

Even a righteous person can become a victim of three sins: fear that leads to compromises, forgetting God’s grace and mercy, and bragging of accomplishments that diminish humility. These sins are so subtle that one may fail to discern them within oneself.

A righteous person may succumb to compromises in fear of persecution and death. One might also take God’s grace and mercy for granted and fail to reciprocate them with required changes in one’s life. In addition, one might become arrogant and proud of one’s accomplishments. One might talk about one’s “tent-making skills” that made one self-reliant, independent, etc. They are so subtle that I have discovered myself often impacted by one of those.

My meditation on the life of King Hezekiah’s fatal sickness mentioned in Isaiah 38:1 reminds me of these three sins. King Hezekiah began very well. “Hezekiah trusted in the LORD, the God of Israel. There was no one like him among all the kings of Judah, either before him or after him.” (2 Kings 18:5) However, in the 14th year when Sennacherib, King of Assyria, attacked Judah, he was so much frightened that he gave him all the silver . . . and gold . . . from the temple of the Lord” (2 Kings 18:15 – 16). He had failed to realize that his life was in the hands of Jehovah and not in the hands of the king of Assyria. So, King Hezekiah fell sick, and Isaiah delivered the message of death from the Lord.

Sometimes, suffering and terminal sickness are blessings in disguise. It helps human beings to value their life and give due respect to the giver of life. Hezekiah came to sense, and he prayed in desperation, “ ‘Remember, LORD, how I have walked before you faithfully and with wholehearted devotion and have done what is good in your eyes.’ And Hezekiah wept bitterly.” (Isa 38:3) The Lord gave him 15 years to reform. Still, soon after he was healed, he failed to appropriate the mercies of God. We read in 2 Chronicles 32:24 that “Hezekiah’s heart was proud, and he did not respond to the kindness shown to him; therefore, the LORD’s wrath was on him and on Judah and Jerusalem.” When the envoys from Babylon visited him, he failed to seek wisdom from the Lord, but he showed them his treasury and wealth with pride (2 Kings 20:12-19) .

It reminds me of a friend who chose business as his profession. Initially, he felt discomfort with the compromises he had to make, but soon, he was desensitized. Then, he entered into politics, and he was mired in corruption. After a few years, he fell terminally sick with blood cancer. He pleaded for mercies, and the Lord healed him. But soon after a few years, instead of a transformation, he was back into his old life. His cancer returned suddenly by surprise and he died instantly. He is gone with the Lord, but he left a lesson for many to learn. Death is imminent, but what matters most in the believer’s life is what happens before and after. What is the legacy that we leave behind?

Dear Lord, save us from those three sins so that our life may be an excellent example for others to follow. Amen!