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\u201cThe people of Israel, including the priests and the Levites, have not kept themselves separate from the neighboring peoples with their detestable practices\u2026 (Ezra 9:1).

\u201cModeration in all things\u201d.

Many of us know this popular bit of folk wisdom. It is very helpful when it comes to a balanced diet, work versus play, and so on. But it doesn\u2019t apply to everything.

Hating sin, for example, is something in which God\u2019s people are to show no moderation. We are to hate it and flee from it with enthusiasm and passion. When writing to Timothy about certain temptations, Paul writes, \u201cBut you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness\u201d (1 Timothy 6:11). To the church he writes, \u201creject every kind of evil\u201d (1 Thess. 5:22).

I think that many of us do not have much enthusiasm or passion for this. We want the freedom, the permission to dabble a little bit with sin. When I was in college, we used to have conversations which essentially asked the question: how close can we get to the line without going over it? Such an inquiry is a long way from \u2018reject every kind of evil\u2019.

One of our issues is that fleeing from sin makes us feel and look excessive and weird. It will separate us from culture.

It probably means that we will need to change from our past selves. We will need to give up attitudes that we have towards other people. The Bible\u2019s persistent call to love our neighbours means we need to stop looking down on others, including people of other races and people of other a socio-economic status. We will need to give ourselves permission to question our political leanings and support.

Its really a question about worship: who or what we worship.

That is where the book of Ezra leaves off. The last 2 chapters deal with Israelites marrying folks from other nations. But that is just the presenting issue. What lies behind this is Israel\u2019s lackluster attitude towards God and worshipping him alone. Their intermarrying quickly progresses to joining their foreign spouses in worshipping other gods.

Israel was to be separate from other nations. They were to be geographically, culturally, ethnically and religiously different from the others.

Christians are not geographically, culturally or ethnically separated from others. However, we are practitioners of a different religion. Our everyday worship of God sets us apart from others.

But what does that look like?

That is the question each generation of Christians needs to ask and wrestle with. This is no easy task. The conversations I had in college were often heated and ungracious. We all thought we knew the right answer. In truth, we were all very na\xefve and simplistic.

We lacked both wisdom and grace. Frequently, such conversations formed camps and we thought the other camp suspect. In some of Paul\u2019s letters he writes about the weak and the strong. Much of what he writes there is helpful for these conversations. This devotion can\u2019t get into all of that. But I do want to stress the fact that each generation of Christian needs to have these conversations.

To help those conversations, I think we need to focus more on the positive aspects of the Christian life. Paul wrote, \u201cflee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness.\u201d If we spend more time on the pursuit side of the equation, the fleeing will be more obvious.

Finally, we ought to follow Ezra\u2019s example. When we become aware of sin, our first response ought to be confession. Ezra\u2019s awareness of the sin in the community leads him to confess it before God. He is acutely aware that they cannot presume upon God\u2019s mercy. Neither can we.

Our current Christian culture tends toward an approach to repentance that advocates \u201csaying sorry\u201d to God and trying (at least for a while) not to repeat the particular sin. We need to recover an understanding of the seriousness of sin and how it affects us.

Experiencing the seriousness of sin in our heart (our guts) makes us more aware of God\u2019s grace. And thankful for it. And will enable us to pursue a life of worshipping God alone.