What assurance do I have that I can do well again?

Q: I am a civil servant and have just been deployed to a dept where I have unfettered access to steal public funds. This is the norm and I’m expected to cooperate. I am 47 years old. I have not built a house. A piece of land I bought 3 years ago is still undeveloped and there is pressure from the sellers to develop or lose the land. My new colleagues have shown me how I can build three houses in a year. This matter is tearing my wife and me apart. She believes this is God’s time for our family. My fear is if I am taken out of this department today, what assurance do I have that I can do well again? If I play ball, won’t God forgive me later? Many people have done this before. So why will mine be different? [First published on 11 January 2009]

The teaching of success and prosperity in Nigeria has been so distorted that it gives the impression that it does not matter how you “make it” as long as you “arrive”.  But the good news is that God’s standard remains the same. Don’t be misled; remember that you can’t ignore God and get away with it: a man will always reap just the kind of crop he sows! (Galatians 6:7, TLB) In another place Jesus makes it clear that life is not measured by the things a man possesses and even wonders what profit a man makes if he gains the whole world and loses his soul. Temptation is not a sin but falling into it is dangerous. I encourage you to stand for God in your office and at home. Put your foot down. When Job’s wife encouraged him to curse God, his reply was simple: ‘That is how a fool of a woman talks” Job 2:10 (NJB)

One cannot wilfully sin and expect God to forgive him later. That sounds like tempting God. Believers have NOT been instructed to follow the crowd: “You must not do wrong just because everyone else is doing it” (Exodus 23:2 NCV). I pray that God’s grace will be sufficient for you at a time like this to keep you from falling.