The Volcano Effect - the devastating nature of sin

I saw a video this week of lava from a recent volcano in Hawaii coming toward a car parked along the side of the road.  The video was mesmerizing.  It went like this. . .

This huge mass of molten ash moves toward the vehicle. It seems so harmless and almost beautiful.  After all, it is not a mass of flames, just a dark mass of what looks like ash with just a hint of red underneath.  It looks like you could almost walk up to it.  There is a general sense of sadness as you realize the car is about to get dirty, but you are almost confident that it will not do any real damage.

Sin lies to us.  It pretends that it is harmless and really does not do any damage.  It pretends it is just a dark mass of harmless material that we can get as close to as possible.  We almost want to because of how harmless it seems.  It looks beautiful and desirable and it draws us in.  And the effects of sin were evident in the video as well.

As the mass of lava moves toward the vehicle, before it even touches it, the car bursts into flame and the dormant lava suddenly springs to life and in a matter of seconds the car is a fireball that then almost as quickly is devoured by the seemingly harmless ash moving toward it.  The car is gone.  All that is left is the mass of ash now completely covering the car, or at least what is left of the car.  The car is totally destroyed.  Gone.  Dead.  Of no use to anyone.  This is the result of sin - death.  Even if you think you get away with it, you die. Apart from the work of Christ we are all dead in our sin, consumed by the fires of hell within us.  Christ changes us. 

So don't allow yourself to be swallowed by sin, fight it by fleeing from it and running to Jesus.