Detox diets never work, do they? Oh but it is still a wonderful ruse isn't it? All you have to do is rid your body of the toxins that it carries around and you will free up your system to move freely as God intended. You will lose weight, jump higher, and love more deeply than you have ever known. It even follows logically. I know I put things into my body that were never meant to be put there. God himself only knows what they put in Taco Bell food and whatever is in the middle of an Oreo is far from natural. I visualize them as car wrecks inside the interstates of my digestive system. The combination of lemon juice and cayenne pepper is the tow truck, the bath with epson salt and vinegar is the ambulance, and that weird pad that they sell on TV to stick on your foot is the DOT cleanup crew. But of course, it never really works, and even if it does, I drink a coke so quickly after finishing that it doesn't even matter.
I have a tendency to manage my life this way. I have a sin in my life, so I try to just purge it from my system, but somehow it always comes back. We cannot detox sin.
In 2nd and 3rd John, the author loves this phrase "walking in truth." He says that it gives him the greatest joy to hear that his children are "walking in truth." This cuts right to the heart of our detox mindset. We want a quick and instantaneous fix to problems in our lives, but that will not bring us to where we need to be. He does not write that he is glad that his children have simply found the truth or even that they have put it into practice once, but rather that they are walking. It is ongoing and is perpetually active.
Don't let that word "truth" scare you just because it has been stolen and abused. It is not that TV pastor's truth that was given to him and only him so that he might judge the heathens, nor is it that neighbor's truth that claims that the only truth is that everyone's truth is valid for them. There is a truth to be found. God has and continually reveals it to us. We can then approach the idea of truth without fear because we have faith that our loving God would not deny us the truth if we humbly and earnestly sought it.
When we find this truth, or rather as we are finding it, we must walk in it. By trying to detox our sin, we are actually trying to take God's job and give him ours. He is the only one who has beaten sin. He is the one who redeems, cleanses, and forgives, so sin needs to be given to him. Then we must do the work of walking in the truth our newly cleansed life. Why couldn't he do the walking for us? Why couldn't he eliminate the sin completely from our system? Because that would be stealing our freedom that he cherishes in us.
Let God flush the lies and false promises that sin offers to us, then walk with Him in the truth that He loves us and has given us life. True life is not built on the quick fixes and instantaneous gratifications of this world, but on constantly seeking truth and walking in it. Living in the truth that you find will not be easy, routine, or quick, but the reward is unparalleled joy.
