day no. 17,377: pocket-sized perdition

“Each one of your teenagers today is walking around with Bourbon Street in his pocket, or in her purse. And in many cases, always downloaded. You are driving off to church, and your (inexplicably sullen) teenager is in the way back, AirPods in, preparing his heart for worship by listening to 'effin’ on the blim blam, n-word in the vocative plural!'" — Douglas Wilson, No Such Thing As Bad Words

You don't have to go to Mardi Gras anymore, it comes to you and you don't have to wait for that one week per year to cut lose, it's available online all year round. Such is the state of things. The lay of the land is licentiousness. Once upon a time, you had to have the courage to seek out wicked things. You had to look someone in the eyes and ask for the thing behind the counter. Now, it comes looking for you. It pops up as a window while you are online, it comes through as a text on your phone, it is a direct message from a stranger on an app. Everywhere we are assaulted by things we did not ask for. It is in the commercial you can't skip between videos you curated, it is the advertisement on the radio between the songs you wanted to hear, it is the billboard on the side of the road on the way you wanted to go. Never have the words, "Be on guard," been more applicable than they are today. Perdition is now pocket-sized. The world has not only gone to Hell in a handbasket, it has found a way to fit Hell into the palm of your hand.

1 Corinthians 16:13

Watch ye, stand fast in the faith, quit you like men, be strong.

Do not let your guard down. Sin never sleeps, so don't sleep on sin. Keep your head on a swivel, your mind on His law, your heart in faith, and your hands in obedience. Do not take your eyes off the eternal prize or give any attention to the booby prizes the world offers (let the reader understand).

Philippians 3:13-14

Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.

Let the past rest in the empty tomb of Christ and lay the future at the foot of His throne where He sits at the right hand of the Father destroying all of His enemies who are chasing you or waiting in ambush. Even though Hell can now fit in the palm of your hand, it once strove through the palm of Jesus'. Hell was nailed to the Cross. Christ came down off of it, but the gates of Hell were cast away. The grave is empty and the threats of Hell are emptied.