This sounds like a command straight out of the Old Testament. What came to your mind when you read the words--a crucifix on the wall, a statuette, a golden calf, a revered object such as people have been falsely worshipping for thousands of years? However, here we're talking about idols of another kind.

This is clearly the most difficult of the three "avoidance commands" (participation, association, avoidance) to lay hold of.

The mirror probes deeper. Indulgence in sin may be passive. Participation raises the stakes a little higher. Now the command becomes active, forceful, imperative: Don't even associate with immorality.

The practicality of the progression continues to tighten like a noose around our necks. Can it get any more real than this -- Do not participate in the sins of others.

The progression of commands in this section grows probing, stringent, convicting...eve, perhaps we should say, impossible.

We suddenly crash headlong into a command whose reality may be difficult to penetrate at first glance. You may have turned the page and feel like you rounded a corner and collided with a stranger.

We return to the pivotal passage of Romans 12:1-2, the all-important undergirding foundation of the Commands. Jesus said: My kingdom is not of this world. In becoming his followers, we make ourselves citizens of a different world than that existing around us. We have emigrated to a new kingdom.

Christians and non-Christians alike almost universally associate "repentance" with an eye-opening revelation that takes place at a critical turning point of life, an overwhelming sense of contrition for sin, a decisive and pivotal juncture when everything changes.

Self-control and patience are closely linked, but contain intrinsic differences. Though patience is more familiar, it is also elusive, Self-control is more powerful.

The final two fruits of the Spirit listed by Paul in Galatians 5:23 are positively astounding. If we are paying attention, they stagger the world of our spiritual preconceptions.