This may sound similar to last week's post, but it's a little different. This one is more personally significant!!! It's talking about if we encourage Christians to make lifestyle choices that could lead them astray, we are putting a stumbling block before them. If we don't warn them that they are going down the wrong path, Jesus takes it personally when we've had the opportunity to help redirect them and we choose not to. Of course, mentioning this is a personal risk, but ignoring this is an even bigger personal risk!
If I turn my back on a Christian going astray, am I saying to Jesus that I figure they'll be O.K., because they are a Christian?
I said that this passage is more personally significant, because it speaks to all Christians. If other Christians can lose their salvation by going down the wrong path by making counterproductive lifestyle and faith choices, then we can too! We have to realize that it's not a Once Saved Always Saved situation, although many churches believe so. If you read these verses, you will realize that we aren't guaranteed salvation just because we were a Christian at one point in our lives.
Fortunately, it also says: "Nevertheless if you warn the righteous man that the righteous should not sin, and he does not sin, he shall surely live because he took warning; also you will have delivered your soul." Ezekiel 3:21
