Derek McLeod

Romans 5:12-14 “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned—
13 for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law.
14 Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam…”

If you are a Native American or First Nations person, you are part of a tribe. A tribe is a people group. They live in the same environments and often share linguistic, cultural, and ceremonial commonalities. No matter what ethnicity you may be from, you are part of a people group. As we dive deeper down the line to clans within the tribes, and families within the clans, we are all part of a smaller family group with its own distinctions. Yet, that family group is still subject to the commonalities of its tribal roots. We tend to become products of the family groups we are born into and often adopt or inherit the traits and tendencies of our family group. We may sometimes look at ourselves and believe that our lives are pre-determined by the family we were born into. “Well, my father was a drunkard, so it’s no wonder I am too.” “I was born the son of a violent man, and this is why I am a violent person today.” “My parents did drugs, and this is why I am addicted to drugs.” And so, we fall into this place where we think that this is just the way things are going to be.

As much as we don’t want to follow after our parents’ lives, as much as we try to avoid their path, we find that something keeps us in the same tracks of whatever family group we are part of.

Much of who we are has a lot to do with where we’ve come from.

My great-great-grandfather came to North America from the Orkney Islands in Scotland. His last name was McLeod. He chose a Cree woman to be his “country wife,” and each subsequent son thereafter continued to marry Cree women, but the name McLeod stayed with each generation onward. One man made a decision that he was going to move to an entirely new country and establish a new life for himself. By doing so, he affected every generation after him.

Now, if we keep going further and further, we all have one common ancestor: his name was Adam. Every person upon this planet is a descendant of Adam. Adam was created by God and was given dominion over the earth. What Adam said and did regarding earth was honored by God because He had given dominion, or authority, over earth to Adam. When Adam sinned against God’s word in the Garden of Eden, his actions were applied to all of the earth and to every human being from that point onward. As descendants of Adam, we are now born sinners. Because of the sin of one man, and the seed of that man being passed down the line, I am a sinner. I was born a sinner. I have no way of getting free from this sin because it is forever in my bloodline as a descendant of Adam.

Romans 3:23 “As it is written, there is none righteous, no, not one; for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” As unjust as it may seem, the fact is that one man’s sin affected us all.

Have you ever heard of Leonard Marsh? Neither had I until recently. Leonard Marsh moved to Canada from London, England, in 1930. As a social scientist, he studied people and social trends. He studied how people and societies acted, thought, and moved. In 1943, he released a report to the Canadian government called the Marsh Report, where he suggested that Canada should adopt a universal financial social measure that would stave off the mass unemployment he predicted would occur at the end of World War II. The government rejected his idea until a couple of years later, when Prime Minister William Lyon McKenzie dusted off the Marsh Report in an attempt to influence voters to vote for his party. In 1945, McKenzie’s government passed a law and introduced The Family Allowance Act. Today, if you live in Canada and you have children, you receive a monthly government allowance, what is called the “Family Allowance,” or the Child Tax Credit. This is the result of a man by the name of Leonard Marsh. What he did has affected every Canadian with children.

In a similar way, Adam’s decision and sin has affected every home and every family upon the face of the planet. His decision and his choice have affected you and me. It has affected our community, our homes, our families, and our marriages. It has affected all of us. Sin has brought death, destruction, despair, misery, pain, hurt, and wounds to the entire world. There is not one person who has escaped the effects of sin. One day, God will eradicate sin. He will do this because He is a Holy God and there is no darkness in Him. Sin cannot exist in His presence. Not one sinner will escape the wrath of God upon sin. It may seem unfair, but the fact is that because of Adam’s sin, we are now all in need of a Savior from sin.

Romans 5:14 tells us that sin and death reigned over us all right up to Moses’ day. It was then that God made a temporary way for sins to be atoned. It was through a blood sacrifice. God spoke to Moses and showed him that the only way sins could be dealt with was through the life of an innocent lamb. This was understood by Abel who, soon after the expulsion from the Garden of Eden, sacrificed a young lamb as part of worship to God.

Sheep were the first animals to be domesticated by humans. They are almost 100% completely dependent on humans for their survival and protection. In the same way, our lives depend wholly and completely upon God. Without Him, we are defenseless. We have a predator who is seeking to destroy us and wants to kill us. At the very moment Adam sinned, that sin bound us to this predatory enemy who we know as the devil.

As God would have daily talks and walks with Adam in the Garden of Eden, He still desires to do the same with us today, but it is sin that keeps us separated from God. It is this desire that moved God to instruct Moses how sin could be temporarily dealt with so that God and man could once again have open communion. It required, however, the sacrifice of an innocent life to appease the wrath of God against sin for a light moment. Up until that day of Moses’ life, sin had reigned freely over all men, but God was showing us all, through the sacrificial lamb offering, that He was going to one day have a lamb of His own that would take away the sin of the world forever.

Simply being a Christian does not make me righteous. We cannot come to God on our merits, or on our own goodness, because it is all like filthy rags to Him. God showed us His Plan of Redemption. His plan came through the sacrificial life of an innocent and completely dependent life. Jesus Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit, thereby bypassing the sin-curse of Adam, and lived a sinless, innocent, and completely dependent life on the Heavenly Father. He was God’s perfect lamb. And when He went to the cross, He became the only way that we all can come to God. Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God. Only the blood of Jesus Christ makes me righteous to stand before a holy God.

Now, through the Lamb of God, we can be adopted into a new family – the family of God! The old things pass away, and we become new creations through Jesus Christ. The wondrous work of Jesus Christ upon the cross of Calvary has eradicated sin for us. We now have open, unhindered, and a restored relationship with the Heavenly Father through the life of Jesus Christ. I can now be free from those ways that kept me in chains, addictions, and bondages, because I am now freed from sin’s grip and given a new way of living through Jesus. I’m no longer bound to the sins and traditions of my ancestors, my tribe or people group. Nor am I bound to the curse of Adam’s sin, because I now belong to God’s family. As a child in His Kingdom, I have inherited His ways into my new life through Jesus Christ. Glory to God for what He has done!

Sonia McLeod

“But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren.” — Luke 22:32

I want to encourage wives and moms. Are you experiencing pain? Have you been wounded? Is the hurt unbearable? I was there. But I want to tell you that there is a way through the pain and hurt you are feeling. I didn’t understand it until we hit rock bottom, until everything fell apart. That’s when I began to learn this incredible truth: whether it’s our salvation, whether it’s our prodigal children coming back, whether it’s our marriage being restored — whatever it is — it has to be the Lord who brings life. It has to be the Lord who restores. It has to be the Lord who makes things whole.

All of our solutions, promises and strategies without Him, will have only temporary effects. They will not last. They might look good for a moment, but they won’t hold up when the real pressure hits. And I know this, because I lived it.

When my husband revealed to me that he was struggling with pornography, I was devastated. I wanted it out of the marriage. I wanted out. I was heartbroken. I was angry. I was done. But in that pain, God began to show me something.

This is where so many of us moms and wives are. When we’re bitter, angry and struggling to forgive, our pain becomes a lens. Bitterness becomes a lens. Hurt becomes a lens. We begin to see everything through those lenses. Everything becomes marked by that pain. We can’t just hear a conversation; we hear it through hurt. We can’t just respond; we respond through offense. And it becomes so hard to hear God in the midst of all of that, because the pain is loud.

The enemy loves it when we stay there. He loves it when we hold onto the bitterness and unforgiveness. He loves it when we can’t release the pain, because then we’re trapped. We’re being dragged around by it.

It was this that the Lord began to reveal to me. Not to shame me, but to free me. Because the truth is, we are powerless to change anything on our own. We can’t fix hearts. We can’t fix addiction. We can’t fix a marriage with a hardened heart. We can’t fix betrayal with anger. We need the Lord.

I’ll never forget the day I pulled over to the side of the road to pray. It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining. But all I could see was the devastation in my home and marriage. I needed to cry out to God at that moment. I wasn’t trying to be dramatic, I was desperate. And then He showed me something.

He showed me darkness that was moving menacingly like billowing clouds toward me. He showed me how the enemy wanted to bring everything down and to destroy my life. Not only my life, but my children’s lives. The enemy wasn’t playing around. His intent was to destroy everything God had purpose for.

But God also showed me this: because I was praying, because I was holding onto His Word, God held it all back. He showed me how powerful His Word is. That His Word has authority. That His Word is not just something we post or think about, it’s something we can stand on. It’s something we fight with. It’s something heaven responds to.

“His Word is not just something we post or think about, it’s something we can stand on. It’s something we fight with. It’s something heaven responds to.”

And still, even with that, I could see I was being dragged around by the hardness of my own heart. And that hardness, if unchecked, will destroy everything. Because bitterness does not just sit quietly in a corner. It spreads. It changes you. It affects how you see. How you talk. How you love. How you parent. How you pray.

And I’m telling you, if I had just allowed the enemy to have his way, he would’ve destroyed everything.

But when we surrender to God’s plans and do what He asks, things begin to shift. And yes, sometimes what He asks is hard. Sometimes what He asks feels impossible. He asks us to love our husbands. Love our children. Love people where they are. Forgive. Release. Pray. Trust Him.

“when we surrender to God’s plans and do what He asks, things begin to shift. And yes, sometimes what He asks is hard. Sometimes what He asks feels impossible.”

And we cannot do this without going into the presence of God. We can’t do this without Him. We can’t do this by trying harder. It has to be all Him.

But when we run to God and we say, “Lord, it is You. I need You to move. Help me. Give me the grace to do what I can’t do,” He will answer with power and authority. And He will begin to change and move the circumstances in your life.

The pain is real. The betrayal is real. The heartbreak is real. These things are all real.

But they have to be handed over to the Lord because the enemy can use those things. We serve a sovereign God, but we have to get out of His way so He can move. We have to trust God no matter what.