By Rita Enemuru, Reporting
THE General Overseer of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Pastor Enoch Adeboye, has said that the cause of untimely deaths among youths is traceable to what he termed “internal enemies.”
According to him, “internal enemies,” in this context, consist of indecent dressing, drunkenness, sexual immorality, gluttony, lasciviousness, idolatry, anger, selfishness and drug addiction, amongst others.
The Octogenarian’s submission was contained in the Thursday’s edition of Open Heavens Daily Devotional made available to Stonix News.
The cleric said that though Christians wrestle against external enemies such as principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this world, the real enemy plaguing mankind are internal enemies.
He, therefore, urged youths to identify these enemies and fight against them by staying true to God and abstaining from every form of unrighteousness.
“It is true that we wrestle with many external enemies described as principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this world, and spiritual wickedness in high places (Ephesians 6:12).
“Many people, however, fight against themselves thereby constituting an internal enemy to themselves.
“For example, there are many people who believe they are free to do anything they wish with their body; they, therefore, would not deny themselves anything their heart desires.
“This mindset often leads to sinful practices like indecent dressing, drunkenness, sexual immorality, gluttony, lasciviousness, idolatry, anger, selfishness, drug addiction and the likes. Such practices often produce results that are detrimental to the body, sometimes generating life-threatening repercussions.
“These sinful practices should, therefore, be correctly identified as internal enemies of all human beings. 1 Corinthians 3:17) says:
‘If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God destroy; for the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are.’
“This is an important statement with a very serious implication. The Almighty God, our Creator, wants us to know that He created us as His own dwelling place. He went on to say that if anyone defiles the temple of God, he or she shall be destroyed.
“This is probably the source of the increase in strange ailments and reduction in life expectancy across the world.
“Those who defile or abuse their bodies with alcohol, hard drugs, sexual immorality, unhygienic food and unhealthy exposure to dangerous substances often become sick and end up dying prematurely.
“Many incidents of youths all over the world dying from drug addiction, mental illness, hypertension, suicide, liver-related problems and so on are traceable to these internal enemies,” he said.
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