MALL

This post was written for Five Minute Friday

(linking up at Andrew's place while Kate is on leave)

Word prompt--MALL

Five minutes to free-write about it

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Malls can be fun places to walk around. Full of eye candy and interesting finds. But also full of temptation to spend money I don't have to spend.

I know this is a stretch, but it made me think of a devotional I just read about desensitization, and how sin wouldn't be such a problem if it wasn't such a pleasure.

In a nutshell, desensitization is when your body or mind learns to tolerate something it once strongly reacted to (such as an allergen, or a phobia, for example) through gradual, repeated exposure to it. Think allergy shots, where the body, over time, becomes used to the allergen and is no longer irritated by it.

Desensitization can happen in our spiritual life as well, as sins that were once considered unthinkable gradually become tolerated, then condoned, and finally openly endorsed, and we are no longer distinguishable from anyone else. 

There was a little exercise at the end of the devotional asking us to make a list of little things in our own lives that ought to bother us but don't. Maybe that's the connection (for me) to the word prompt. All the temptations I am faced with daily are like the eye candy beckoning me in the mall.

On my list were books I would never have considered reading when I first became a Christian, that now I don't see why not; TV shows I would not have watched that now seem harmless; turning to food for comfort when I feel frustrated--in addition to the Lord, instead of Him alone; and the list goes on. 

It was quite convicting.