What are some of the bad habits the Bible talks about? - Habits - TouchPoints

Galatians 5:19-21When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.

1 John 3:8When people keep on sinning, it shows that they belong to the devil, who has been sinning since the beginning. But the Son of God came to destroy the works of the devil.

Though as fallen people we will not completely overcome sin in this life, any sin allowed to grow can become a habit, a pattern of sinful living. When we make no attempt to change our behavior, we show that we are not serious about following God. Though perfection may not be possible in this life, seeking to follow God with all our hearts is something anyone can do. And with God’s help and the Holy Spirit’s presence and power, our seeking to obey will lead to a transformed life.

Exodus 8:28, 32“All right, go ahead,” Pharaoh replied. “I will let you go into the wilderness to offer sacrifices to the Lord your God. But don’t go too far away. Now hurry and pray for me.” . . . But Pharaoh again became stubborn and refused to let the people go.

Exodus 9:7Pharaoh sent his officials to investigate, and they discovered that the Israelites had not lost a single animal! But even so, Pharaoh’s heart remained stubborn, and he still refused to let the people go.

Pharaoh developed a bad habit of stubbornness, even in the face of terrible consequences.

Numbers 11:1Soon the people began to complain about their hardship, and the Lord heard everything they said. Then the Lord’s anger blazed against them, and he sent a fire to rage among them, and he destroyed some of the people in the outskirts of the camp.

Numbers 14:1-2Then the whole community began weeping aloud, and they cried all night. Their voices rose in a great chorus of protest against Moses and Aaron. “If only we had died in Egypt, or even here in the wilderness!” they complained.

The Israelites developed a bad habit of complaining. Chronic complaining can quickly turn into bitterness.

1 Timothy 5:13If they are on the list, they will learn to be lazy and will spend their time gossiping from house to house, meddling in other people’s business and talking about things they shouldn’t.

Too much time and too little to do can be fertile ground for bad habits. Idleness makes it easy to develop the bad habit of gossip.

Isaiah 1:13Stop bringing me your meaningless gifts; the incense of your offerings disgusts me! As for your celebrations of the new moon and the Sabbath and your special days for fasting—they are all sinful and false. I want no more of your pious meetings.

Hosea 8:13The people love to offer sacrifices to me, feasting on the meat, but I do not accept their sacrifices. I will hold my people accountable for their sins, and I will punish them. They will return to Egypt.

Matthew 15:8-9“‘These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship is a farce, for they teach man-made ideas as commands from God.’”

Religious rituals without true faith can become bad habits. They can be an “inoculation” to the living gospel. A vaccine inoculates against a virus by giving our bodies a weak, watered-down version of the virus. Then, when our body gets the real sickness, it’s familiar with the virus and easily shrugs it off. Empty religious rituals can do the same thing to believers. When they become a mindless habit, they can inoculate us to God’s living love and truth. We must make sure we haven’t created habits of “worship” that have stopped being true worship of our living God.