As the return of Jesus Christ nears, the need for us to prepare becomes more critical than ever. While witnessing the world winding down the path to destruction, we find that Christ alone is our refuge. We must place our trust in Him and follow Him as never before.

Doing this is easier said than done because each of us has sins that impede us from following Him fully, so we must find a place to start the process of repentance from dead works. The pre-Passover examination process is an excellent place to begin because its goal is to help us become worthy to take the Passover (I Corinthians 11:28).

But what part of our lives should we examine? This year—and every year—we need to ask ourselves some tough questions. Why do we act the way we do? What causes us to be the way we are? What are the sources of our sins?

In Matthew 15, the scribes and Pharisees complain about Christ's disciples not washing their hands before eating. Jesus explains, "Not what goes into the mouth defiles a man; but what comes out of the mouth, this defiles a man" (Matthew 15:11). Defiling sin proceeds from an internal source and comes out of the mouth in ungodly speech. The internal source is our heart's (our mind's or our nature's) overabundance of supposed needs and desires. Dirt on our hands does not defile us, but our "dirty" minds do!

In Genesis 4:7, God tells Cain, "If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. And its desire is for you, but you should rule over it." He reveals to Cain—and us—that sin is linked to our decisions about what we will do or say. Again, God points out that righteousness or sin is an internal matter, that it arises from within us.

The apostle James takes us a step farther: "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded" (James 4:8). What is double-mindedness? A dictionary defines it as "a state or condition of being wavering in mind, undecided, vacillating." It suggests that a double-minded person is unsure and shifting between two opinions and is therefore indecisive. James informs us that such a person is "unstable in all his ways" (James 1:8). Such a condition often leads to the second meaning of double-mindedness: "hypocrisy; insincerity," as the double-minded person will act and speak one way then another due to his internal ambivalence.

The apostle Paul exposes his struggle with double-mindedness in Romans 7:15-25. He describes the battle against our nature, how we want to follow God's instructions and do right, but the sin that still dwells in us presses us to transgress and behave carnally. It is the old, bitter contention between the enlightened mind and the selfish flesh that all God's elect must face.

Eve shows her double-mindedness at the birthplace of human nature in Genesis 3:1-6. Her response to the serpent indicates that she knew what God had said about eating the forbidden tree's fruit. Satan's deceit caused her to vacillate in making a decision. Then she made justifications based on her carnal longings: The fruit was eye-catching, probably tasted good, and promised enlightenment (see I John 2:16). She made her choice, not on God's Word, but on her heart's desires. This led to Adam and Eve hiding from God in shame and guilt, and then, instead of admitting they were wrong, they lied to shift the blame.

Unlike Jesus, their focus was not on pleasing God but on satisfying their hearts' desires. This double-mindedness made them insincere and hypocritical in their worship of God. By considering His instructions to be merely equal—or even less!—to their own desires, they revealed that they believed more in themselves than in the One who created everything.

We do the same thing. We sin because we justify our actions based on our hearts' desires and believe ourselves over what God says. Instead of truth, we believe falsehoods—and sin.

The Parable of the Pharisee and the Publican in Luke 18:9-14 illustrates this double-mindedness. The publican "went down to his house justified" because he admitted his sinfulness; he confessed that God was right, and he was wrong. He was of a single mind on the issue of his unworthiness and desired to change. Conversely, the Pharisee purported to follow God, but inside, he was swollen with pride and insincere, believing his piety made him worthy.

We, too, can become deceived and justify ourselves. We can reach the point where we become so self-absorbed that we cannot recognize our faults, or we may even see them as virtues. We tell ourselves that we are not so bad—certainly better than the world. This attitude becomes a challenging problem to overcome if we, like the Pharisee, view our calling as a badge of honor rather than an obligation. It becomes a matter of pride rather than a call to serve God.

Herein lies the warning. If we are not careful, overcoming will become difficult, if not impossible, due to double-mindedness. If we allow our human nature equal say in our decisions, it will take advantage of our emerging but still-weak godly nature and take over. Our worship will become insincere, our focus on God will blur, and our relationship with Him will weaken.

Using the Feast of Unleavened Bread as a background, Paul writes in I Corinthians 5:7-8:

Therefore purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new lump, since you truly are unleavened. For indeed Christ, our Passover, was sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.

Here, Paul refers to Joshua 24:14, where Joshua tells Israel, "Now therefore, fear the LORD, serve Him in sincerity and truth, and put away the gods which your fathers served . . .. Serve the LORD!" Sincerity means "honesty of mind; freedom from hypocrisy." Paul is teaching us that, through Christ, we must purge our double-mindedness and insincerity, our self-deception, and our desires to please ourselves rather than God. These are the gods we and our forefathers have served. We must abandon them altogether!

If we want to live a life worthy of our calling, we must treasure the truth and sincerely worship God. We must eliminate any attitudes or feelings of superiority over others, and instead, we must serve God and His people. We must root out all deception and cling to the truth. We must tamp down the desires of our carnal hearts, always putting God and His instructions first.

Because of the sin that resides within our nature, we alone will never be truly worthy of our calling or to take the Passover. Only through Christ—who has saved us, chosen to help us overcome, given us the truth, and intercedes for us with God—are we considered worthy. But He will not force us to obey; we must choose to follow Him and Him alone!

To follow Him properly, we must constantly examine ourselves and repent of every sin, every carnal attitude, and every wrong perspective we find in our hearts. To make this work, we have to be honest with ourselves. We must admit what we are and turn to Christ with a whole heart, as He alone can save us from this body of death. We need to look beyond our sins and focus on what causes us to sin, the rot that remains in our hearts! By doing so, we can overcome our double-mindedness and become one with Christ.