"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar."

     People like to understate and overstate issues, beliefs, opinions and other elements of their lives.  I've done that several times.  Not necessarily the high points of my life but admission that I've done this keeps it real.  Besides, I've learned from these events.  One of the questions that arises is why do we do it?  Feelings of being under important or overly important are but two of the reasons why we do this deed.  Sometimes we feel that the only way someone will hear us is if we over or under state our thoughts.  Sometimes we keep silent so that we won't be found out or have our theories destroyed.  Feelings of inadequacy are highly suspect when we can't see the cigar for what it is...a cigar.
     Why do we need to have a specific representation of what we believe?  Is it really because we believe so strongly or that we don't want to be found perpetuating less than the truth?  Selfishness comes into play almost immediately when we take something innocent and make it wrong or wrong and make it appear innocent.  Sometimes we are believed and other times we are tolerated or even confronted.  We live in a time when confusion is smoothed over by man's bias.  "Well, this may be the truth but he/she was justified thinking that way."  We "wink" at issues and beliefs where we should be standing up and testifying regarding "right" and "wrong."  Society is guilty and so are you and I.  Taking a stand and saying "it's a cigar." may be right but at what cost do we state this with conviction? 
     When my kids were little they, like all kids, were prone to making up stories, embellishing stories or just retelling stories that have previously been told.  We knew the story was imagination.  However, our child didn't necessarily know that.  But, because we love them we listened, asked questions and praised them for telling the story that may or may not be true.  As we trained our children in the way they should go (Biblical reference) we raised our expectation that they would put away childish things.  There should be a point in a person's life when they are "done" with that phase of our lives.  As long as mankind can find justification for what they believe, what they do and ignore the consequences the cigar will never be just a cigar.
     What we should believe is what God states in his Word.  Nothing more and nothing less.  The Word has been, is, and will be the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.  That is, if it's not changed by some individual or group who cannot tell a cigar from an orange.  Changing truth to reflect what we want it to doesn't lessen the reality of what that truth really reflects.  We have so many different Christian denominations that have different beliefs about what the Word says.  We "do it this way, not that way."  "That's what we used to believe."  "They just don't believe the way we do."  Call it what you may, when you change the unchangeable (God) to fit your changeable nature, it's sin.  The Bible says that "If we don't do what we know we should do, we sin." James 4:17.  Sin is sin. 
     Guilt on my part doesn't justify a change of the Word so that I can feel better about my sinning.  We do that.  It doesn't work.  Sometimes sin is just sin.  All the time the Word is the Word.