There’s an old story about the laconic New England farmer. The wife isn’t feeling well, so off he goes to church on his own. When he returns, his wife asks what the minister preached about. “Sin,” he tells her. Trying to drag more out of him, she says, “Well, what did he say about it?” His reply: “He was against it.”
So was the Apostle Paul, who told us, “Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its desires.” (Romans 6:12) They key is in the word “reign”; we are not to let sin control us, have dominion over us. Sin has so many bad effects, that any sin, no matter how small we think it is, is destructive.
Paul said that the wages of sin was death; James agreed, “Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it has run its course, brings forth death.” (James 1:15) We tend to think of the death caused by sin in cosmic terms; that is, sin causes death in the form of eternal damnation and separation from God. That is absolutely correct. But don’t ignore the fact that every sin also kills something right here and now. Every time we lie, our sense of truth, our ability to be truthful, dies a bit more. The trust others might have had in us dies. Every time we look at porn, the ability to have a normal relationship dies a bit, a bit of our respect for women dies a bit. We are killing the ability to see a lady as a person; she becomes just an object for us to lust over. Every time we sin, our fellowship with God dies, and he will not hear us: “If I regard wickedness in my heart, The Lord will not hear…” (Psalm 66:18) Every time we sin, something dies.
As a result, sin is addictive; it gains power over us as it kills what is true and good and right and normal. Some sins are obviously addictive: drugs and alcohol fit here neatly. But while every sin may not be physically addictive, all sins are psychologically addictive, but as it kills the normal and right, it is burning new neural pathways in our brain. Our brains are wired and re-wired by the choices we make. Psychology is just waking up to “neural plasticity,” the fact that choices create actual physiological changes in the brain. When we sin, our brains are becoming wired to that way of thinking, creating habits that are just as truly physically addicting as drugs and alcohol and smoking.
At that point, the problem becomes the fact you have to live with the consequences. You repent, and seek God’s forgiveness, and you are just in His sight, clothed in righteousness. But He in His sovereignty does not always remove the consequences. We’ve got broken relationships, lost others’ trust and respect, and sometimes physical problems that linger. Think of how David’s sin played out in the next generation – the raping of Tamar by Amnon, leading to Absolom’s rebellion, and could we include Solomon’s sexual addiction? In a way, all sin leaves us with physical consequence: habits of thinking burned in neural pathways that we struggle to rewrite.
A quick thought on that last paragraph: many of us have the most boring testimonies in the world, a fact that became clear in our small groups these last few weeks. Rejoice in that! You need to understand what a blessing it is to have been saved at age five or six or seven before you got into bad sins, and grew up in a Christian home that required Christian behavior. You have so little to deal with, so many consequences you have avoided, so much that you don’t have to live down. I hear young people say they need to do some wild living, because they’ve been told all their lives how wrong it is, but they’ve got to FIND OUT FOR THEMSELVES! What they don’t get is that, yes, the Lord will welcome them home one day when they return, but they’re going to be packing more baggage than a 747.
Sin is serious stuff. You can’t mess around with it. If you want to understand the sinfulness of sin, just look at what it took to redeem it – the death of God Himself. The horror of that sacrifice shows us the horror of even our smallest sins. So if your wife asks what you were reading, just tell her it was about sin – he was against it.
THINK ABOUT IT:
- 1. What sin can't you conquer? How can you break that habit?
- 2. Are you dealing with baggage from past sin?
- 3. Do you understand God has forgotten it?
- 4. What might that baggage teach you that you could share with a younger Christian?
You can comment below with thoughts or questions
2nd Annual Bibles, Brass, and BBQ event - Saturday, June 7 from 12:00 - 4 pm. This event is for men 13 years old and up. Click the button for more info and to get signed up!
