Category Archives: Sin

Light expels darkness; holiness expels sin

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Yesterday I began presenting some thoughts about holiness and sin being unable to exist in the same place, seeing this as an explanation as to why sin must be removed in order for someone to be in the presence of God.

As I mentioned, I compare this to light and darkness. Darkness can’t remain in the presence of a bright light. The light expels it.

John uses this fact to describe God when he writes:

“This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth.”
(1 John 1:5–6 NIV)

The New Testament frequently uses darkness to describe evil, while describing God as light. The two can’t go together.

My thought is that God’s holiness acts toward sin as light does toward darkness. There can be no mingling of the two. Where the godly one exists (holiness, light) the other cannot. God is life so there is no death where he is. God is truth so there can be no lie in him.

God is holy. That holiness expels and destroys sin.

We were all dead in sin. Some still are.

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seekingContinuing the train of thought from yesterday, I’d like to look at how the apostle Paul talked about sin. Think about what he told Titus:

At one time we too were foolish, disobedient, deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. (Titus 3:3-5)

We were lost. God saved us. Some are still lost. They need to be saved.

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. (Ephesians 2:1-5)

Some are disobedient. We were among them. We were dead. In sin. Now God has saved us. The disobedient still need to be saved! They are still dead. They are still in sin.

When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins. (Colossians 2:13)

Dead. Because of sin. Not just the Colossians. Not just the Gentiles. “He forgave us…”

We can’t lose this message. It’s too important. I once was lost, but now am found, was blind, but now I see. I was a sinner. Dead in sin. Lost. God saved me.

Some are still disobedient. They are dead in sin. They need to be saved. They need the good news of salvation, the hope of eternal life, the message that in Jesus God is offering salvation to the whole world, to all who will obey, to all who will come to him in faith.

Sinners in need of grace

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seekingIt’s becoming popular these days to leave sin out of the presentation of the good news of Jesus. Let’s talk about Kingdom. Let’s talk about becoming a member of the people of God. Let’s talk about taking part in the restoration of all things.

But let’s don’t talk about sin. That seems to be the spirit of the day.

As I’ve said before, it’s one of the usual pendulum swings that we get regarding theology and Christian living. One generation emphasizes one thing, so a later generation feels the need to reject that one thing and go to the other extreme. That’s the very tendency we have to fight against.

Many car wrecks occur due to what is called oversteering. It’s an overreaction to a situation that calls for a correction in steering. The panicked driver turns the wheel sharply, worsening the situation rather than helping. Instead of running off onto the shoulder, they veer across the center lane into a headon collision. Instead of sliding on the ice, they throw their car into an out-of-control spin. Instead of hitting a road hazard, the driver throws their car sideways across several lanes of traffic.

Overcorrection in the church is no better. Removing judgment and sin from our vocabulary is not the way to respond to a perceived overemphasis of those themes. Let’s talk about the Kingdom and Kingdom values and restoring a fallen world, but let’s not forget that the Bible teaches that each of us needs the forgiveness of sin.

We will never reach a lost world if we don’t admit that world is lost. We will never reach a lost world if we don’t admit that we were lost until God’s grace reached us. We will never reach a lost world if we delete sin from our vocabulary.

The condemning spirit

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I took one of my blog posts and adapted it for the use of Heartlight Magazine. The article was called “She Had An Abortion.” It ran on their website last Wednesday.

I received a number of comments on that article, mostly positive. One was blisteringly negative. The writer said, “Tim can Criticize Christians for Speaking the Truth ? But Christians Are Wrong for Speaking the Truth Against sin ??” He ended the e-mail by saying:

Shame on the False Teacher , teaching Half-Truths.. Read the Text, Read your Bible, You have One Life, you have an enemy and sin IS his weapon.

As I read it, I felt sorry for the person that wrote it. Not that I’m against speaking out against sin, but this person was advocating vigorous condemnation of those entrapped by sin. When I commented about the message to Steve Ridgell, my co-worker, he immediately said, “That person is hiding something in their own life.”

A flash of recognition came over me. That’s where I’d heard that tone before. Those who are hardest on sin are typically those with hidden sin in their own lives. They are especially merciless if they can relate to that sin. The person struggling with sexual sin will condemn the adulterer with a fury. The person fighting addiction will denounce the alcoholic. I’ve seen it enough to know that it’s true.

There’s usually one of three things going on:

  1. These people don’t understand that salvation is by grace.
  2. These people don’t understand that God’s forgiveness is ongoing.
  3. They aren’t aware of the work of the Holy Spirit in helping us overcome the flesh.

Because they are painfully conscious of the struggles in their own lives, they can be brutal with those who yield to similar temptations. They’ve seen the ugliness of sin in their own hearts, been repulsed by it, and direct that repulsion to others.

Obviously, that’s not true of everyone. But I’ve seen it far too many times. Even in myself.

photo by E. Cerroni

Sinners are people too

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She made a mistake. A big one. It was over a quarter of a century ago, but it haunts her daily.

She got pregnant. And, despite being totally against it in principle, she had an abortion.

Now it’s 2012, and she’s reaching out by phone, calling a Christian non-profit, desperately seeking some words of comfort and hope. Her family doesn’t know. Her minister doesn’t know. The one other person who knows doesn’t seem to share her pain and remorse, though he was just as responsible in the situation as she was.

She talks to me, a stranger. She won’t even tell me her first name. She cries most of the time. She speaks of her fear of one day facing her unborn child. She speaks of her fear of being found out by family and friends. Most of all she speaks of her fear that God will never forgive her.

What she hears around her offers her no comfort. Christians saying that everyone involved with abortion is headed straight for the lake of fire. Family members saying that baby killers deserve any and all punishment that God gives them. Church leaders taking a strong stand against abortion, unwittingly heaping increasing loads of guilt on this woman’s shoulders.

I don’t know that I was able to help. She said that I was the first that had given her any hope, and I pray that I was able to do just that. Wish I’d remembered 1 John 3:20, the verse that says that when our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our heart. I did tell her that God is bigger than any sin that we might commit, that his grace can cover even our worst misdeeds. And we prayed together.

It’s a reminder to me, a call to gentler speech. This is a reminder to you, about the same. It’s easy to grab the rocks and throw them against the sinners: the abortionists, the drug dealers, the adulterers, the homosexuals. It’s also wrong.

I need these words engraved on my heart: “Whichever one of you has committed no sin may throw the first stone.”

We need to know how to take a hard stand against sin without trampling sinners in the process.

photo by Xenia Antunes