Sin is Destructive
I am so glad you are sharing your time with me today! Continuing with the topic of sin, we will follow up on our two previous posts. If you have not had the chance to read them yet, I encourage you to do so. They are 4/26/23, “The Empowerment of Grace” and 5/3/23, “Are You Bound By Sin?” Eric
Sin is a serious necessary topic for us to look at. In today’s world, many voices are demeaning, minimizing, or attempting to cancel those who teach the truth and are, in fact, rejecting the truth. The progressive narratives today are calling good evil and evil good.
To avoid any confusion, we will Biblically define ‘sin’. Then, we will search the Scriptures focusing on answering the questions of why “sin” is not to be ignored or taken lightly; why as believers, we still have to contend with sin even though our sin is forgiven; and finally, understanding why grace is no excuse to sin.
The Hebrew word for sin is chattah and according to Brown—Drive-Briggs Lexicon, it means: a miss, or misstep, to go or do wrong, or to commit a mistake. We gain more understanding by looking at 1 Samuel 15:22 and 23 (NKJV), “So Samuel said: "Has the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, As in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, And to heed than the fat of rams. 23 For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, And stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, He also has rejected you from being king." The root word of rebellion, mara, means : rebellious, disobedient, disobey, and bitter against. The Hebrew word for witchcraft is qesem meaning: divination, enchantment, false vision and lying. The prophet Samuel told Saul, ‘to obey God is better than sacrifice.” He told Saul that to disobey is rebellion. We can infer from the next part of the verse that when we rebel, we are being stubborn (being insolent, arrogant and presumptuous.) and being stubborn is as iniquity (wickedness) and idolatry. Let us remember that Saul had been appointed as king by God.
In our last blog post (5/3/23), “Are You Bound By Sin?” we discussed that by the shed blood of Christ, our sins are forgiven and forgotten by God. We also shared that for believers, even though our sins are forgotten and have no power over us, we still sin and have to take action on it. The needed action is revealed to us in 1 John 1:8 and 9 (NKJV), “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” The Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, (John 16:8) and we choose whether or not to confess it and turn away from it. (repent).
The first thing I’d like to establish today concerns the free will God gave to mankind. God did not control Adam and Eve, but gave them the freedom to make a choice. Genesis 2: 16 and 17, “And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, "You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, 17 but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die." Then we read in Genesis 3:6, “So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate, and she also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate.” Adam and Eve had the freedom to, and did, disobey the Lord’s command.
Even though it is God’s desire that all will be saved, yet, as those who have been given a free will, whether or not we do accept God’s gift of salvation is totally dependent on the choice we make. John 3:16-18, “"For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.”
We also see examples of the ‘free will’ provision from God in the Old Testament. Joshua 24:15, “And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the LORD, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD." Then in Deuteronomy 30:19, we read, “I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live,”
Then the Apostle Paul establishes that we continually face making choices. Romans 7:15 and 19, “For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. ... 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.” We never lose our freedom and privilege to choose.
However, we must realize that because God has given us the freedom of choice, we choose either, to live a life of righteousness or unrighteousness. We cannot blame anyone else for our choices.
You see, even though we are forgiven of past, present, and future sins by Jesus’ blood, there are still consequences of sin. If you rob a bank, you go to jail. If you choose to involve yourself in illicit sex, you may contract a sexually transmitted disease, or lose a marriage. If you choose to use illegal drugs, you will destroy your mind and body. If you gossip or lie, you could lose a friend.
God chose in advance to provide a way to redeem mankind from his rebellious choices.
Ephesians 1:5 (NLT), “God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure.”
1 Timothy 2:3,4, “This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.”
2 Peter 3:9, “The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.”
We live by grace, the unmerited favor of God, and our sins are forgiven, however, we still must choose what kind of life we live and who we serve. Romans 5:19-21, “For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous. 20 Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, 21 so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Romans 6:1-4, “1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? 3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.”
2 Corinthians 5:17 (NKJV), “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.”
Romans 6:15,16, “What then? Are we to sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! 16 Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?”
We are called to maturity in Christ in order that we can become strong enough to not be drawn back into a life of sin and the possibility of rejecting Christ.
Hebrews 6:1-6, “Therefore let us leave the elementary doctrine of Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again a foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, 2 and of instruction about washings, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. 3 And this we will do if God permits. 4 For it is impossible, in the case of those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, 5 and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, 6 and then have fallen away, to restore them again to repentance, since they are crucifying once again the Son of God to their own harm and holding him up to contempt. The phrase ‘fallen away’ means to walk away from Christianity.
2 Peter 2: 19-22, “They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved. 20 For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. 21 For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. 22 What the true proverb says has happened to them: "The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire."
We see clearly through these last two Scriptures that it is possible to lose the relationship you have with Christ, based on the choices you make. Did you notice that verse 19 of 2 Peter reveals that “whatever overcomes” a person , to that he is enslaved (or in bondage to), as we saw also in Romans 6:16?
I want to be very clear here, I am not saying that every time you sin, you have lost your salvation. However, you do need to discern that grace is not an excuse to sin. Romans 6:1 and 2, “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?”
If we knowledgeably continue to choose acts of disobedience, eventually, we will be overcome by it.
Praise God for Romans 6:17 and 18, “ But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, 18 and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness.” When you choose to become wholeheartedly obedient to the teaching of the Word and you have committed yourself to it, the choice to reject Christ becomes very difficult to make. The Holy Spirit will keep after you to keep you in the fold.
Romans 6:16, “Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness?” The sad point made though, in this verse, is that if you yield (present yourself) to sin, the consequence will be death. Death in this verse is the Greek word, thanatos and means: all the miseries arising from sin, as well as physical death and the loss of a life consecrated to God and blessed in him on earth, to be followed by wretchedness in the lower world. (Thayer’s Greek Lexicon).
We are exhorted then to stand firm in our faith so that we are not drawn back to the slavery of sin. Galatians 5:1, “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery.” Then we read in verses, 16-21, “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. 17 For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other, to keep you from doing the things you want to do. 18 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.” This is a very blunt warning concerning of the danger and consequences of sin. We must, by our choices, put the desires of our flesh under the control of the Spirit of God.
God’s grace does not negate our free will. Hebrews 10:26, “For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins,”
I believe we have seen that sin is not a thing to be ignored or made light of. It is destructive and breaks our fellowship with God: 1 John 1:5-7, “This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. 7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.” We have also seen that even though Jesus’ blood has provided for our sins to be forgiven and forgotten, as people given a free will, we still have to contend with sin. Then finally, we saw that grace is not an excuse to sin.
Be encouraged, since you have chosen to be in relationship with Jesus Christ, you also have His Spirit living inside you to help you overcome sin.
As a result of our being a new creation in Christ, we are able, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to walk in that newness of life.
Do not become intimidated or join the camp of those who clamor that evil is good and good is evil.
Stand firm in your faith! Read your Bible. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.
Resist sin!
Choose to be filled with His Spirit!
Allow the fruit of the Spirit to be manifested in your life.
Grow in His likeness and walk in His light!
Obey His Word and you will share in the joy of His presence!
Till next time, remember, God loves you!
Unless otherwise noted, all scripture is taken from the English Standard Version.
NKJV New King James Version
NLT New Living Translation