Lately, I have been struggling with some of the sin issues I thought I had mostly laid to rest in my past. It got me to thinking about sin and how, by now in my walk with Christ, I should be able to react as a mature believer especially when confronted with sin in others.
Let me make this a little clearer. These past few weeks I found myself getting really angry with my teenage children for various reasons: disrespect, lack of love, goading others into sin, harsh words, and so forth. I would snap at them, raise my voice, and order them to stop their behavior. Many times the conflict would erupt into a loud verbal skirmish and I would leave the encounter dismayed at my reaction. I would then be upset about the situation, their sinful behavior, and thoroughly disappointed in myself.
This entire week I have been praying about my heart and asking God to show me what is wrong with me that I can’t seem to get a grip on dealing with sin in my own life the right way. As I prayed, He began to show me the different stages of sin and our responses to it.
RECOGNITION: When we were unbelievers, we acted and made decisions apart from God’s law, in direct opposition to it. When we first come to acknowledge that God’s law exists, we recognize that because God’s law does exist, we are, therefore, unrighteous sinners who have broken this law and made ourselves into enemies of God. When the Spirit of God speaks to our hearts and exposes our sin, we RECOGNIZE 1 John 1:8-9 that “if we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” The first step in the Christian life is to recognize that sin exists and we are sinners. As our faith grows, we are still babies in the faith, but we become more aware of when we sin because now we have the Holy Spirit’s presence to convict us of unrighteousness. In other words, we know exactly when we sin. It is neither hidden nor hard to find. The Holy Spirit speaks very loudly in these situations.
RESISTANCE: As we grow in our relationship to God and move into a more child-like faith, we begin to see ourselves coming into a sinful situation, and we should begin to lean into being more self-controlled and like Christ, resisting the sin that the situation unearths. Take 1 Corinthians 10:13 for example. The Apostle Paul promises us that “no temptation has overtaken you beyond what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.” Remember back the Old Testament in the book of Genesis, chapter 39, when Potiphar’s wife attempted to seduce Joseph into a sexual encounter? Scripture says that day after day Joseph refused her lures and then even refused to be anywhere near her. Joseph knew what she was asking was sinful and he resisted over and over so he would not displease God nor sin against his master, her husband. This is a phase of maturity that we can get stuck in for years, simply learning to resist sin and not give into it. This is good, this is important, but this is not the final place where God wants us to be.
RESPONSE: As we continue to growth in our faith, there is another big step to push us through to maturity. This is the ‘response’ phase, the place where one does not simply resist sinning in a situation, but one actively takes a step further and responds in love. We find the most perfect example in the person of Jesus Christ. He was beaten, scourged, flogged, whipped, and crucified and yet, the prophecy of Isaiah 53 was fulfilled in that “he did not open his mouth” and utter one word of complaint or accusation. He resisted sinning. His very act of dying that most painful and humiliating of deaths was the next step of response, and yet, he demonstrated how to respond in love when he cried out to the Father to “forgive them, for they know not what they do.” (Luke 23:34) Jesus, in the midst of his own intense physical torture, bloodied and bruised, managed to mentally step outside of his circumstances and beseech his Father on behalf of those who misused and abused him. THAT, my friends, is how we are to respond in any situation; we respond in love the way Christ did, in all humility and concern for the welfare of the offenders.
Where are you today in your assessment of sin in your life and how you view it? Have you simply recognized it for what it is? Great! Have you begun taking the next step of growth by learning to resist it? Even better! Now, I challenge you to push yourselves to become even more like Christ and RESPOND, in love, in whatever situation you find yourself. You will then be well on your way to maturity in Christ Jesus our Lord.