Tuesday August 26, 2013
Lust gets pregnant, and has a baby: sin! Sin grows up to adulthood, and becomes a real
killer. James 1:13 (TMSG)
In
1973 Dr. Karl Menninger wrote the classic “Whatever Became of Sin”. In a recent article Dr. James Emery White wrote
about Menninger’s message:
Menninger detailed how the theological notion
of sin became the legal idea of crime and then slid further from its true
meaning when it was relegated to the psychological category of sickness.[1]
“Sliding”
is a great way to understand how we lose the shocking value of something which
can do us harm. James used the birth
process to describe how sin works. It
begins like a pregnancy, births into actions, and, in the end, brings death
(always!).
These
slippery slides often proceed quite innocently.
When
our youngest, Carrie, was about five, I was painting the kitchen in the house
we’d just moved into. As our little one
walked past me on the ladder, she casually remarked about the uncovered
electrical outlets, “I know what happens when you put your finger in there,
Daddy.”
Well
– she had opened the topic, so I bit, “What happens, punkin’?”
“You
get allergic.”
allergic is a far cry from electrocuted!
Allergic,
indeed!
In
our culture, the shock-effect of sin has devolved to the point where any sense
of moral wrong, or its accompanying penalties, have not only been pushed aside
as irrelevant, but obliterated from memory as if the shame and consequences of
wrong only existed in some cartoon caricature of ancient and regrettable Puritanism. We have succeeded at taking the killing power
of sin and turning it into a minor allergy.
In
my role as “Daddy-in-residence” it was my duty to help my daughter understand
the difference between electrocution and a rash. (I must have done well; both my daughters
married guys who play with wires for a living).
As
a pastor it’s also my job to help us remember to always speak the truth about
how our actions have real consequences.
And it’s not just “choices” as if we are somehow morally-isolated from
the One who gave us life and the privilege to make those choices.
When
we choose against what God said is right and/or permissible, no amount of
“word-dance” (calling sin by a less-shocking title) will take sin’s
consequences out of the birth canal. Once
conceived, sin will always go full term; the birth of death – always.
Today
Our
culture has disconnected the wires from the power source…don’t fall for that
trap. Make it a point in your prayer
life, beginning right now, to name your sin. Call it what it is, and ask the Father’s
forgiveness. Then, count on what He has
promised:
But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to
forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness. 1 John 1:9 (NLT)
Don’t
confess the “allergy of poor choices” – confess your sins; the Faithful One
will cleanse every bit of it. He said
so!
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