We can have no greater enemy than that which separates us from God. The Prophet Isaiah, speaking to the people of his day, said: “Behold for your iniquities have ye sold yourselves, and for your transgressions is your mother put away. Wherefore, when I came, was there no man? When I called, was there none to answer?” (Isa. 50: 1, 2)
WHAT IS SIN?
The First Epistle of John, chapter3, verse 4, reads: “Sin is the transgression of the law.” This is a common definition of sin. Weymouth translates the verse, “Everyone who commits sin also commits lawlessness: for sin is lawlessness.” We have a word for lawlessness—anarchy. The dictionary defines it as the “absence or lack of government, hence a lawless condition of society – confusion in general – the theory of absolute, individual liberty.” The essence of sin is selfishness—man having his way in defiance of God’s will. Because He doesn’t want a “lawless” world, God has instituted government, with laws and penalties—and violation of these laws is called sin.
But in God’s Kingdom there may be sin when there is no outward violation of His law. Jesus said:”Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: But I say unto you, that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart” (Matt 5:27, 28). Be careful how you hate any one; hate is the essence of murder, and in the sight of God, one may be a murderer who has not actually taken life. The seat of sin is in the heart, the inner man. Christ laid emphasis upon this when He said: “For out of the heart proceed evil thought, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts false witness, blasphemies …” (Matt 5:19). A man is corrupt or pure in proportion as his inner life is corrupt or pure. “Keep thy heart with all diligence; for out of it are the issues of life” (Prov 4:23) is a scriptural admonition that one should always heed.
Lack of love is sin. “He that loveth not knoweth God: for God is love” (I John 4:8). “But if anyone has this world’s goods and sees that his brother is in need, and yet closes his heart against him—how can love for God continue in him?” (I John 3:17).
EVIL EFFECTS OF SIN
“The way of transgressors is hard” (Prov 13:15). We reap what we sow. “Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting” (Gal 6:7, 8).
“Let no one who is tried by temptation say, ‘May temptation comes from God’; God is incapable of being tempted by evil and he tempts no one. Everyone is tempted as he is beguiled and allured by his own desire; then Desire conceives and breeds Sin, while Sin matures and give birth to Death” (James 1:13-15 Moffatt).
GOD’s ATTITUDE TOWARD SIN
St. Paul states God’s attitude toward sin in these words: “For wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness” (Rom 1:8). Sin is abhorrent to God, “because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be” (Rom 8:7). It is against all that God stands for and for all that God is against. The more spiritually-minded one is, the more he abhors sin. Henry Drummond was a deeply spiritual Christian. Dwight L. Moody, in his evangelistic services abroad, called on him to help in the “inquiry room.” Drummond met many tough characters in this work, and later wrote of them: “Such tales of woe I’ve heard in Moody’s inquiry room that I have felt that I must go out and change my very clothes after the contact! Oh, I’m sick with the sins of these men! How can God bear it?”
If sin can appear so offensive to man, how must it appear to God?--H. H. Smith, Sr. 1959
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