There is no Christian (or person for that matter) I know that does not struggle with one or more (and if we are honest, it is “or more”) brands of sin that he or she is convicted of and wants to get out from under. The common counsel given by the church today seems to be:
- Remember, you are saved by grace. God has forgiven you of everything. And if the friend/discipler/pastor you are taking to is really good, he or she will also tell you that you are perfectly loved and accepted by God now because of Jesus. Your successes or failures will not add or detract from that acceptance or love.
- You have the Holy Spirit living inside you now. You are no longer controlled by sin. Jesus freed you from that. Jesus wants you to live abundantly (John 10:10). Through Him we can take every thought captive for Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5). If you abide in His word, and you know the truth you can be free (John 8:32).
- You have done the first part which is confess your sin and admit that you struggle with this (James 5:16). Now you need to come up with a plan to fight against this sin. Here are some Scriptures to memorize that you need to recite when you are tempted. Here are some resources that you can use by some great Christian authors. Follow these instructions and believe that God wants you free of this and do the hard work of recognizing your weaknesses, changing your habits and thought patterns, and you will win. God does not want you to be controlled by this sin, so you know that with Him on your side you can beat it.
What I have been learning is that this oft given counsel and the books and materials that are promoted with it, don’t often work. They may give confidence for a while, but the war against our particular brands of sin we desperately want to be free from seems to just go on and on.
Is that your experience too? One of the things my old mentor Charlie Jones used to say was, “What you hear doesn’t do you a whole lot of good. Because if what you hear did you a whole lot of good, you’d be a whole lot better than you are because you have heard a lot of good stuff haven’t you!” I think he was right.
Albert Einstein is famous for saying the height of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. We want to think we can overcome sin and re-write our brains with better thoughts and so get free of a particular sin. But, if we are honest with ourselves, I think experience tells us that this is not really true.
I think the problem may be that we are looking to deal with sin by treating it with law instead of grace. Law never produces righteousness, it never gets rid of sin (Romans 3:20, 8:3, Hebrews 7:11, 19). It may suppress it. It may modify our behavior. But law—be it God’s Law or human law—never produces righteousness. All it does is show we can’t live up to it. When we tell people they can stop doing a particular sin by doing A, B, and C (no matter how good A, B, and C may be) we are treating sin with law, and law does not do the trick. Law shows us what is required. That is good to know. Law convicts us and shows that we don’t measure up (also good to know). But law doesn’t make sin go away. Law does not lead to victory.
“But what are we supposed to do? Certainly you don’t think we should just give up or cozy up to our sin? Don’t you think that God wants us to give up sin? Don’t you think that God has made that possible in Christ?”
I am all for fighting against sin. I do believe that God in His grace can give us victory. But I think the way to do that is not by committing to a program, or a process or a method.
No matter what we do with the head, we are not able to change our hearts. Only God is able to do that. And that is where the problem is (Matthew 15:18-20). We need to remember that while our sins are all forgiven, we are still sinners. Our sin nature no longer defines who we are in God’s eyes, but it is still there. Grace forgives sin, it does not cure us of it. This is the reality Paul was trying to express and explain in Romans 7:14-25 (NIV),
We know that the law is spiritual; but I am unspiritual, sold as a slave to sin. I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. For I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good I want to do, but the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but it is sin living in me that does it.
So I find this law at work: Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!
So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin.
Whatever our approach to dealing with sin is, it needs to own that truth. This side of the grave, we are never going to be free from that war. We can learn about our sin, become familiar with its roots, it motivations, the ways it trips us up…and that will go a long way to helping us avoid falling into its trap so easily. We can get good at fighting, but don’t think we get to the point where it is ever beaten.
I have been learning that the most effective way of addressing sin is not by committing to a program, or a process or a method, but to the Person, Jesus Christ. Build your love for Christ, ask God for Him to help you love Him more. The more you fall in love with Jesus, the more sin loses its appeal. Sin, after all is not a head problem, but a heart problem. And when it comes right down to it, it is owning God’s grace and love and being more and more caught up in the beauty and wonder of it that will deal with sin. After all, we want to please what we love. We become like what we love.
The more we love God, the more we will see that we need His grace even more than we thought. The humility that that dependence on God’s grace produces, grows compassion, mercy, gentleness, and grace. We aren’t going to be surprised by sin, in us or anyone else. The more we know God’s love for us, the more we will rest in knowing that we have nothing to prove. His love for us is not dependent on what we do or don’t do but on what Christ did. The Christian never has to worry about making God smile at them, because of Christ, He always is. That acceptance of how God sees us in His love produces a God-grounded confidence that grows kindness, patience, long-suffering, goodness, peace, and joy.
When those fruits of the Spirit are present and growing the music they play in the heart reveals the discord in the alluring tones of sin and works to drown out its call.
I have some more thoughts on this but I think this is getting a bit long. I would love to know what you think.
Learning To Be Full Of Grace And Truth. 