Dealing with this issue of (s, i, n)

Okay, you are a Christian.  Yet we have this “sin thing” that is still an issue for each of us…we just try to hide it from other Christians.  Maybe we can overcome this thing through our own efforts.  Ha!

Sin “Management” 

When we try to manage our sin through willpower, the process looks something like this:

Sin. . . confess.. do better for a while, then sin again.  Embarrassment, confess again, ask God to take away the desire, then sin again, confess again, sin again, confess again, shock, more determination to stop sinning, think about it a lot, examine it.  Make promises, create some boundaries, and sin again, now even worse than before.  Despair, anger, shame, distance from God, guilt.  Self-condemnation, self-loathing…sin again.  Disillusionment, doubt, self -pity; resentment at God: Why doesn’t He hear my prayers?  Why doesn’t he do some­thing? More anger. Then fear that we allow ourselves to get angry with God.  Then real confession, a heartfelt one, and a sense of cleansing.  Ah, a new start.  Things seem better.  Yeah, I’ve finally got this sin under control.  Oops, sin again.  Desperate efforts, bargains struck.  Once-and-for-all healing,  Really mean it this time.  Sin again.  Lose hope, give up, rationalize, mini­mize, blame, pull away, hide, judge others, put on a mask, go past the sin again, and so on.

This scenario, in varying degrees, depicts the pattern many Christians live out all their lives. This roller coaster ride has no happy ending.  It only causes us to feel beaten down, to compromise our integrity, to feel cynical about this second-class life we lead.

Worse, a sin management system shuts off the only resource that can deal with sin: our trust in who God says we are, attracting the power of his grace.

Confession Is Limited 

Confession does not resolve our sin either. To be sure, admitting our sin is an important part of the process—but words do not resolve sin.         We can be sorry for something we have done wrong, and even confess it, and still desire to continue doing it.  Agreeing that we have done something wrong is not the same as trusting God with what we have done.  Sin is resolved when we are cleansed of it, and only depend­ence upon the cross of Jesus cleanses us from sin.  There is power there.

How does grace make repentance a gift for us—a gift that actually resolves our sin issues?

Grace Empowered Repentance

When grace introduces us to repentance, the two of us become best friends.  When anything else introduces us to repentance, it feels like the warden has come to lock us up.  But when grace gets involved, the truths of repentance reveal a fabulous world of life-freeing beauty.

Repentance is about trusting, not willing!

from the book TrueFaced

by Thrall, McNicol, & Lynch

submitted by Paul Neighbors