Today I’m going into a topic which I don’t normally like to dwell on a great deal; and that is sin. However, in order to build up high, we first need to dig very low.
We read in Psalm 25, verse 11, “For the sake of your name, LORD,
forgive my iniquity, though it is great.” (NIV) The reason that God forgives our iniquity
is because of his character; because of who he is.
However,
there’s even more to it. I really like the way that the ESV puts the second
line of this verse. It has, “pardon my guilt, for it is great.”
That is the
reason our sins need forgiveness – because they are so great. It’s not
something that we can fix up through some other actions, or set up a payment
plan to pay off our crimes. It’s like we’re trying to pay off the $35 trillion
national debt of the United States, and all we have is the savings in our piggy
bank.
J.C. Ryle describes
this situation using the phrase “the exceeding sinfulness of sin.” Sometimes we
fail to fully grasp how exceedingly sinful sin actually is before God.
So let’s back
up a bit. What is sin? One way to describe it is the moral disease that has
affected every man and woman since Adam and Eve. It is the slightest departure
from complete parallelism and agreement with God’s revealed will and character.
Hence “a sin” is doing, saying, thinking or imagining anything that is not in
perfect conformity with the mind and law of God.
This can occur
even without obvious acts of wickedness. We sin in things we do, and we sin in
things that we do not do (known as sins of omission). Sin pervades our
understanding, our affections, our reasoning, and our will. Even after we are
regenerated through Christ, it is a lifelong fight. Just think of the examples
we have of Peter and Paul. Paul wrote to the Romans, “… For I have the desire
to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For I do not do the good that I
want to do, but the evil I do not want to do – this I keep on doing.” (Rom
7:18b-19; NIV).
Even the best
of our actions are stained by impure motives. I know that a lot of the time, I
want to rebel against God’s will for how I should live – whether that is in an
obvious fashion, or rebellion disguised as some more palatable dish. And then,
we can sin in ignorance. But ignorance of the law is no excuse for breaking it.
And we know sin
is a big problem. After all, without sin we wouldn’t need salvation. We
wouldn’t need justification, and we wouldn’t need the process of
sanctification. But the point I’m making today is that sin is not a big
problem. It’s a really, really big problem.
If you have a
running list of ‘things we can’t fully comprehend in this life’, then I think
you can add to that list: “We can’t fully understand the offensiveness and
vileness of sin in God’s sight.” The reason that I say this is because we have
no yardstick to measure it against.
A blind man can’t tell the difference between the Mona Lisa and a stick figure painting by a five year old. There is simply no metric for him to realise the beauty of one of the paintings and the rudimentary form of the other. Take another example: pigs don’t know that they’re wallowing around in the filth of a pigsty. It really doesn’t bother them, because they don’t see it for what it is.
In the same
way, we’re so used to wallowing in sin that we find it hard to see it for what
it truly is. We’re living in a fallen world, growing up in sin and surrounded
by sinners, breathing an atmosphere of imperfection. So we can only form an
inadequate conception of our hideous crimes.
Just a few
verses to illustrate this:
·
“Your
eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrongdoing.” (Hab 1:13a)
·
“For
whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of
breaking all of it.” (Jam 2:10)
·
“For
the wages of sin is death…” (Rom 6:23a)
If that is it,
those are some pretty scary verses. We are often tempted to dabble around and justify
our sin, or rank it as if that makes it better. Oh, it is just a little sin. It’s not as bad as some other
people I know. It’s harmless. It doesn’t hurt anyone else. I have good intentions.
I think – how
many times have I lied? How many times have I called my brother or sister a
fool? How many times have I looked at someone with lust? How many times have I
been jealous of someone else, or envious of what they have? How many times have
I engaged in gossip or slander? Even though I haven’t committed murder or
adultery or theft – Jesus says that I actually have in my heart.
Every single time
we choose our way over God’s, then we are engaging in the ultimate crime:
treason against the divine ruler. And treason gets the death penalty. We are
all on death row until we receive a divine pardon.
And this is
where we can best visualise the “exceeding sinfulness of sin”. The ultimate
proof of how terrible our sin is – is in the cross and suffering of Jesus to
pay the price for it. What guilt could be so great that nothing but the blood
of the son of God could pay for it?
You can’t know
the true value of wealth unless you know what it’s like to be in poverty. You
can’t fully appreciate true, elated joy unless you have been in the pit of
despair. And you can’t fully appreciate the goodness of the good news unless
you realise the blackness of your own sin.
Let us thank
God for his indescribable gift! We don’t need to be afraid of looking at the
terribleness of our sin if we have our other eye fixed on Jesus, who paid the
price for it.
Rom 5:20a says,
“But where sin increased, grace increased all the more.” And that sums up the
gospel: Our sin is great. God’s grace is infinitely greater.
Bibliography
Ryle, J.C.
(2010). Holiness. Moody Publishers. Abridged version.