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Category: sin
The Sin That Sticks
“If iniquity is in your hand, put it far away,
And do not let wickedness dwell in your tents.” NASB
“And give up your sins– even those you do in secret.” CEV
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“When the sentence for a crime is not quickly carried out, people’s hearts are filled with schemes to do wrong.”
Eccl. 8:11, NIV
We know it, deep inside of us. Our sin and iniquity, those things that stick to us, must be renounced and stripped away. I think it’s interesting that Job is working from the assumption that each of us has sin issues. I don’t think scripture is ever really shocked by the depth of our iniquity. We are sinners, and we will sin, but the Holy Spirit is never surprised or caught off guard by our sin and deceit. But we are, most certainly guilty.
This verse in Job emphasizes “renunciation”. That means relinquishing or repudiating the evil that we love doing. I think that in Job’s thinking it means abandoning our sinfulness. We are to let it go, releasing it to the grace of God. We are not to sin in secret.
We privatize our favorite sins to make ourselves acceptable. I think that this is a truism: “We care more for what people think of us, then what God thinks of us.” Our sin thrives in solitude, its like a warm and humid greenhouse for our evil. Secretiveness just causes it to grow, our hiddenness is “Miracle Grow” for our darkness and ugliness.
Job is very much concerned I think, by the contagiousness that sin has. We transmit the sin virus to our brothers and sisters in Christ. If we have a hidden darkness, we will most certainly sicken those we touch. Our Churches have been decimated by private and hidden sin. I’m thing of Achan in Joshua 7. He secretly desired nice things, and it destroyed him and his family.
What judgement will you bring on to your loved ones, and your church? What are you hiding? Often, I have heard questions like that, and it temporarily moves me. But it seems the change is not permanent (I desperately wish it was.) But I suggest that you go into your “tent” and bring your deceitfulness out into the full light of day. And then, put it to a merciless death.
Polluted Hearts
The gatekeeper opens the gate for him, and the sheep recognize his voice and come to him. He calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.
John 10:3
But God’s strong foundation continues to stand. These words are written on the seal: “The Lord knows those who belong to him,” and “Everyone who wants to belong to the Lord must stop doing wrong.”
2 Timothy 2:19
Identity is necessary. We can only prosper if we know who and exactly what we are. This may seem basic, but it’s coming at us through a culture that is murky and foul. The world offers up an evil concoction that pollutes and contaminates all that it can.
Our identity is exclusively based on what the Lord has done. It is we who must ‘catch-up’. He calls us by name, which staggers us and causes us to doubt. Who are we, and why us? We must deal with this ‘calling’ business– their must be some kind of mistake.
But Lord knows. In spite of all that we know about ourselves, He entertains Himself of a more subterranean assessment of us. He simply scoops us up, deeper and wider than we can spread out our pollution. He picks us up beyond our ability to contaminate. We are His, with all our foulness and evil attached.
We now have an identity. We have become His possession. Gummy, sticky decay and all. We are transferred out of a poisonous and ugly situation to be transplanted into a wholesome and healing environment. This is radical, and cannot be manipulated by our effort or control.
We find ourself to be transplanted into a good place. And it is there where we receive our new name. With that new name comes a new identity, and purpose. We are no longer poisonous or toxic to others. We cannot defile them with our concentrated evil. Our new name begins to affect us and others. He deals with us in a radically different manner.
He starts to lead us out by name. This brings us a security and a contentment we have never known. We belong to Him! That realization is profound and staggering. Who are we, that He should be so kind? Our lives were embedded with evil, and darkness of every kind imaginable. Now we are His?
He knows all that is His. He has marked us and led us through the pollution. We pass through the toxicity and the filth and He intends to bring us all the way out and all the way home. We do nothing, but say ‘yes’! It’s then we realize that we can do nothing to save ourselves. He is quite solitary about salvation and He intends to receive eternal glory for your deliverance.
Broken Believers 