Since President Biden brought it up (see last week's article - newspaper or online), let’s look at sin.
First, we must define sin
In one of my commentaries, I found the following quote.
“In a real sense, the essence of sin is our attempting to take the place of God. We want to be in charge. We want to establish the ground rules and lay out the playing field. And we want to provide our own definitions of what is right and what is wrong, what sin is and what sin is not. John, on the other hand, is not interested in human opinions on the matter of sin. Divine revelation will set the bar and establish the truth.”
Yes. This is the essence of sin. It was Lucifer himself that originally sought to take the place of God and overthrow Him. Such has been, to this very day, the desire of those who follow Satan.
The Word of God states in 1 John 3:4
Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.
We live in a day when people operate in open defiance of God’s law. This is sin. If God says “Thou shalt not commit adultery and we commit adultery, then we sin. If God says, “thou shalt not steal,” and we steal, then we sin. If God says, “thou shalt not lie,” and we lie, then we sin. I think you get the picture.
A powerful measure of a community’s spiritual health is its efforts to fight against sin!
Many people seem to have a “Jesus” that is ok with their sins. “He understands,” they say. “He gets me,” they say. Let me explain to you what the Lord Jesus Christ, of the Bible, says about sin.
Do you remember that thing that God said about the sin of adultery? Jesus said,
Matthew 5:27–28 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.
John 5:14
Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee.
SIN NO MORE!
John 8:11
She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more.
SIN NO MORE!
John 8:21
Then said Jesus again unto them, I go my way, and ye shall seek me, and shall die in your sins: whither I go, ye cannot come.
YE SHALL DIE IN YOUR SINS (Trust me, you don’t want to do that)
Jesus doesn’t approve of your sins. Jesus doesn’t approve of the tolerated sins of this community and its institutions, and He will hold you and Chattooga County accountable on the day of judgment.
Our community needs to search its collective soul!
You know, Jesus just doesn’t assess individuals and communities, he assesses churches too. In Revelation 2 and 3, the word “repent” is used 8 times. Repentance would be a good place for us to start!
What would Jesus say about the churches of Chattooga County?
Let me ask you a question. Do we measure spiritual health in “doing” or “being?”
BOTH!
In the medical world, we measure health by physical exercise (doing), but we also measure it by lipid levels (being). By the way, “being” is impacted by “doing." If you eat the wrong things and don’t exercise, your lipid levels will probably not be encouraging!
We measure the spiritual health of a community in the same way. Our “being” is evidenced by our “doing.”
We look at things like church attendance/church closures.
We measure things like our prayer lives, Bible reading, material support of the work of God, and our personal witness for Christ.
We measure it by our internal attributes, love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, etc.
We look at things we allow and legalize/tolerate, and sometimes celebrate (like gambling, abortion, alcohol, evolutionary indoctrination, false religion, and all forms of sexual deviance).
A famous preacher from years ago said this concerning sin.
“Listen, I'm against sin. I'll kick it as long as I've got a foot, I'll fight it as long as I've got a fist, I've butt it as long as I've got a head, and I'll bite it as long as I've got a tooth. And when I'm old, fistless, footless, and toothless, I'll gum it till I go home to glory and it goes home to perdition.
I saw a quote from a preacher on Twitter recently. He made the following statement
“The reason many Christians try to be invisible is because they cannot hold up
under scrutiny. Dan. 1:13; Matt. 5:14-16”
The Bible says in Romans 14:12 - So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God.
The Lord Jesus Christ wants to help this community with its sin problem.
The Bible states that JESUS shall save his people from their sins (Matthew 1:21).
The Bible states in John 1:29 that JESUS is the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
Come to Him today in repentance and faith!