GETTING TO THE ROOT OF SINFULNESS

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In Christ, Mark

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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.

James 4:17

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Sin.

It has been the most significant and harmful affliction mankind has dealt with and indeed continues to deal with.

More destructive than cancer or any organ disease (heart, liver, or kidney to name a few).

More damaging than any mental health disorder such as anxiety, depression, or post-traumatic stress disorder.

More devastating than dementia or Alzheimer’s Disease.

For while these physical and mental illnesses might impact the body severely, even causing it to eventually stop functioning, none of them have any significance when it comes to one’s spiritual standing before the God who despises and hates sin, the God who will bring the fullest extent of His wrath on any transgressor who has refused to be saved and justified by His Son Jesus.

And we need to know that sin will serve to keep an unbeliever unbelieving all the way to Hell and an everlasting life of damnation and torment.

Given this, that sin can be the very hinge point between Hell and Heaven, it would help to know its root for unless someone knows that, they will have no chance to overcome iniquity while trading it in for right and righteous living through Christ Jesus. Thankfully, we find the source cause in the closing verse of James, chapter 4. Look again at those words here:

If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them. v.17.

James is writing to Hebrew Christians here and lets them know that the root definition sin is found within them and the things they do.

If they knew they were to do something good, which was code for doing as God expected, but decided to do otherwise, then they sinned. Plain and simple.

Need an example of what this looks like?

We don’t need to go too far into the Bible to find it for the first time that people willfully were disobedient to God was in Eden’s garden. There, God had given the following edict to its sole human inhabitants, Adam and Eve:

The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.” Genesis 2:15-17

Shortly after this, Eve was created and we know that the order to not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was known by her because when we get to chapter 3, she says this to the serpent:

“We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’” Vv. 2-3

Both Adam and Eve knew that God had forbidden them to eat the fruit from the tree and yet they did so anyways. They knew the good they were supposed to do and they didn’t do it, invoking a curse on mankind from that point forward, a curse that will only end at Jesus’ second coming.

Since Eden, men and women have continued to struggle mightily with complying with the good God wants them to do, sometimes frustratingly so. In the New Testament, the Apostle Paul confessed his aggravation with words I think we can all relate to. He shared:

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! Romans 7:14-25

In the Bible, there was no other Apostle who accomplished more for the cause of the Gospel than Paul and yet he was not immune to sin and its effects, chief of which was doing evil when he wanted to do good. The struggle was as real for him as it was and is for us today.

So what’s the solution to this conundrum?

The bad news is that there’s no cure for the disease of sin that afflicts us but we can work every day to drive it into remission by keeping the Lord closer than the world in the way we think, speak, and behave.

If you have placed your belief in Jesus, you have within you the indwelling of the Holy Spirit and He will always lead and guide us away from sin and toward righteousness and holiness if we trust Him to.

If you have rejected Jesus up to this point, the only chance you have to avoid Hell is to believe in Him and receive God’s free gift of salvation along with the aforementioned Holy Spirit.

In regard to Christ believers, if we let our own desires complicate the matter of doing good or bad, then we, like Adam and Eve will lust for that which God has forbidden and we are doomed to fall into sinfulness.

But if we constantly and uncompromisingly allow the Lord’s desires to replace our own, ever seeking to please Him instead of ourselves, then we have a real chance to put sin where it needs to be, in recess so the Lord’s holiness might assume the forefront of everything we do.

It’s my prayer today that we all will do just that.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

PS: Feel free to leave a comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.