People in today’s world highly value personal autonomy and believe they can make their own life choices without accountability. What is right or wrong, true or a lie has become a moving target for most people. However, without clear boundaries, chaos and confusion abound. Who has the ultimate right to declare what is good and what is bad? Only God, the Creator, knows all and evaluates everything rightly. God stands apart from humanity in His absolute purity and holiness. Therefore, everything we do, think, or say that opposes Him and His will is defined as sin. Opposing God invites His justified wrath and causes untold harm to ourselves and others. Human history and personal experience confirm this is true.
Every human born since Adam and Eve’s fall into sin inherits a sinful nature. We sin because our desires are corrupted – so ruined by sin that we cannot please God or satisfy His righteous standards on our own. In our unredeemed state, we value our own pleasure more than God’s will. Our minds and will are so ruined that we are without hope – left to ourselves. Our judgment becomes distorted, and the choices we make take us nowhere that matters in the end. Understanding the universal curse of sin elevates our need for God’s grace.
The gospel addresses both sin’s pervasive damage and the only source of rescue known to mankind. In our sin, we deserve only God’s wrath. Christ bore sin’s curse for all who believe. God seeks to restore us, but only on His terms and with a recognition of our absolute need of Him. He promises to take us back into a full life with Him when we respond to Him in faith.
Without understanding the universal and eternal damage caused by sin, no viable explanation exists for the evil in the world. Even the internal wrestling between right and wrong within the human heart cannot be explained. We will not turn to Christ for rescue if we do not comprehend the personal and societal damage inflicted by sin. The truth about sin is bad news. But this must be grasped before we can rightly understand the truth about God and the reality about ourselves and the world.
Sin’s damage highlights the unfathomable reach of God’s grace. He persistently extends mercy to people caught in sin’s death grip. Sin’s encroaching damage humbles us before the God we have offended but who also offers our only hope. Wariness about vulnerability to sin leads believers to moment-by-moment dependence on God. While we await eternal deliverance from sin’s stranglehold, we can experience the Holy Spirit’s power to overcome temptation and sin.15 And when we do sin, we can run to Him in confession and repentance.16 Our sin is great, but our God is greater. Psalm 25:8-9 says, “Good and upright is the Lord; therefore he instructs sinners in his ways. He guides the humble in what is right and teaches them his way.” Through the cross, His mercy endures!
Resource: BSF
No comments:
Post a Comment