The Evangelical Universalist Forum

Sin

Practices Christian Living
#21

I went ahead and deleted the post for you, Chris.

Hope you’re feeling a bit better, now… :wink:

#22

Hey Chris

Just a note of encouragement - don’t beat yourself up too much, mate. We all put a foot wrong now and again, especially when we’re feeling low - hell, that’s what it is to be human :smiley: . And I can promise you I’ve done way worse, and I’m still here :smiley: . Cindy really is a sweetheart :smiley: .

All the best

Johnny

#23

I also need to thank Evangelical Universalist for letting me write my poetry and thoughts here. It has helped me out greatly. When I first started I was lost and in doubt and fear. Now I’m having a blast!

#24

Chris, it’s fine. Don’t worry about it – and you’re right. I shouldn’t have laughed at them. I’ve known people like that, and they are kind of ridiculous, but that doesn’t make it funny that they’re in that state. You’re right. It’s actually quite a sad thing. Thanks for calling me on that, and while you might have used gentler wording :wink: I do appreciate your being honest. :blush:

Love, Cindy

#25

To further this topic along, I’ll pose some additional questions.

  1. What is considered a life-style of sin?

  2. What is considered ‘habitual/besetting’ sin? How do we define it?

  3. Overall, how do we define if someone is a righteous man, or an unrighteous man?

  4. By what method were people considered ‘righteous’ in the Old Testament? - For example, many of the Psalmists declare they are righteous and do so rather boastfully. However, Psalm 143:2 says “For in Your sight no man living is righteous.” There must be at least two definitions of the righteous. One for mortals, and one for God, though perhaps there are many more definitions.

#26

Hey Gabe,

For me part of what holiness is - is being pure or free from the grip of sin. To be set apart. The sins most deadly for me are anger, pride, laziness, greed, overeating, impatience, envy, and lust. The corroding thread underneath most of these is fear. When something disturbs my future it can bring about these defects. But when my faith is in God and His wisdom to run things along with my circumstances this is when fear is uprooted and the defects loose their power. Because God is infinite in wisdom and love and He holds my future in His hands I have hope. This hope destroys spiritual despondency and lifts me up out of the dumps to get motivated. It’s faith hope and love that is the motivating factor. My mind clears as I find that inner peace and humility. I let God and let God as I trust Him to handle my circumstance. He is sovereign and in control and knows what He is doing even if I don’t understand why at the time. Because I no longer fear the future and have hope these sins are wiped out. Some days are better than others and it’s ruff and first but it gets better with time. I do stumble but this is when I get back up and keep trying. I’m not sure what a righteous man is. But I have had a change in attitude and mind to where I no longer live a lifestyle of sin. I’m headed in the other direction even though I do stumble and fall.

#27

Just about in the centre of the NT we read these words: For if by the trespass of one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who recieve God’s abundant provision of grace and the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. Rom 5 v17 For me this is where the rubber hits the road. It is helpful to reflect truthfully on where we are at. This advice comes in many places in the NT. I find my thoughts agreeing with so much that has been said above. What can I expect then, either as a new baby Christian or as a rather older and wrinkly one? I find that He who is at work in me does so to His good purpose. I’m a work in progress and yet at the beginning of his letter to those in Philippi Paul reminds that what God starts he finishes ch 1 v6. I have the promise of provision for every day and the gift of being made right with God. Sometimes I get a kick in the rear, the Holy Spirit does that, but mostly I find myself like a child sitting on Farther’s lap - it’s a nice feeling. Is that what reigning in life is?

#28

I’d like to bump this topic for further discussion. While I have, I believe, looked at this objectively, I do want to open this up to opinion. So I’ll ask another question.

How do you personally deal with the fact that you still sin? How do you pick yourself up from a failure? Do you ever wonder if your lack of complete obedience (as described as never yielding to temptation) is, in fact, disobedience and are therefore considered a son of disobedience? Just curious. I myself strive, but still fall short. Sometimes I wonder if I am indeed striving, or if I lack the spirit…

#29

Gabe. I don’t worry too much about the small sins. As we learned in A.A. the underlying thread of the seven deadly sins is fear and fear is always future based. Confess your sins to God and another person. Let go and trust Christ and the Father. When the future is secure and the past is gone, you live in the NOW. Anxiety and frustration will melt away as hope arises.

#30

Thanks Cole. I wish I could join you with that in mind. I do, in fact, worry about the small sins and that is mainly because small sins grow to bigger sins and it isn’t the sin itself that bothers me so much as the sin nature. The fact that I desire sin in my heart (desire, meaning, I am tempted) is what discourages me. I don’t merely care to sin less, I desire sin to be eradicated in my nature. I desire to never yield to temptation, no matter how small or large. That is my desire. Yet, I am far from it… I still desire the works of the flesh, because I am tempted by them often.

#31

Gabe

Just let it go and have faith. If you trust God then you have nothing to worry about. Accept the fact that you have minor flaws and go on. Don’t take them so seriously. Make a list of all your character flaws. Find a trusted friend to read them to. Get it out and then let it go. It’s progress not perfection. If you mess up confess you sins, let it go and make amends if you need to.

#32

I like to read Romans 7 when I feel like I’m falling into sin again and again :wink:

The thing that I would try and think about is that we DO NOT strive to stop sinning. We strive to satisfy the one who loves us. I am not implying that God is does not fully love us if we are constantly sinning. And I am not implying that we shouldn’t care about sinning. I am saying two things:

First of all, when we love God, we want to please him. As Jesus said “If you love me, keep my commands.” Sometimes it’s tempting to read that like an abusive partner telling you to do what they say. But it’s not like that at all. Within the context of John 14, Jesus is teaching and also comforting the disciples. Just before that verse he tells the disciples how he is in the Father and the Father is in him. He tells them they will do greater things than him and how anything they ask for in his name, he will do for them. Just after the verse, he tells them how he will send the Holy Spirit to them when he goes, an “advocate”. Saying “if you love me, keep my commands” is not a harsh rebuke or an abusive demand. It’s just a natural part of love - we want to please those who we love. We keep God’s commands because we love him and want to follow him. That’s how God wants us to show our love - through our obedience. And he wants us to be obedient to him because if we’re completely obedient to anyone else, it goes wrong. God is helping us.

The second thing I’m trying to get at is that because God loves us, he cannot cope with us sinning because it is destructive. When we see that God loves us, that he is for us and wants us to stop sinning because it damages our relationship with him and with others, then we develop a bigger passion to stop sinning than we do if our sole concentration is to stop sinning for the sake of it or because we feel like we have a offended a powerful, holy God. That sort of view makes God out to be a tyrant and it’s an evil view. God is holy because there is no sin in him. And how do we know what sin is? Because it breaks the law or commandments. What are the commandments? To love God and to love your neighbour. It’s a slightly simplistic way of viewing it but I think it works - God is holy because there is no sin in him and sin is anything that destroys love. So God is holy because he is love. He wants us to be holy because we are only fully loving if we are holy.

Thus we do not strive not to sin but we strive to love God and love our neighbour.

Hope that helps in some way :slight_smile:

#33

Johnny, The tricky part is the dual nature we have. I do desire to do good and keep the commandments, but that doesn’t stop one from being tempted by the flesh. The two natures ‘war’ against each other. I guess that is what I am describing.

#34

It was the same with Paul Gabe - so you are in good company. :slight_smile:

#35

Which is why Romans 7 is such a great passage when thinking about this. Paul had exactly the same struggles :slight_smile:

Hence, I think it’s better not to even concentrate on our sin because it can drive you crazy. Better to focus on God who loves us and when we’re in the process of that, as our love grows, our sins fall away. Sometimes it seems like they don’t, sometimes it feels like we’re getting even more sinful. But if we love God and we focus on him, I think it’s easier for us to stop sinning.

Every Christian has this same feeling Gabe so don’t feel alone because of it.

#36

Good thoughts, Jonny.

Also,

Complete obedience, i.e never yielding to temptation is probably not possible until we are in our glorified state or when we are perfected into the image of Christ? I just don’t think thats possible in this present body of corruption. Plus, there’s 1John 1:8 - “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us”.

I think it’s helpful to note the difference between temptation/desire to sin, and sinful acts, as I don’t think our will is involved in the first. What I worry about, is not fighting against the animal impulses and deliberately, i.e, willfully sinning without any resistance by the will. And I’m interested in the distinction between struggling with sin vs being enslaved to sin.

#37

Nope. Paul is not talking about himself in Romans 7. He is talking about a person who does not appropriate the enabling grace of Christ. He is using the hypothetical “I”. Notice before he states what “I” do without Christ, he says the following:

  • Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve not under the old written code but in the new life of the Spirit. (Rom 7:4-6)*

Notice he is about to talk about what it was like for us “while we were living in the flesh”. The implication is that we are no longer living in the flesh but in the new life in the Spirit. But he then goes on to talk about how things were before he trusted Christ to deliver him:

For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. (verses 11-15)

Paul is saying in essence: “Without Christ to deliver me, I know what I should do, but I cannot do it. I do the very thing I hate.”

But what does Paul say at the beginning of chapter 8?

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. (Rom 8:1-4)

So because “the law of the Spirit of life has set me free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death”, I know longer only serve God in my mind, but I serve Him in reality “in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled” in me. I have this inability to do right as long as I do not appropriate the new law of life in Christ, but when I do come under the new law, I succeed in doing right.

I understand the way people think. “If the great apostle Paul couldn’t do right as he wished to do, how can I be expected to do right?” But that is a serious mistake and excuse. The apostle Paul COULD do right as he wanted to do, because of the enabling grace made available to him through Christ’s death and sacrifice. Romans 8 makes that clear.