sup guys,
In resonance to paul in romans 7, its no great confession to admit my tendency to constantly put off good and noble deeds and instead pursue the selfish worship of the unholy trinity: me, myself, and I. I can confidently say the same of every reader. Temptations and desires are not, by themselves, sinful but submitting to our own evil desires is. While not every believer is called to be preachers or missionaries, every one of us are called to progressive sanctification. paul instructs timothy to train himself in godliness. "Train," as in to put sweat and effort into this labour of holiness. Nobody stumbles into holiness or has Godly habits naturally given to them. The question then becomes whether we are struggling the right or wrong way.
Wrong Way:
One can feel remorse and desire a change from self destructive patterns of sin apart from God. Struggle of this kind often leads a saved believer down a very familiar cycle: shame/guilt in sin, try to will themselves to not do it again, fail over and over, give up and take God's grace for granted (this is just who i am, God will still love and forgive me anyways), get touched by God at a conference, vow to never do that sin again....repeat. Merely attempting to will the sin out of us is a sad, weak attempt to purge a deadly poison.
Worse yet, even IF one succeeds in willfully suppressing certain behaviours, pride consumes them. This person will lack grace towards those who're suffering from the same patterns they once did and can't help but think themselves superior for conquering what others can not. They fool themselves and others into thinking they are holy and yet are precisely the kind of people to whom jesus says "i dont know you." I can describe this process in great detail because I have been there and didn't like who I was at the end of it.
"So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy." - romans 9:16
Right Way:
I believe sanctification is not behaviour modification, the key difference starts with realizing one's sins are an offense to the holy God of the universe. This leads to a far deeper remorse than mere shame or guilt - it leads to mourning and repentance. The first step to struggle against sin is similar to the first step to christianity - it is to recognize how much our sins are an offense to our creator.
See, if we get that...if we understand how evil and depraved that single act of arrogance towards our mother was or how utterly abhorrent that lustful thought, we wouldn't be afraid to sacrifice dignity and comfort to erase those sinful patterns from our lives. We would desperately seek out accountability partners for us to confess our sins to, out of humility to reveal ourselves as vulnerable to sin to people who lovs us. We would eliminate the influences in our lives that prompt us to sin. Notice how jesus doesn't simply say cut off our hands and gouge of the eye (which by itself should be enough), he goes on to then say pick our hands/eyes up and throw it away in order to illustrate the vehemence with which we should root out sinful influences.
Sanctification and struggle against sin is not an option for believers, it is a command. Jesus cursed a fig tree that bore no fruit and it died...a christian who deliberately stay in sin, making zero effort to push him/herself towards God similarly yields no fruits of righteousness. no christian should be a believer in a purely intellectual sense. If all we have is a verbal "i believe" but no transformation - then we lack genuine faith. Encouragement for the week, labour and struggle correctly in Godly works and our own personal sanctification as we always seek to connect God to everything we do, including our sins.
Have a happy wednesday!!
Edward
"For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead." - James 2:22
"A healthy tree can not bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit." Matthew 7:18
"For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins...how much worse punishment...will be deserved by the one who has spurned the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace." Hebrews 10:26
"For Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death." - 2 Corinthians 7:10
Guy dancing around the world (thanx cristina!)
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