Childish Things, pt.2

The bare fact is, any sin will become a lifestyle and a lifelong battle if engaged in habitually. Gossip, stealing, drinking, heterosexual affairs, homosexuality, pornography, masturbation, gluttony, lying, drugs, gambling, self-pity - all the "obvious" sins you would expect to find in a list of sins, will dominate one's life and for most people take a real battle to overcome. Then, there are the less obvious sins, like failing to give thanks to God for all things, not trusting Him, and not walking in total dependence on His ability rather than our own.

This is why God gave the Ten Commandments - to establish the standard of behavior. It's also why He gave His Son - because we can't live up to the standard. Because we are flesh and blood, He took on flesh and blood, lived a sinless life, and paid the penalty for our sins, so that we could be delivered and restored to fellowship as holy and beloved in God's presence.

I believe this also underlies why Paul said, "When I was a child I spoke as a child, thought as a child, reasoned as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish tings." Although his emphasis was on realizing that faith, hope and love are more important than what spiritual gift you may or may not have, I believe Paul was saying that mature adults have a more mature and accurate perception of things than children. So, put away your childish perspective on life.

Put away your childish understanding of "who you are," "what you can or can't or must do," "what your value is or isn't," and "why you do the things you do."  See yourself as God sees you. You are redeemed by the blood of the Lamb - holy, beloved, faultless, and blameless. You are a new creation. As an old creation in the human nature of the first Adam, you cannot come up to the level of holiness required to enter into God's presence, and as that Adam died because of sin, so shall all men. But Christ, the "second Adam," took on flesh, because that's the way we are made.  He took on flesh, so that dying to sin and for sin, He might deliver us holy and blameless through the torn veil of His own flesh to abide in the presence of Holy God. Rising form the dead, he conquered death and the one who had the power of death (Satan) that we might live. You don't have to abide in sin. You don't have to continue in sin.

If you are ensnared by a habitual sin, realize: you were born, as a descendant of Adam & Eve, into sin. But you were not born into a specific sin. God did not create you to be a gossip, or a homosexual, or adulterous, or to habitually live in any other sin. He created you to know and love Him, and to receive His love and kindness. It is by His doing that we are in Christ Jesus, who was made to us wisdom from God and righteousness and redemption, so that we have nothing to boast in but God.

If you know someone who is ensnared by a habitual sin: in Galatians 6:1, Paul exhorts, "Brothers, even if a man is caught [ensnared] in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself, lest you too be tempted." There is restoration for those who are ensnared in sin. Part of that restoration is for fellow Christians to gently help the sinner realize that the snare that holds them is the perspective of a child, and help them find a more mature perspective of who they are in Christ and what He has done to set them free.