You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart.
Jesus -- Matthew 5: 27-8
We don't know what sin is. Jesus tries to explain it. He tries to take us beyond the Pharisaical view that sin can be portrayed in a volumes of do's and don'ts that are crudely carved onto hearts of stone. Jesus never intended to make sin a trivial matter, but rather to take us beyond the most rudimentary views. "Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them." He came to fulfill the Law โ to take us beyond God's most primitive, rudimentary perspective on sin and righteous living and up to a higher order of living and understanding. Yet today, we tend to ignore Jesus' teaching, favoring man-mandated rules and misguided notions of holiness and (self)righteousness. And where the notion of sin makes us uncomfortable, we embrace the flippant notion that grace and love covers the need for any real concern about sin.
Frankly, we aren't taught what is, so it figures we also have no clue for dealing with it. It's a very risky position we place ourselves. As Jesus says, "Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven ..." Of course that's always somebody else ... right? Right."... but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven." We need to get beyond pretending we know what sin is all about, and abandon the demonic tool of guilt that is so often used for driving people toward our own sin of moralistic self-indulgence.
Jesus rarely got the point across, so who am I to suggest that I can do it here? I can't tell you exactly what sin is, because the essence of sin is beyond human expression. But I can tell you what sin is not, because the false notions of sin are created by people and are thus easily articulated in normal human language.
All I can do about sin is point you in the direction of understanding. That, of course, is in the direction of Jesus Christ and his gospel of truth. Through the work of Jesus, we have access to the door of understanding. Through that door, we can sense the essence of sin. We can see the devastation it is creating in our lives. We can see how it is blocking our higher walk with God. We can clearly see the implications of our sin, because we see the truth of ourselves through the work of the Holy Sprit, and free of the foggy ambiguity, guilt, and emotional corruption that some ignorant teacher/preacher would impose upon us.
Know the Bible โ the entire Bible. Join an active fellowship of believers. Worship God with all your heart. Be zealous of casting off man-made religion and picking up the mantle of truth. Pray and meditate as often as possible. Develop a personal relationship with God. Let God to the talking when you are together. Grow in the Spirit. Grow. Grow. Then one day the essence of sin will become very, very apparent. And you will come to know yourself very, very well.
When you encounter sin as Jesus describes it, there is no great sense of remorse, guilt, sorrow, bitterness, or fear. Men have imposed these human responses as normal reactions to man-made impressions of sin. I've encountered that wall of sin in my spirit. I was amazed at the breadth and depth of it. My petty moral "sins" were totally overtaken by the magnitude of all that stood between me and my God. Those silly "sins of omission and comission" that once annoyed me like a swarm of marsh mosquitoes became mere freckles on the face of the sin that God saw fit to expose.
It isn't a fearsome position, because I am convinced that God won't let anyone go there until they understand the overwhelming power of the Gospel. Like Satan, our genuine sin is broad and powerful opponent. But like Satan, our sin is defeated by a truly Holy God. When you manage to touch the hem of His garment, he will let you see your sin. And when you see your sin, you can deal with it. And when you deal with your sin, you can touch the face of God โ and live to tell about it.
