“But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:8
Growing up in a Christian home, I naively believed sin was something only non-Christians needed to really worry about. What I didn’t understand at the time was that sin is much more than outright rebellion against God. Sin permeates just about every aspect of our culture and is as much a part of us as our personality. It’s inescapable this side of heaven.
The harsh personal reality of sin makes what Jesus did on the cross so much more powerful: God didn’t just give us a way to avoid some distant sin; He stepped down into the depths of our sin and brokenness and loved us despite it all!
It was this realization that helped me grow beyond my naive understanding of grace and realize that I’m just as guilty as anyone else; my sins put Jesus on the cross! Just because I was born into a Christian home and didn’t have a dramatic “born again” experience, doesn’t mean I was born free of sin’s curse.
The enemy wants us to minimize sin so we let our guard down and fail to see our need for a savior. So let’s look deeply at our sin, examine it in all its brutal ugliness, search for the root causes, and repent. Only then will we truly be able to understand grace and forgiveness and see how wonderful it is that Christ would choose to love us sinners.
Dear Jesus, please help me be aware of the sin that lurks in the shadows of my life. Help me identify sins that threaten to enslave me. I need Your strength to endure and to resist temptation. Amen.
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