I had been walking with the Lord for only 3 months when it happened. Made alive from a life of sin and now set on the narrow road. What happened after my heart change truly humbled and sobered me. Before the incident, I thought surely I couldn’t/wouldn’t fall. I was on fire for the things of the Lord, but I soon found out that sin was more in me than around me. I opened the door for sin and it took control from there. During this time I was being discipled by some faithful brothers, I was attending a biblically sound church, and two weeks prior I had finished preaching my first sermon. I'm good to go, right? I was quickly reminded that there was an enemy in me that constantly offered temporal pleasures.
During this season of deception, I would hide from the guys who were discipling me. I knew what I was doing was wrong. I knew that I was attempting to run from the God who had just revealed His eternal love to me. I was running! I would literally hit the airport and fly out of town to attempt to hide my sin. “God knows my heart” I would tell myself. “I can get myself out of this when I’m ready.”Praise be to God that when He saves His people He gives us a Helper.
God gives us the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit who is in every born again believer in Christ isn’t satisfied with a life of sin. The Holy Spirit reminds all believers that we are no longer who we used to be, that the old person has been crucified with Christ. That's how serious sin is. The Son actually died in our place because of it. By God’s grace and discipline I was able to get out of that situation. God used the guys who were discipling me to graciously and firmly rebuke the lifestyle I was attempting to hide, and the Holy Spirit would not let me be satisfied in swimming in sin... But the fight wasn't over.
The sin in me continued and continues to fight for more attention. Sin never sleeps and it never turns down an opportunity to ruin you and everyone around you. My sin could have cared less about the new life that had been purchased for me in Christ. My sin could have cared less about my new desires that were given when I was raised with Christ. The sin in me wants the destruction of my witness, my family, and my blood bought joy in the Lord. Sin is truly allegiant to the destruction of all that is good and it is the destroyer of all that used to be good. O how we need the Lord daily.
The fight isn’t just for us to strain and stiff-arm "bad things." No, the fight against our sin is to fight against what attempts to hinder us from keeping in step with the Spirit, "good" or bad. For every person in Christ, the Spirit is the One who continues to point us to Christ. He continues to point us to the the love and power of God that’s constantly working towards us in Christ. For the believer, our remaining sin will only and tragically point us away from God’s love in Christ and constantly introduce us to an affair with spiritual death, and in many ways, literal destruction. We will be in this fight until we die or the Lord returns. Our sin could care less about how long we’ve been walking with the Lord, whether its 3 months or 30 years. I’m here to say that sin will never give you what it promises. Never! I’ve lived it and I fight it everyday.
Sin awaits the opportunity to destroy. In Christ, let us continue to look to Jesus our Savior, let us be renewed by the Word, let us love one another as we're called to, and let us know that when we’re tempted with the temporal pleasures of sin, that the end product will indeed be the opposite of the life and freedom that sin says it will give us. For the believer, we’ve already been given everything we need in Christ. God is truly for our good. He's in us and we're secure in Him. Continue to fight daily, and when you're tempted to dive into sin, be reminded of this, “Sin will always give you the opposite of what it promises." Always. Fight well. Amen.
"For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 6:23
Live in light of truth and wear truth!
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