Monday, July 21, 2014

Sin is sin...large or small

Sin took advantage of those commands and deceived me; it used the commands to kill me. (‭Romans‬ ‭7‬:‭11‬ NCV)

In Romans chapter 7, Paul tells us that the law (whether we obey it perfectly or not) is powerless to save us. It is only through Jesus Christ that we are saved. Paul states in verse 11 that sin (satan) takes advantage of the law to deceive man. Humm..Deception is the tool satan has used since the beginning of time to trick us into questioning the very word (law or command) of God.

Remember the question the serpent asked Eve? He said

"Did God say 'you shall not eat from any tree in the garden?'" Gen. 3:1

That was not the command at all. God said

"You may eat freely from every tee in the garden but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat for in the day that you eat of it you shall die." Gen. 2:16-17

Satan tried to get Eve to question what God said, thus deceiving her into breaking the only law God had in place. He does the same to us too by misusing the law. The law itself is not sinful or evil. Its function is to reveal sin. Paul tells us in verses 7 and 8 that we would not know sin if it were not for the law.

Let's look at this example. One of the 10 commandments is "Thou shall not steal." Now this one doesn't sound so difficult to keep does it? You may be thinking "I haven't stolen anything so I'm good." Well, you may not have broken in to someone home or business and stolen money or items off the shelf...but if you've ever taken a pen from your job, or chatted on Facebook with friends during working hours without permission from your boss...you are stealing. That's right. In this example, you've stolen a pen and the time your employer is paying you to do the job you were hired to do.

Taking a pen from work may not seem like that big of a deal, but in God's eyes a sin is a sin. Stealing a pen or any other office supply from work is just as big a sin as stealing money from a bank. A law has been broken so a penalty must be paid.

Praise God for his grace and mercy...more importantly Praise God for sending His son, Jesus, to pay the penalty for our sin. Jesus is the only One who can rescue us from sin and ultimate death.









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