Victory Over Sin

Sin is one of those tough topics to think about and talk about. We all want to think of ourselves are pretty good. It’s easier to write posts that share God’s love and are uplifting than ones that deal with deep heart issues.  The truth of the matter is though, God takes sin very seriously. We would be amiss to gloss over it and just pat each other on the back and sing Kubaya around the campfire.

With that in mind, let’s focus on Romans 7. Here Paul is again using the illustration of marriage to help us better understand our relationship to sin and God.  He explains that when you are married to someone, you can’t marry someone else unless the first person has died.  Likewise, we must die to our sinful passions in order to be alive to the Spirit.

As believers we struggle with –  on one hand, wanting our hope to be built alone in Jesus name and on the other hand justifying the sin that seems so irresistible. But the truth of the matter is, we can’t be serving our passions some of the time and God some of the time.  We have to die to our will and give it a burial and then we are free to live for God’s.  If I’m giving in to my sin some of the time and giving to God at other times – it’s adultery. We have to be fully committed to the relationship for victory to be consistent.

I jokingly told my husband that I will love him forever because after 20 years I’ve already invested too much into this relationship quit. There are bits of truth to what I said though, I’ve put effort into the relationship because I’m committed to it – as has he.  When things got tough, we struggled through them because the relationship was more important than getting our way.

Does that mean I never say something stupid or something I later regret to my husband? Nope.  Not a chance. I still screw up-all to often. But I ask for his forgiveness, get back up and keep going.  That’s what you do in a relationship.

Same thing holds true for our commitment to Christ.  When we fail, we ask forgiveness and get back up and try again.  That can be especially hard in the beginning steps of turning from a particular sin because sin attractive.  When we continually make the right decisions because we want to glorify God, over time sin becomes less appealing.

It’s like when I began eating gluten free foods 15 years ago.  In the beginning I thought everything tasted awful and I would have ditched the diet in a heartbeat if I wasn’t feeling so dramatically better physically.  Now, though – I don’t give it a second thought.  I think in some part my taste buds have changed and I now fully enjoy food – a bit too much sometimes!

I want to end with a bit of encouragement I heard from our Pastor this weekend.  He was preaching from John 17, in verses 20-26 He showed us that Jesus loves us and is praying for us to bring God glory. How cool is that?  Not only do we have the Holy Spirit indwelling each of us if we are believers, but Jesus is praying for us.  We can have hope of success because we don’t have to go it alone.

Blessings to you and thanks for sticking with me through this tough topic.  May we all be a sweet aroma to God as we strive to bring Him glory!