SA Ep85 - Articles of Faith #8 Sin

SA Ep85 - Articles of Faith #8 Sin

In this episode, we examine the doctrine of sin. The Bible teaches that sin is not just outward behavior, but inward rebellion against God, and that all men are sinners by nature and by choice. We will look at what sin is, where it comes from, its consequences, and why it separates man from God. This episode also shows why a right understanding of sin is necessary to truly understand the Gospel. Sin is not a small issue. It is the central problem of the human condition.

Transcript

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Welcome to the Seeking Approval Podcast. I'm Dr. Chris Smelster from Gilead Baptist Church. You know life moves fast, and faith is not meant to be rushed. I want to take some time and slow down with you and have some honest conversations from the Word of God about daily living. So join me here today on Seeking Approval. Everyone talks about mistakes and struggles and bad decisions. The Bible uses a much stronger word that we don't hear from many pulpits today. Sin. And until we understand what sin really is, we'll never truly understand why Christ had to die, why the cross was necessary. Why couldn't we just, you know, live good or good enough? Why does salvation matter? Why does everyone talk about the blood? The reason is we need the blood. But we have so minimized sin in our modern church and our modern Christian world that sin has just become an innocent bystander in all of the Christian walk. It's just, well, you know, everybody does it. And God loves us anyway. So, you know, it's not that big of a deal, but sin is a very big deal. In fact, it's number eight in the Articles of Faith is the doctrine of sin. And when we're looking at sin, we're dealing with the central problem of humanity. We talked about the fall of man and where sin began in Article number seven. And now we're talking about our sin. The reason for every broken relationship, every act of violence, every form of corruption, every hidden struggle, every outward failure. It all is sin. And it can be traced back to sin. And you may, in certain situations, you may be the one standing there holding the bag saying, But I didn't do anything in this situation. I am the victim in all of this, but it still goes back to sin. Everything goes back to sin somewhere. Someone is involved in sin, someone is hiding sin, someone is uh uh uh dabbling in sin, whatever it's somebody, it's their sin at the root of all problems. The world likes to use softer language. Preachers and pastors today are encouraged to use softer language, oh, mistakes or flaws or weaknesses, or people say, well, we're sin sick. You know, we're just we're we're we're still sickly with sin. No, the Bible says we are dead in our trespasses and sins. That's a much stronger word, but we don't really like those strong words today. We'd rather have a Bible that doesn't use words like that. It's far too serious, far too accurate. Let's let's not call it sin. Let's call it something else. But I would rather just call it the way God sees it and the way God says it, and it's sin. And we'll never fully understand salvation if we don't ever fully understand our sin and how wretched we truly are. The Bible defines sin very clear in 1 John 3 4 when it says sin is the transgression of the law. That means sin is a violation against God's standards for living. It's stepping across the line that God has drawn and said, Do not go any further than this. And when we go further, then we have sin. But sin is more than just rule keeping or lawbreaking, it's falling short of what God requires. Romans 3 23, for all have sinned. What does that mean? Come short of the glory of God. He says, and for all have sinned, for all have not been able to keep the law, and we've come short of keeping the glory of God, of what He would require for us. So sin is not only not doing what you should do or doing what you should not do, but it's falling short of what we ought to be. Who we ought to be like. It's missing the mark of God's holiness that we should have. And that's again another word we don't use. There's so many biblical words we don't use anymore. People don't talk about holiness anymore. They'll label you as a charismatic freak today. Start talking about wanting to live a holy and separated life. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, partner. Let's don't get too crazy here. Don't be talking about that. You're talking about holiness. Let's just, you know, hey, let's bring it down. But whether it's an action or attitude or thought or omission, sin is anything that does not align with the character and will of God in our life. At its core, sin simply is rebellion. Why don't rebel against God? If you're not doing what God is telling you to do, if we, let me say that, let me change that. I gotta change the pronoun. If we are not doing what God is telling us to do, we are in rebellion. It's the same as what happened in the garden. We choose our own way over God's way. Isaiah 536 says, All we like sheep have gone astray. That's sin. We have turned everyone to his own way. In the time of the judges of Israel, when they they longed after a king, and God raised them up judges to because they God would should have been their king, God should have been their their their leader, but they wanted an earthly king like all the other people around them had. And so God gave them judges. And it was during the time of the judges that every did what was right according to his own heart. He felt like if it felt good, do it. All sheep have gone astray. It tells us that the heart the heart of sin is self-rule instead of submission. I'll do it my way, God. And I'm still going to end up where I need to be. Sin begins in the heart, it begins under the surface before it ever appears in life. You know, that's why leprosy in the Old Testament is a typology of sin. There's also uh in the New Testament, you've got the uh the the bulls and the sores. You also see those in the old testament as well. Those are also typologies of sin, because all those are diseases, especially with leprosy, those are diseases that start under the surface where no man can see. And then uh you uh uh uh uh uh slowly start to feel the effects of it, that the skin it becomes itchy and red, and you know, you know there's a problem there, a minor abrasion of some sort, and then the next thing you know, that sin breaks through the skin, and by that point it has made your nervous system numb. You you you you don't even know that it's there. The way the way leprosy would work was it would attack the nervous system or the nerves of that area, and that's why people with uh leprosy a lot of times won't have like their fingers or their nose because as the the skin becomes uh numb, they will rub that their nose or their eyebrow or they'll scratch a part of their arm, and because they don't feel the feedback of, hey, you're scratching too hard, you're rubbing too hard, they end up rubbing these sores on, they then become infected, and then there's other parts of the leprosy that happens as well, and then they end up just rubbing those parts off. I know that's a very gross picture. I mean, hey, come on, what preacher, what are you doing here? I'm trying to drive and drink my morning coffee, and you're talking about people's noses falling off. What are we doing here? We're talking about sin. Sin's ugly. They know a real easy way to talk about sin. It's not a light matter to deal with, but we we've got to understand it. If we don't understand the death of our sin, we don't understand the greatness of our salvation. We don't understand our sin, we don't understand his death. That's why today people are people can find any way to God today. Joel Osteen. Joel Osteen said, I don't like saying things that I don't hear people say. I don't like repeating things. If I've not heard it, I don't like repeating it. Heard Joel Osteen say in an interview, and it was with I think the interview was with Larry King. Um I'm seeing that set behind him in my head, but I remember seeing him in this interview, uh, the setting of it, but I remember the interview when I was asking, Well, do you believe that uh Jesus is the only way to heaven? And he gave that same kind of stuttery, smiling answer, very, you know, diplomatic, political, you know, well, well, well, well, well, you know, I don't um well I I I believe I bel I believe that there are are I I believe people will get to heaven in in many ways. There it is. If you believe that you can get to heaven in many ways, other than Jesus Christ through the blood that was shed at Calvary, then you are minimizing the sin of our life. Period. You minimize sin, you minimize the Savior. You don't need him that much. You can go other ways. The consequences of sin are serious. It says in Romans 6.23, the wages of sin is death. That is not just spiritual death, that's also physical death, spiritual separation from God, eternal judgment. Sin is not a harmless act. It destroys, it separates, it corrupts, it brings guilt and shame and fear, damages relationships, hardened hearts, blinds the mind, blinds the heart. It leads to judgment. Sin can't be ignored, it can't be excused, it can't be treated lightly. We must look at our sin. One of the greatest dangers we have today is that we try to rename it, excuse it, justify it, or compare it. Well, at least I'm not doing this, so-and-so's doing it. Don't matter what so-and-so's doing. It's you. It's me, it's my sin. I was preaching on sin back whenever COVID hit, and that's when we started uh doing online stuff through our church, and I was I was preaching on sin and talking about uh that all have sinned. And I had a lady from, I think it was Ohio. She uh wrote in on the comments and said, I can't believe that you would stand up there and call all those people sinners. How dare you judge somebody? The Bible says to judge not, man, lady, you're up so far from the mark. First of all, that's not what that verse is saying. So let's let's lay that one aside for a minute. We'll come back. I'll write you a dissertation about that verse because that ain't what it's saying. Second of all, I didn't call the people sinners. Paul did. Paul didn't call them sinners. God did. God called us the sinners. I'm just repeating what God said in his in his word. We are sinners. And we need a savior. We're lost, we're guilty, we're separated from God. We gotta have a savior. So why is it so important to understand our sin? Well, if we don't know it by now, ten minutes in, probably ain't gonna know it. We're probably already so blinded to the importance of our sin that we'll never understand it. But the reason why this article is so important and what it means to me and you is that we've gotta be honest about our condition. Because if we can't be honest about our condition, we can't be honest about our salvation. If we can't be honest about our salvation, then I ask, do you then know Jesus Christ as your personal savior? Oh yes, I do, preacher. Then what did he save you from? Did he just save you to go to heaven? Is that all he did? Well, there's more to it than that. There's a reason why he hung on that cross. There's a reason why he shed every last drop of his blood and it took all of it. I know, I know, grandpa used to preach if just one drop of blood wouldn't be enough. No. The Bible said that he had to spill all of his blood. And why did he do that? For the believer to make salvation a reality so that we can escape the sin that does so easily beset us, so that we can have eternal life. And that so, yes, we can go to heaven, but it's so much more than that. But if we're not careful, our sin will rob us of every eternal promise that God has ever made to us. Thank you for joining us today on Seeking Approval. You know our faith oftentimes grows in quiet places. I hope today's conversation gave you something worth carrying throughout the rest of this day. And join me, Dr. Chris Smelser, again next time as we continue thinking, learning, and walking together. Until then, grace and peace to you from Seeking Approval at Gilead Baptist Church.