Just A Few Words - Sin

Just a Few Words - Sin

I can’t help but wonder if we would take sin as lightly as we do if we had to regularly slit the throat of an animal to seek atonement for it.^a —Nancy Guthrie

WELL, SINCE I TOUCHED on the subject of sin, I might as well go all the way. Let’s face it. We’re a mess.

In sixth grade, at the height of my hormonal carnival ride, I had surgery on my big toe. A little aggressive with the toenail clippers, I had cut them too short. One ingrown toenail surgery morphed into another when the toe just wouldn’t heal. The second surgery resulted in about eight to ten stitches in my toe (and one weird-looking toenail).

Post-surgery day one, it was time for the bandage to come off for my daily foot soaking and treatment in mineral salts. But I wasn’t game. I liked the bandage where it was. I didn’t want to look at my toe. I didn’t want to deal with it. And I certainly didn’t want anyone else to see it. Drama resulted. Mom and Dad won out.

I think we’re this way with our sin, too. Especially the big ones. We want to be free, but we don’t trust God to unwrap the dressing. So we sit, bound up tighter than our fanny in a pair of Spanx on New Year’s Eve, just hoping no one else will notice our sin and that we’ll never have to deal with it. All the while, we cry in our heart, our mind, and our soul, What’s wrong with me?

Wash me clean from my guilt.Purify me from my sin.For I recognize my rebellion;it haunts me day and night.Against you, and you alone, have I sinned. (Psalm 51:2-4)

Well, I tell you. You’re just like me—a sinner saved by grace. But that doesn’t let us off the hook. We must unbind ourselves from the recurring sins that choke the joy out of our lives. We have to look at the ugliness.

I once took my big sins a bit too lightly. Oh, yes, I felt guilty; I asked for forgiveness; and yet, just as with my big toe, I didn’t want to look closely because it was sickening. Until I finally let God treat the wound.

Unbind yourself. Freedom is a prayer away.

^a Nancy Guthrie, Hoping for Something Better (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale, 2007), 101.