Nick Bogardus

After reading some recent reports in the news, these 3 big ideas came to mind about sin.

1. Confront Sin

Sin can be in word, thought, and deed (sins of commission) or by not doing what you should do (sins of omission). Sin is not neutral; it ultimately destroys and never leads to life (Gen. 4:7;Rom 8:1-8; 1 Peter 5:8). As John Owen famously said, “Be killing sin, or sin will be killing you.” 

Sadly, we see the sins of omission every day:

• We see it in friendships when people gossip about the dumb stuff their friend is doing rather than having the hard talk with the person.
• We see it in small groups when they enable each other to stay on the surface and never get down to real, heart-level issues. After being in a group together for years, adultery, porn addiction, abuse, and any number of other things can sinfully be allowed to exist for the sake of comfort.
• We see it in marriage counseling, most often in husbands. The husband’s sin of passive omission can lead his family into debt, his wife into committing adultery, or his wife into never receiving the care she needs for sin committed against her in childhood.

Loving Jesus, loving your spouse, loving your friends, loving your people looks like confronting sin with truth and love. There is no greater contempt for someone than to leave them in their sin.

You’ve got to confront sin in yourself (Rom 8:1-11), in your spouse (Gen 3), and in your friends (Gal 2:11-14).

2. Sin Will Come Out

Sin always comes out. 1 Timothy 5:24-25 says this, “The sins of some people are conspicuous, going before them to judgment, but the sins of others appear later. So also good works are conspicuous, and even those that are not cannot remain hidden.”

In our era of reputation management and people pleasing, we need to see this. Sin, either because it seeks to destroy or because God will use it to discipline us, will come out. Some people’s sin is flagrant, they wear it on their face. Other people’s sin comes out years down the road, when they least expect it.

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Your sins do not define you. Your identity is as a redeemed, reconciled, justified, cleansed son or daughter of our loving Father.

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Many men stand idly by, like their father Adam, believing the lies that if they just ignore it, it will go away. They can just deal with it next time it comes up or “it’s just how the other person is.” At the bottom of it all is selfishness and the idol of comfort. It does not love the person the way the cross shows us to. The cross shows us that God saves by first condemning, God heals by first wounding, God builds up by first crushing, God makes alive by first killing. You cannot get to the gospel without suffering, and trying to circumvent that is what Bonhoeffer called “cheap grace.” The sin of omission is giving someone else cheap grace. It belittles both sin and Jesus. 

3. Jesus Killed Sin

That’s the incredible thing about Jesus: he killed sin. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, he lived the only perfect, sinless life. At the cross, he paid the penalty for our sin to redeem us from sin’s bondage, reconcile us from sin’s estrangement, justify us from sin’s guilt, and cleanse us from sin’s filth. 

More so, through the gift of a new heart and the presence of the Holy Spirit, it is his kindness that convicts us of sin and leads us to repentance (Romans 2:4). It is the Father’s love that disciplines us (Hebrews 12:7-11). Jesus doesn’t passively show us contempt, he actively shows us love. Better yet, when we confess those sins, we receive forgiveness and cleansing from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). 

Because of that, you, if you are a Christian, have freedom from the fear, shame, and condemnation of sin. Your sins and the sins done against you do not define you. Your identity is as a redeemed, reconciled, justified, cleansed son or daughter of our loving Father. You can be bold in confessing and confronting real sin because the grace God gives is real.

What We Can Do To Kill Sin Before It Kills Us

1. Be with Jesus. The Holy Spirit is faithful to work through the word, whether it is read or preached. A bold prayer could be, “Jesus, show me the things I need to repent of and the people I need to repent to (Ps. 139)”
2. Be in community. Pastor Brad House has a good post on this here. 
3. Create a culture where the truth is told and heard. Nathan Burke has a great post on this here. 

This post originally appeared on the Resurgence.

Eric Mason

Notre Dame sociologist Christian Smith has studied Millenials (18-29) extensively. In his book, Souls in Transition, he found that a few of defining characteristics of this generation are that life is marked by transitions and incessant change, that there is a focus on going from dependance to independence and standing on one’s own feet, and that in the midst of the pace of change in their lives there is ‘so much to figure out’ - skills, tasks, responsibilities - to keep moving forward.

Eric Mason, lead pastor at Epiphany Fellowship in Philadelphia, recently spoke directly and helpfully at how to minister in transient populations in an article at the Resurgence.  Here are his main points:

1. The importance of patience. People are becoming more process-oriented and need a place to work through worldview-transforming information with God’s people. 
2. Commitment to community formation. Being positionally connected to the body through the gospel does not make a person functionally connected to God’s people. It is the beginning and an empowering mechanism of true and practical knitting. People have to want to be with one another (2 Corinthians 6:11-13). 
3. Help people face what they are running from. Stability is scary to many of us, although we know we need it. Slowing down helps us face places in our soul where Jesus’ functional rule has not yet conquered. Running only postpones the inevitable.  
4. Dealing with natural and spiritual maturity equally.Although all things in our life should be viewed through a spiritual lens, it is helpful to work through some distinctions. Emotional, volitional, intellectual, geographical, financial, sexual, and relational health is a must to help people grow in Jesus. While not a comprehensive list, these are the greatest obstacles that impede people from stability. Ephesians 4:15 calls us to grow up in all respects—a phenomenal challenge for transient people. 
5. Recognizing that people ultimately belong to God. Some people will remain for a season. Our goal must be to do as much as we can to love them and engage them in the season when Jesus has allowed them to cross our paths. God ultimately is sovereign over people’s life span and direction. 

Read the entire article at the Resurgence.