I have to admit that the sound of the word sin has an enticing, somewhat sinister, ring to it – SIN. Just at the sound of the word images begin to crowd into our minds. Conversely the thought of being good doesn’t bring to mind nearly as numerous or exciting images. Let’s be honest, who really relishes the thought of being good? Being good is somewhat like a perpetual, never-ending, year-round homework assignment.
We do like to use sin as a barrier to separate ourselves from others. We tend to snub certain groups, judging them as inferior, or at the least separating ourselves as not as “bad” a sinner as “them”. Yet when you boil it down, the chief difference between the Christian and others is only that a Christian is an admitted sinner. Actually the one thing most true about sin is that it unites us. We’re not all crooks, perverts, or murderers, BUT we are all are in some way sinners.
In the early 1970’s, psychiatrist, Karl Menninger, wrote a book entitled, Whatever became of Sin? He wrote in the book a plea that we, as a society, not write off all the unpleasant behavior as maladjustment or that we reduce evil to a legal problem by calling it crime.
My dear Dr Menninger, I fear it is too late. I know that we have seemingly always called them the ‘deadly’ sins, but do we still believe that about Sloth, Pride, Anger, Lust, Envy, Greed, and Gluttony? Or has time and culture lessened the sting of these so-called seven deadly sins? Have we stop believing that these sins can harm us? Have we become immune to the thought of sin? Have we outgrown the Seven Deadly Sins?
Jeff Bridges, the actor, stated in a recent interview, “I don’t do Facebook or tweeting or any of that, but I spend huge hunks of my day in front of a computer screen emailing . . . it’s addicting. Like so many things in life, the stuff that comes easily and feels good can really be dangerous.”
The serpent was clever, more clever than any wild animal GOD had made. He spoke to the Woman: "Do I understand that God told you not to eat from any tree in the garden?" The Woman said to the serpent, "Not at all. We can eat from the trees in the garden. It's only about the tree in the middle of the garden that God said, 'Don't eat from it; don't even touch it or you'll die.'"
The serpent told the Woman, "You won't die. God knows that the moment you eat from that tree, you'll see what's really going on. You'll be just like God, knowing everything, ranging all the way from good to evil."
When the Woman saw that the tree looked like good eating and realized what she would get out of it—she'd know everything!—she took and ate the fruit and then gave some to her husband, and he ate. Immediately the two of them did "see what's really going on"—saw themselves naked! They sewed fig leaves together as makeshift clothes for themselves. GENESIS 3:1-7
The Serpent, brings the temptation – “Did God say . . .” Temptation comes in the simplest of forms. Sin comes to most of us not in the big ways, but in the simple, it’s no biggie, that’s not really a sin, it doesn’t matter, no one will care kinda way. We are still giving into the same lies – “it will do you no harm. You’re being cheated of pleasure and good.” Our inner desire we can handle (or so we think) it is the external temptation that we get caught up in.
Temptation works like this – no one wants to be involved with Pornography, but the harmless link on the computer that looks interesting – the pretty picture - the non-descript e-mail – begins to slowly spiral into a dark region of internet pornography in which we wake up and say how did I get here?
You see I believe as a church, as Christians, in the name of tolerance we have stopped calling sin – sin. Or in our desire to be tolerant, we have stopped doing anything or in old world terms we have become slothful. We have bought the biggest lie of them all – it doesn’t matter. We have in effect been devoured by one of the Deadly Sins with out even knowing it or caring about it – SLOTH.
Sloth pokes at the areas of our life that should be active and alive and instead causes them to atrophy.
A primary assertion amongst family counselors as to the large number of undisciplined children in our schools is that their parents are too lazy to do the hard work – to invest the time and the energy to teach and to nurture their children. Which is why schools are so desperate for quality parents and grandparents to volunteer.
Sloth takes our time and wastes it. It takes our emotions and dulls them. Sloth is an escape – an excuse. Sloth is indifference.
When did Dr. Marcus Welby give way to Nip/Tuck?
When did Carol Burnett become SNL?
When did Johnny Quest become Eric Cartman?
When did Dennis the Menace become Bart Simpson?
When did Father Knows Best become Family Guy?
When did Lucy and Ethel become Desperate Housewives?
When did Old Time Radio Drama and Comedy stop being entertaining?
When did Civil Disobedience become riots in the streets?
When did innuendo become reality?
When did tragedy become entertainment?
When did disrespect become vogue?
While we’re at when did Sin stop being sin?
When did greed become profit?
When did excess become necessity?
When did lust become a marketing tool?
When did envy become a basis for our economy?
When did anger become the preferred method of passionate rhetoric?
When did pride become a virtue?
When did sloth give way to tolerance?
Author Dorothy Sayers writes about the sin of sloth this way: “The world calls it tolerance. It (sloth) is the sin which believes in nothing, enjoys nothing, loves nothing, seeks to know nothing, finds purpose in nothing, lives for nothing and only remains alive because there is nothing it would die for.”
The haunting words of Pastor Martin Niemöller (Jan 14, 1892 – Mar 6, 1984) speak to slothful and tolerant ways (The origins of this poem have been traced to a speech given January 6, 1946, to the representatives of the Confessing Church in Frankfurt):
When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for the Jews,
I remained silent;
I was not a Jew.
When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
Church, we remained silent and rationalized the removal of prayer from our schools as no big deal. Then we pondered at the loss of calm and the rise of problems, chaos, and discipline in the schools.
We remained silent and thought it won’t affect me as ratings and guidelines for movies and television lessened and then we pondered, “How did we raise such a violent and sexual aggressive generation?”
We remained silent and thought no problem when they removed the Ten Commandments, like thou shall not kill, from the walls of our courthouses and public places. Then we pondered as the courts made abortion legal and now ponder legalizing assisted suicide.
We remained silent and rationalized abortion as a personal choice and then pondered, “How did we get to the point that children and women have no value and their lives are bartered in human sex trafficking and pornography?”
Church, we are dead when we avoid the truth that hurts and accept the easy lies.
We are dead when our blood does not boil in the face of injustice.
The world is drowning in sin. We are drowning in sin! And someone must cry out! Do not be pulled under! Church, I am asking, no I am pleading, “Wake Up!” Do not be lulled to sleep! Do not let another day go by with someone drowning in the waters of sin!
God put it simply, “you are either for me or against me!” There is no gray. There is no tolerance. Sin is sin and no matter how hard we try to rationalize it in our lives, it will not work in our relationship to God.
A friend once told me, “I’ll never become a Christian because they are always unhappy, carrying a burden of guilt for all their sins. I don’t want a life of guilt.”
The truth couldn’t be further from that concept. A Christan is the only one who does not need to go around feeling guilty. For a believer, sin is a burden that can be put down – let go of – because you are forgiven. The inability to admit you are a sinner is what creates guilt.
It is not fatal to be a sinner, BUT it is fatal to deny that you are a sinner.
Let us take time to confess our sins, and then rise up as forgiven people and begin again this journey of faith.
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