Sin and Evil

A couple days late, but I thought I would share some lessons from this past Sunday service at my church. It was about the makeup of true evil and sin.

From the moment we are born onto this earth, we are born into sin. Of course we know it all stems from Eve eating the forbidden fruit. Alot of people believe we are inherently good natured, especially as children. But have you ever wondered why we have to teach kids to play nice with others? Or why we have to teach them to share? Or why we have to teach them to speak nicely? Because if we didn't, everyone would be completely self centered and murderous. If we didn't teach our children how to behave they would take whatever they wanted, beat other kids up when they got mad, talk horribly to each other, and so on. We are not inherently good, we are inherently sinful in nature.

Dr. Millard Erickson summarizes sin as this..."Sin is any lack of conformity to God's moral or spiritual law, whether in deed, word, thought, action or disposition. Actively, it may be violating God's law, or going beyond the limits He set. Passively, it may mean "falling short", or failure to do what God desires or commands. In short, sin is man's tendency toward autonomy, rather than surrender of self, life and will to God".

Many non-Christians will say they believe they will still get into Heaven because they are "good people". Some will even say they only "miss the mark" 2 or 3 times a day. Even if we mess up once a day, that's sin and it separates us from God. Every single one of us misses the mark MUCH more than 3 times a day. Again, think of not only your actions, but your thoughts, your words, your disposition. I'm sure you will realize just how much we all sin on a daily basis.

Romans 3:9-12 says...

What shall we conclude then? Are we any better? Not at all! We have already made the charge that Jews and Gentiles alike are all under sin.

As it is written: "There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God."

All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.

That pretty much says it...every single one of us is a sinner. The beautiful part is that Jesus led a perfect life and paid the ultimate price so that we may enjoy eternity in Heaven with our Father. Sin would be the doom of us all if it weren't for God's gift of grace.

Romans 3:23-24 says...

All of us have sinned and fallen short of God's glory. But God treats us much better than we deserve, and because of Christ Jesus, He freely accepts us and sets us free from our sins.

Here's the thing...Sin has to be admitted before it can be defeated. We have to admit our faults to God and truly repent. Repenting doesn't just mean saying we're sorry...we have to make an effort to overcome whatever the sin may be and not do it again. Of course we are human and we will fall again, but we have to make that effort to improve. God not only forgives us, he completely forgets about our past sins and washes us completely clean. When we completely surrender to Him and give our lives over to Him, he makes us into completely new creatures, thus the term "Born Again". It's true, we really are born again as new children of God.

Some notes on Satan. We all know he is evil incarnate. He will do everything he can to tempt us and destroy our relationship with God. We must trust in the Lord to deliver us from Satan and his evil. Satan has no power over us as long as we have God inside of us. God rules over all things, including Satan and all of his demons. We have nothing to fear.

Here's what the bible tells us about who Satan really is:

• The father of lies. John 8:44


• A thief who comes only to steal and kill and destroy. John 10:10


• A strongman who strong arms. Mark 3:27

Evil comes in ALL shapes and sizes, BUT IT'S STILL SIN. Jesus Christ will deliver us. We are going to sin, it's in our nature since Eve ate the forbidden fruit. But we have to try and live every facet of our lives for the Lord, and when we do sin we have to admit our sin to God and ask for Him to wash us clean...and He will. If you haven't already given your life to Jesus, there is still time. He is waiting for you and loves you...no matter what you've done in your past.

I'll close this post with Psalm 51:

Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.

Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.

For I know my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.

Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you are proved right when you speak and justified when you judge.

Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.

God Bless!