Sin. What’s the big deal?
Certain words make people feel uncomfortable. For example, “tax,” “coffin,” “debt”, and “haemorrhoids.”
“Sin” is another. It reeks of condemnation, judgementalism. We don’t like to hear it, we feel a bit embarrassed saying it.
What is sin, this thing that makes us so uneasy? In the Garden of Eden God gave Adam and Eve one command:
‘You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.’
Adam and Eve were surrounded by food-laden plants and trees, so this wasn’t a very difficult command to keep. But…
Genesis 3:1-7 The snake was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, ‘Did God really say, “You must not eat from any tree in the garden”?’ The woman said to the snake, ‘We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, but God did say, “You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.”’ ‘You will not certainly die,’ the snake said to the woman. ‘For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.’ When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realised that they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
This explains five things about sin:
First, sin is breaking God’s law. It is crossing a line that God has forbidden us to cross. It is disobedience.
Second, sin is making ourselves the law-maker. “Knowing good and evil” means: “You, not God, will decide what is right and what is wrong.” Sin is doing what is right in our own eyes. Sin is not just breaking the rules, it is making them.
Third, Sin is putting ourselves in God’s place. When we decide that we know better than God, that God’s laws don’t need to be kept, that we can replace God’s laws with our own, then we seat ourselves on the throne that belongs only to God.
Fourth, sin dehumanises us. If we were made to love, obey, and worship God—and each of these three actions is the expression of the other two—then to sin is to descend from our true nature. Sin bestialises us, but worse, for even the beasts act according to their true nature.
Fifth, sin ruins our lives, and the lives of those around us. How can we can break God’s law, make our own laws, depose God, and deny our humanity, without terrible consequences?
“Sin” makes us uncomfortable, but until we understand it, we can have no idea of how broken we really are, and why we so desperately need a Saviour.