Sara Maxwell

Faith…

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by

Sara Maxwell
in ,

Today I had the privilege of joining a ladies bible study. Two Australians, one Dane, one Norwegian and myself…it was lovely. The subject was sin and the grace of God. Over the years sin has been whitewashed into a lesser evil. The terminology has changed…for example…adultery is now called an affair. It doesn’t sound as bad. It is more palatable. How did this happen? When has a sin stopped being a sin? And what is a sin these days?

It’s so easy to label murder, sorcery, adultery and such as sin…but what about hatred, gossip, lust and selfish ambition? Galatians 5:16-26 talks about sin and its consequences. It also talks about the fruits of the Spirit. Love, joy, peace….so many wonderful qualities. How can we as Christians persevere in this world? Where everything is watered down and becoming acceptable? Where even in churches the message is about love and acceptance instead of sin and grace?

The study moved into the topic of faith. How can we walk the walk even on our dark days? No matter how much bible study and prayer we engage in, and it goes nowhere? It occurred to me that God’s grace and our faith can be compared to a long marriage. There are dark days and wonderful days. The one thing we can hold on to is the love and faith that we have in each other. When there is no conversation, there is still the faith that we will get through this. Gods love and grace is always there, even when we are ignoring Him. A good spouse is always there waiting…! Loving and forgiving! Don’t know if this makes sense to you…but it was as clear as bell to me. A real reassurance that I am in it for the long haul…Jesus and me!

Comments

5 responses to “Faith…”

  1. Marika Avatar
    Marika

    I was thinking about this a little the other day and my thoughts boiled down to this, why do we need to define the sin? Do we really need to share all our shortcomings with one another? Why would we do that? If I share with you my deep dark sin, will I find grace, forgiveness, love? My opinion ( and only an opinion) is that we should focus more on the sinner and not the sin, who is this person? Where do they come from? What have they survived? If a child abuse survivor hates their abuser, what would show them more grace- tell them hate is a sin? Tell them they need to forgive? Or just treat them with the compassion and acceptance that they so need? I don’t believe in complacency, but I have never believed that trying to define the sins has ever pushed me closer to God. These blogs are great for getting me thinking :)) thanks Saara for being sincere with them!

  2. Saara Leppanen Avatar
    Saara Leppanen

    Marika…great question! I don’t believe that we need to define the sin to someone else…we just need to acknowledge it to ourselves. So much sin is “acceptable” these days. Unless we can face what the underlying causes of our distance from God is, there isn’t true freedom and intimacy in our relationship with Him. Not because He doesn’t know what is inside of us holding us back…but we can’t break the barriers to get to Him. The ones we build ourselves, with sin. Thanks for the dialogue. It is good to get us thinking.

  3. Phoenix Avatar
    Phoenix

    I do think things are greatly watered down in the church these days. I have a feeling it is that many actually don’t have a relationship with the King of Kings… Jesus. You realize sin is only a scary word is you are not willing to humble your self and say You need Jesus. We are powerless to change ourselves without the friendship and relationship with Jesus. I still sin but my desire is to live more and more fully free from things that kill my soul and heart (sin). Why would I be afraid to call being jealous a sin…because we all know how ugly that feels inside….so do we fell free…nope. To me sin is what makes us unhappy and just plain old ugly…maybe others can’t always see it….but we see it weigh us down. It is Jesus that wants us to be free…not to be the killjoy and weigh us down with rules. He gets it…we will never be free or joyful being afraid of sin and in turn hiding it and holding on to it because we don’t want to label sin anymore.
    Let us not fear sin and try to remove it from our dialogue….it’s still there and it rots. Isn’t better to call it what it is and share what the solution is JESUS…and his love for us and HIS BLOOD.
    Why are we watering it down….everyone knows that something is wrong in the world today….SIN….but we have the answer Jesus and his unconditional love.

  4. marika Avatar
    marika

    Hey Saara 🙂

    Agreed for sure that barriers of sin separate us from God and hold us back from the potential we have in Him. I know for myself I have held onto some of the sins in my life out of habit, fear of letting go, unknown future directions, etc… My struggle is the “acceptable” “water down” sin thread. I don’t look at the world’s values, the world is the world (and I’ve not given up on it – it’s a battlefield), conversely the world definitely looks at me. I want them to see someone who struggles just as they do, and rather than point out wrongs or misguidances, I’d rather show them that while I don’t accept my sin, it’s something God alone forgives and He and I will work it out. Maybe that sounds like I’m not trying hard enough, or it’s the watered-down christian answer ;), it’s just that I know like any real relationship there has to be a genuine component to it or it’s all for naught. Thank you for letting me tag along on your blog, I am encouraged by you!

  5. Saara Leppanen Avatar
    Saara Leppanen

    That’s exactly where honesty comes in. People respect honesty. I’m not saying that you need to squawk the sin word at your friends in the world…just that we, as Christians, need to read the Word and take it at face value. If God calls something a sin, that’s what it is..not a personality quirk. We all struggle with sin, just don’t like to call it that, it’s sounds ugly and unforgivable. And that’s where Gods grace comes in…

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