Intro
I think one of the biggest mistakes many Christians make today is through the misapplication of scriptural teachings on sin and holiness. I include myself in this and do not intend to instill guilt into people who have done there best to apply scripture in following Christ. As you who will read this will see, the point is that in striving to follow Christ we all sin; The key is to be able to acknowledge our part in continual sin even if we don't recognize it. Without repentance of sin, even sins of ignorance, I believe we handicap our ability to forgive and love others (especially those who many see as unworthy of love or forgiveness, aka people on the fringe).
Diagnosing the Problem
I would be willing to bet that no matter where you go to church that sin would be acknowledged as a problem. When contemplating what sin is, you might get tons of differing responses. Human beings have made it there business to associate a long list of things which we should not do. This list of "do nots" varies from person to person, church to church, denomination to denomination, etc. In reading the gospels, it makes me wonder if we are missing the point.
I know the intent of listing sins is to simplify things, and the intention of this is to help people to achieve holiness in some cases. But if we put aside the good intent of trying to use scripture to list sins, have we really simplified things? Jesus is constantly redefining sin and judgment throughout his ministry in the gospels. If we truly take his teachings to heart, we have to ask ourselves how deep the rabbit hole really is.
There are individual sins, group sins, communal sins, governmental sins, physical sins, sins of the mind, and sins of ignorance. I've only listed types of sins and I think we can all agree it would be a waste of time spending the rest of my life trying to isolate every specific sin onto a list and then using my time trying to avoid those sins. And yet this is how we often practice our faith. We walk on egg shells day to day, and even worse, when someone else struggles with something in their lives we condemn them. I want to mention that this type of behavior is not limited to a specific group of people. I think we all struggle with this to some extent. We are either acknowledging this behavior and trying to get better at being judgmental with the help of God and others, or we feel like because we have forgiveness for our sins and don't commit certain sins (which are worse than other sins) that we are set apart from others. For those of you reading this who don't struggle with sin anymore, you might find this blog post of little use.
For some of us, before we can even take steps to try and "fix" our tendency to judge, we must first acknowledge that we are living in continual sin whether we know it or not. Jesus likened thinking certain thoughts to committing physical sins. He also calls us to self examination before we try to solve someone else's problems with sins. If we are living in continual sin, shouldn't we be constantly examining our own roles in injustice at every level? If we are to be judged as we judge others, shouldn't we handle our relationships with others in a respectful fashion, especially our enemies who we are called to love? I know that I have run into problems when I mistakenly think that sin and holiness begin and end with me. When we become absorbed in our own lives, we shut ourselves off from the beautiful opportunities God places right under our nose: To serve and be in fellowship with others, especially people on the fringes of society.
It's not just serving the poor, but doing our best to empower them to join in the service of others. We can't do this if we don't recognize that we as Christians suffer from the same continual sin as others. When we label sins, we are mostly setting a standard that no one can live up to as well as putting ourselves, as broken and imperfect beings, in a place reserved for God. In my opinion and experience, doing so is about power and control. Ironically, the way Jesus established these things was through service and humility. I could be the one misreading scripture, but I don't recall Jesus ever belittling a person's right to think for themselves or make there own choices. He definitely spoke to consequences and results of certain choices, but set an example of forgiveness, to the point that he even forgives the very people who hate him and are nailing him to the cross. I can safely say that if someone caused me suffering like Christ suffered, forgiveness would not be at the front of my mind. I have failed many lesser tests in life and therefore am in no position to judge others.
Redistribution for a Solution
I think that I have at least made a point for the fallacy of specifying sin and trying to achieve holiness by not sinning. I would propose that we unlearn the way we think about sin and put our energies and time to better use. It is far clearer, in my understanding, what we are called to than what we are called not to do. Please recognize that what we are called to is still difficult, but it is exponentially easier than trying to avoid all sin (or even some sin; or even one sin). Our time would be better spent trying to avoid getting wet in a downpour than it would be trying to spend our lives not sinning. While sin is ugly, without acknowledging it we wouldn't be able to experience repentance, forgiveness and love to the fullness of what God intends. The bottom line is that sin is a paradox which we will never fully understand, and that while we would probably prefer not to sin, God turns the negativity of our actions into the beauty of our individual and communal stories/testimonies. Would the parable of the "Prodigal Son" be the same without the son's bad choices and struggles?
Rather than trying to shine a light on our sins, why don't we think of it as a sickness. An epidemic that plagues all of humanity. If Jesus invites everyone to follow him, than the only difference between Christians and non-Christians is that Christians continually repent and seek forgiveness for their sin. I am obviously over simplifying when I type that, but how would people as a whole be different, even transformed, if they analyzed themselves instead of judging others? What would church look like without walls of any kind? Even scarier, what would church look like if we truly invited everyone, regardless of identity or credentials, to follow Christ in community of the church?
I would dare any church, local or greater, to invite and build relationships with anyone who would accept that invitation. We fall into the myth of believing that we have to reach a certain status to help or serve others, especially in Western culture. For many Christians and people in general, we invest so much time into achieving a certain level of success that we lose the ability to help others. I myself have become so absorbed in my social status, my financial status, and my spiritual status that I am sure to have missed many opportunities to put my God given gifts to work in spite of my situation. Even to this day I fear that I spend way too much time feeling sorry for myself.
I want to conclude by saying that I know the processes I have proposed are not easy. I am also not trying to justify obvious wrongs by thinking of sin as an epidemic instead of a list we can avoid. If you take anything away from this, I would say that we should redistribute our energy into what we can participate in or what we are called to rather than taking stands against certain behaviors or people. It is impossible to know why certain people do things unless we truly walk in their shoes. I'm not saying we would make the same decisions, but it is undeniable that environment and circumstance influence choices. The sins of the "haves" are not any less to God than the sins of the "have nots." Rather than isolating certain people for certain behavior and speaking against them, why don't we work together to improve others' situations so it is less tempting to resort to certain behaviors?
We are called to love God and love people above all else, so let's continue to do our best to love people as God intended.
I hope those who read this are moved and I will tackle holiness in part two. I am open to discussion and suggestions on said topic(s).
God bless,
Jason
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