Responding To Sin Fully

What is the first thing you do when realizing you’ve sinned? That, of course, assumes you believe you do at all. To sin is to act in a way that opposes God’s commands and desires for you. Let’s assume you admit to being a sinner. Okay. How do you respond?

I typically try to repent to God, confess my sin. I do this to acquire His grace and forgiveness. The Bible says God forgives:

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” (1 John 1:9)

So, we repent and receive forgiveness, but there is more? I typically stop at confession. However, today I realized that the Bible is also clear from beginning to end about the effects sin has on human life. There are consequences that last beyond God’s forgiveness.

Cain is warned not to sin because sin is slavery. (Genesis 4:7; John 8:34.) It destroys your ability to choose, love, enjoy. Sin also brings blindness-the more you reject the truth about God the more incapable you are of perceiving any truth about yourself or the world (Isaiah 29:9-10; Romans 1:21.) – Tim Keller

Satan doesn’t want you to see all these negative impacts of sin. He wants you to think that repenting is enough. But don’t be fooled or blind or naive, sin messes us up and shows us no mercy. The consequences destroy our lives and those around us too.

My point is that we cannot stop at repentence. We’ll mess up again. Repeating any sin over and over (or even one time) can have devastating affects on your life. So in short, pray for God to help you turn completely away from that sin. Also, recognize that getting forgiveness is just the beginning of dealing with sin.

If we miss this second part, we’ll never be truly free.