The enormity of sin

A subject that has come up several times in my recent reading and listening has been the way that people, especially Christians, view sin. It's not a topic that many are comfortable with, and some preachers and churches try to shy away from the subject and dwell instead on what they would consider more "positive" aspects of salvation, like God's love and His plan for your life. (This is not true in my own church; our pastor is very clear about sin and its effects on everyone's life.) "You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar," they might respond to criticism of their approach.

Certainly some people come to Christ through the revelation of God's love expressed in Him. Still, there has to be some explanation for just how that love was expressed on the cross. This has been an issue throughout the history of Christianity; views of the Atonement have sparked controversy and produced an enormous amount of writings as theologians argued their points. No matter what approach you take, however, you still have to explain how the love of God for us required Jesus to go to the cross.

Part of the problem is that in our contemporary Western society we have lost a sense of the enormity of sin. In American culture, you are more likely to see sin applauded than condemned. People who live for sex, money, power, and vanity are looked up to by many, and what they do to achieve their successes is seen as something to emulate, not avoid. "As long as no one else is getting hurt, why worry about it?" is the question posed to those who would criticize from a Biblical worldview.

I think where the confusion comes is in the difference between the seriousness of the effects of sin here on earth and the enormity of sin in God's sight. We tend to think of sin on a sliding scale: a white lie isn't as bad as shoplifting, which isn't as bad as dealing drugs, which isn't as bad as killing someone, which isn't as bad as genocide. In terms of the temporal effects of those sins, there is some truth to this. However, this scale of sin fails to take into account what eternal effect of sin is.

In the end, all sin results in one dramatic and horrific effect: the nailing of God to a cross. Our sin, no matter what the individual act may have been, resulted in the death of Jesus. Given that effect, all sin is an offense against a holy and loving God. Sin is an infinite offense against an infinite God, and separates us from God by an infinite gulf that we cannot bridge ourselves.

It is because sin is this serious that it took Jesus' infinite sacrifice to enable us to be restored to God. Our sin separates us from the God who loves us, and He is the One who, through Christ, makes it possible for us to be brought back into His family.

To view sin as anything less is to take a human-centric perspective and assume that is reality. Popular religious belief says that if you just do more good than bad in your life, you'll get to heaven. God will give you a pass on your sin if you've done enough good deeds to offset them. If this is true, then there was no need for Jesus to die. God could have simply hand-waved away sin without Jesus having to suffer so much.

To do so, though, He would have to suppress much of who He is. In my previous post about the simplicity of God, we saw how all of God's attributes are of equal, interdependent importance. A God who winks at sin is no longer just or holy, among other things. To remain true to Himself, God has to view sin as it is, and we need to understand, as well as we can, just how serious sin is in His sight.

Once we realize the enormity of our own sin, we can understand out need for divine intervention for the forgiveness of our sin. Then we are open to the good news of Jesus' sacrifice for us, and can respond with hearts that are humbled, contrite, and grateful for all He has done for us. Remembering how serious sin is also helps us to "go and sin no more." True, we will stumble and fall sometimes, but knowing what it cost for those sins to be forgiven ought to at least begin to motivate us to avoid sin out of our love and thankfulness to our Lord and Savior.