God's Grace and our sin

I was confounded with my own words. Sometimes I am ashamed at what comes out of my mouth. I am constantly amazed at the Lord’s process of sanctification. When I finally am at the apex of conquering a particular sin, when I begin to experience the effects of sanctification, almost immediately I am confronted with yet another sin, almost immediately does the process continue. These infinitesimal moments in between these periods of sanctification are my glimpses of heaven, of a time and a place, without sin.

I have heard it said, “The sin we most disdain in others is the sin we most hate within ourselves.”

I find this to be an indelible truth in my life. There is nothing like being confronted with someone who blatantly shares my same sin-struggles and realizing my anger is a result of the hatred of my own sin. Yet the truth that I am confronted with is that all I can control is myself. I know that I am called to look inward rather than outward, to really consider removing the plank in my eye than the splinter in my brothers. I love this verse… and hate it, because apparently my eyes are full of planks.

It’s uncomfortable to be confronted with sin, to be told we are wrong, or that the way we see is blurry. We don’t like to be uncomfortable, to sit in a room exploding with moments of awkward tension, or to meet people who are different than us, or to be told yet again that we are broken. Yet for a Christian, the more we sit in the discomfort the more we grow accustomed to it and God most graciously gives us another room a little more uncomfortable than the last. We are constantly in this life of being uncomfortable, constantly sitting in that chair that is poking into our backs or the room too loud or the person spitting as they speak. What I have found is rather than escaping the discomfort or trying to acclimate to the discomfort, we ought to quickly look up.

I feel helpless. Not in the way that is negative, but helpless in the sense that my only possible help could come from up, from above. As I am confronted with my sin the reality of my Savior is made greater and greater. Without Christ I would run to what is comfortable, to what is familiar or to that which brings me sinful pleasure. I’ve often given thought to what I would be like if I did not have Christ. It’s a nightmare in my mind. I literally fear myself without Christ. To what would I turn for comfort? Where would I seek help if I were in trouble? In whom would I place my trust and love and tell the deepest darkest secrets of my heart? How would I find rest in a world that moves so quickly and with such vehement speed as our world? I tremble to think of the places I would turn, to the people I would seek, to the rest in which I would drown, and to the material things of which I would craft my tiny god’s.  I fear my life without Christ, and I am comforted that I have a Savior who promises to never let me go.

I was encouraged today by these words from Deuteronomy 31.

            “Then Moses summoned Joshua and said to him in the sight of all Israel, ‘Be strong and courageous, for you shall go with this people into the land that the LORD has sworn to their fathers to give them, and you shall put them in possession of it. It is the LORD who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.’”

(Deuteronomy 31:7-9 ESV)