Pandemic of SIN – Sins are the Symptoms

The Pandemic of Sin: Sins Are the Symptoms

Let’s play a game of Can You Top This. I’m sure you can! This past month, we celebrated our 48^th Anniversary, celebrated Happy Birthday America, I hit my head on the low basement ceiling., went to ER and had a concussion, Righty, my right hearing aid went dead, I got slammed by another car close to home, went to ER, concussion, car totaled, now I’ve lost Righty, and I broke my dentures in half! Like your list of ‘surprises’, He was not surprised, so all is well.

Now, the following is a text message I recently sent to several people:

Just spending some quiet time with the Lord. I met Him back in 1977 and without any major diversions have diligently pursued Him, to know Him as He actually and always Is. I would certainly say I know Him more than I did then…and yet, I feel I’m like a racehorse who still awaits the gates to open, to bust out for His glory. There is so much more of Him to know….I am determined to press on and continue to share what I discover. Pray one for another.

Each month, expressing and sharing My Running Thoughts is simply sharing what ‘pressing on’ means to me. Each month I share what I have considered, realized, witnessed or experienced. My intention is that I might remind and encourage you who are reading this blog post of

the reality of God. He actually Is
the mysteriousness of life. There is a whole unseen kingdom that is as real as all that we see. Air exists, thoughts exist, God and His heavenly realm exist.
truths within these mysteries. All His promises are always true, God loves us perfectly, we can know Him personally. “Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent” John 17:3
and our opportunity not only to believe God exists but to interact with and know Him actively and intimately. “my sheep hear my voice”

Life on this earth, at this time, is not meant just to be survived, but to be lived. I must admit that I and most others that I meet, and I might suggest you, attempt to survive our days carefully versus live our lives freely, securely, productively, powerfully.

I’ve checked my motives many times. Why do I do or say what I do?

Like Paul, to know Him as He Is and then to ‘show and tell’ Him to others.

This verse says it well;

And this, so that I may know Him [experientially, becoming more thoroughly acquainted with Him, understanding the remarkable wonders of His Person more completely] and [in that same way experience] the power of His resurrection [which overflows and is active in believers], and [that I may share] the fellowship of His sufferings, by being continually conformed [inwardly into His likeness even] to His death [dying as He did]; Phil 3:10-11 Amplified Bible.

So now, another month of thoughts that have been mine since we last chatted.

During this past month I found myself thinking less about my circumstances and more about the condition of my heart. Broken hearing aids can be repaired. Cars can be replaced. Dentures can be remade. Concussions heal. As inconvenient and painful as these things can be, they are not life’s greatest problem. But what about the deepest problem every human being faces? What if many of the things we call “our problems” are actually symptoms of something much deeper? That thought led me to consider the difference between Sin and sins

This month I wanted to discuss the difference between sin and sins. As usual, I’ll probably use less than perfect analogies. Like this one, cancer.

Such a bad, unwelcome word. Unchecked cancer is a killer. If we have it, whether we know it or not, it will kill us. It is not the pain, the tiredness, the trouble breathing, the frequent urination, the lost limbs that kills us. It is the disease named cancer. Symptoms are not the disease, they just reveal the disease. They are as a result of the disease. And so it is with Sin and sins.

Sin is the disease, sins are the symptoms.

Think of it this way. Imagine going to your doctor because you’ve been experiencing constant headaches, fatigue, shortness of breath and unexplained pain. A wise physician wouldn’t simply hand you a bottle of aspirin and send you on your way. He would want to discover why those symptoms exist. The headache isn’t the disease; it is evidence that something deeper may be wrong. Treating only the symptoms while ignoring the disease may provide temporary relief, but it can never bring lasting healing.

In much the same way, many of us spend our lives trying to manage our outward behaviors. We try harder, promise to do better, become more disciplined, more moral, more religious. Those efforts may lessen some symptoms for a time, but they cannot cure the disease. God’s concern has never been merely to make us behave better. His desire is to make us new.

So what? What’s the big deal?

The sad, amazing reality is that, unlike cancer, everyone, everyone ever born, is born with the disease of sin which was introduced into the world way back in the Garden of Eden. It is often called original sin pointing back to its origin in the Garden. We all have it. And sins are the evidence of it. Just look at this world!

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,..” Romans 3:23

Keeping the analogy alive, unresolved cancer kills and unresolved Sin kills.

“For the wages of ( payment for ) sin is death, …”

And it is also true that, unlike cancer, there is a total, sure, foolproof remedy.

“ but the gift (the remedy) of God is eternal life in^[^b^] Christ Jesus our Lord”. Rom 6:23

Again, I get it, so what? A couple of observations come to mind.

The cancer analogy works because we understand physical life and physical death far better than eternal life and eternal death.

Consider these estimates. Demographers believe that approximately 120 billion people have been born throughout all of human history. Of those, about 8.2 billion are alive today. That means roughly 112 billion people have already completed their earthly lives and entered eternity. Every one of those 120 billion people has been born with the deadly disease of Sin. Each of those 112 billion who have gone before us has now entered either eternal life or eternal death. Think about that. One day, unless the Lord returns first, we too will join them.

The disease of Sin is unlike every other disease. It cannot heal itself, it cannot be ignored, and no amount of human effort can cure it. God Himself had to provide the remedy.

I have observed many possibilities.

For cancer/sin, we can deny it even exists. Yet, it does and it kills.
We can not know that we have it, but we do, and it kills.
We can try our best to lessen the symptoms via various treatments or behavior modifications yet the underlying disease still kills.

With regard to sin, I think with numbers so large (billions) we do not confront the diagnosis: that eternal death of life is at everyone’s doorstep. We sort of whistle, Que sera, sera., what will be will be. Yet it does not have to be!

What to do?

Well, first off we must deal with ourselves. Like on the airplane they tell the passengers in case of emergency that they need to put their masks on to enable them to help fellow passengers, 1^st, we need to be healed of Sin. And there exists only one remedy, it is to believe and surrender to Jesus as Lord and Savior.

“And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” Acts 4:12

What to realize?

Understand that even after we are forgiven of, healed from Sin, some of the symptoms will linger. Yet, if we have truly recognized and surrendered to Jesus as Lord, we will find that we are not sinless but will indeed sin less. We have spent a lifetime under the control of the disease, freedom needs time. He will though “complete the good work He has begun” in us Phil 1:6.

Here is an important spiritual health tip: Don’t try to stop having symptoms, instead, begin living the new life out from under the disease. Then the symptoms, over time will disappear. Like physical rehabilitation, we need to eat well (God’s truth), exercise (His promises) and rest (in Him)

The challenge is that we are still in this world with a pandemic of Sin and yet we are not of this world any longer. We have been clothed with Christ for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. Gal 3:27 Picture a person swimming in an ocean of Sin but wearing Jesus…the sin can no longer touch us. Or another picture of Sin as a magnet that others are bound to but you are free from. You may still sin, but you no longer have to live under sin’s control.

And, even if you struggle still with Sin’s symptoms you can know for sure that the disease can never come back. We are not in remission, we are healed. You cannot and need not earn that which has already been provided. The battle is won.

Ok, one more tip. Though the disease of sin can never be transmitted to us again, being exposed to one with symptoms can impact our total restoration. “Do not be misled: “Bad company corrupts good character.”” 1 Cor 15:33

How to live?

WE NEED TO LOVE. Look around and realize everyone you see is either with the disease of Sin or has been healed from it. For those who have been healed, like me, I need encourage others by word and deed. I need to assist where possible in their spiritual restoration. I need to lead by example as to how to fully recover.

For those who are still living with the Sin disease, I need to care. I need not judge them or their symptoms, I was just like them. I need to do my very best to point them to Jesus as the only healer, take them to Him, speak to Him on their behalf. I need to take people’s lives seriously and like Jesus who loves us so much He died for us, I need to love them to Him and to “ Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect” 1 Peter 3:15 We need to be a good neighbor, a good Samaritan.

We need to see ourselves as those who have discovered and applied the remedy. And we need to see ourselves as still living in the cancer ward. We are the salt of the earth, the light of the world and can deliver hope to the hopeless.

Let’s go and do and thereby know..