Oct
31
Honest Sinner
Filed Under Devotional
I used to know myself very well before I was saved. My life was all about survival and doing pretty much whatever it took to get along. When you spend as many years as I did developing the survival skills of the unsaved, it becomes part of your nature. Then that one bright, shining moment happens and the Holy Spirit lifts the veil and Jesus Christ is so clear that a new nature is born. From that moment on, the old and the new are in direct conflict. It would be fabulous if the old nature would just pass away quietly, but it doesn’t. The new nature wants to rule, but the old holds on to what appears to be practical survival skills. The dysfunction of our upbringing and our surroundings all have to be sorted out. The old nature is always in our face and the new strains to get our attention. There is no doubt we want to give into the new completely, but the battle is not easily won. Yet, the new nature is the best, the brightest, and the most peaceful. Looking through the dense jungle foliage of worry, survival, failure, carnality, and all the rest, it is the glimpse of what can be that draws us on in a repeating cycle of sin and repentance.
“But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.” Romans 7:20
Paul knew this conflict and every man knows it, if he is honest. But, there is the rub, the great oxymoron. Is there such a thing as an honest sinner?
“For what the Law could not do, weak as it was through the flesh, God did: sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and as an offering for sin, He condemned sin in the flesh.” Romans 8:3
Even in the conflict of natures, God rescues ultimately and sin finally dissipates with this body. What a great and magnificent God we have! He is perfection and can create perfection for His pleasure and, yet, He loves the imperfect. I cannot fathom why, but I am grateful beyond my capacity to express it.