The biggest lie we believe.

My sin separates me from God. Even though I have received salvation, my sin is a barrier to my relationship with God. I need to live a righteous, holy life so that I can stay in fellowship with God. When I fail, I better spend a lot of time in the Word and in prayer to make it up to God and get back on his good side. It might also help if I also feel extremely guilty and make promises to God about how I'm committing to stop sinning. Maybe then, the perpetual disappointment he has when he looks at me will be somewhat appeased.

LIE.

Paul was not kidding around when he said, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." (Rom 8:1)

No condemnation. NONE.

Christ paid for every single sin on the cross. Nothing we can do will ever surprise God. He knows everything we have done and everything we will do from before our birth till after our death.

Paul was also not kidding around when he said "[Nothing] in all of creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Rom 8:31)
 
Because of Christ's sacrifice on the cross, the curtain of separation between us and God was torn in two. We have full, complete access to fellowship with the Father. Nothing we can do will ever be able to separate us from his acceptance and love for us.

Because he is not surprised by our sin, he is also not disappointed in our sin. Of course he desires for us not to sin because he knows the destruction that it brings in our lives and he knows the life and freedom that a righteous life offers. But no matter how much we fail, his attitude towards us is always 100% delight. This is because his view of us is not based on our lives, but rather it is based on Christ's perfect life. Christ exchanged his righteous record for our sinful record on the cross, which means that no matter how much we sin, God sees nothing but a sinless life in our place.
 Let's stop denying God his power. He conquered sin and death on the cross, which defeated our sin once and for all. He has also placed his Spirit in us -- the same Spirit that raised Christ from the dead. When we bask in our guilt, we are elevating our sin to a position above the Spirit in our hearts. When we continue in habitual sin, we are saying to God, "I don't believe that you can really help me overcome this. My sin is too big." But God has empowered us through the Spirit to stop sinning and instead live for his glory.

Therefore, our sin does not separate us from God because he already knows about it, he already paid for it on the cross, and he already has given us the means to overcome it by the Spirit.

What would our lives look like if we truly believed that God loves us and delights in us continually? What if we laid down our heavy burdens of guilt, shame, and fear at the foot of the cross and instead danced and sang for joy because of the freedom that we ALREADY HAVE in Christ?

There would be no time to sin if our lives were instead consumed by worship.

Let's stop believing the lie and instead start believing in God's power.




 

{Disclaimer: I am not saying that our sin does not in any way affect our relationship with God. Although I wholeheartedly believe that God's attitude toward us can never change due to our sin, I definitely believe that our attitude towards God is greatly affected by our sin. Sin does damage our relationship with God because sin is an action of turning away from God and turning towards something else -- or in other words, sin is an act of rejection (on OUR part) of the fellowship that God is willingly offering us.}