Calling A Spade A Spade

Do you realize that we've become so callous, so blasé, so uncaring about sin that we don't even realize anymore what sin is? We give it lots of different names, some of them funny, some even glamourous, but we don't call it what it is: SIN!

The Holy Bible tells us that God hates ALL sin. Shakespeare wrote "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet...."; the Bible says sin by any other name is still sin! We need to learn to start calling a spade a spade where sin is concerned. We need to stop making excuses for it, stop glamourizing it, stop joking and laughing about it, and start seeing it for what it is: an abomination in the eyes of the holy and righteous Almighty God.

And He {Jesus} said unto them, "You are they who justify yourselves before men; but God knows your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God". (Luke 16:15)

Take adulterers, for instance. We say they are "special friends", or they have an "extramarital relationship". We even glamourize it, using words like "paramour". Sure sounds better than adulteress, doesn't it? No one has used the term "fornication" in years; instead we say unmarried lovers are "significant others" or "living partners".

Homosexuals like the term "gay", as if their lifestyle was one of giddy bliss instead of ugly sinfulness. All of these little euphemisms lessen or decrease the idea of sinfulness. A drunkard is no longer called a drunkard, he is an alcoholic, which somehow lessons both the sinfulness and the responsibility, as the term implies an illness that the person cannot possibly control.

We have a lot of that these days. Everything now is a sickness, something an individual has no control over. Drinking, using drugs, sex, gambling, overeating--- you name it, there's a twelve step program out there for it. Everything excess is now called an addiction. We don't indulge in sin, we have an illness.

People used to call these things sin. They used to know the difference between right and wrong, and if something was wrong in God's eyes, they knew it. We've somehow lost this basic concept: there is an absolute right, and an absolute wrong. And we deceive ourselves if we call sin by other other name.

Know you not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? BE NOT DECEIVED: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. (I Cor. 6:9,10)

We need to wake up to the fact that we are all sinners, and learn to see our sins as what they are. There is no excuse that justifies any sin in the eyes of the Lord. We need to stop making excuses, stop trying to make it sound better, stop trying to justify it, and instead just confess it and ask God's forgiveness for our willful disobedience to His holy word.

God WANTS to forgive us. He is not willing for anyone to die in their sin, and perish. There is no sin that God will not forgive, if we truly repent and confess our sin to Him. But in order to do that, we have to humbly admit that we are guilty, that we have committed sin. Not that we had a lapse in judgment, although that may very well be the case. Not that the devil made me do it, although we know he is the author of all sin. Not that we have a disease or syndrome that has taken away our free choice, although this is a common excuse.

We cannot change ourselves. Even all those twelve step programs out there know that. Only God can change a person. And only God can make us see our sin for what it is. But we have to accept what the Bible teaches us about our sin, and we have to humble ourselves before God and repent of it. If we harden our hearts to His word, He will let us go our own way; God never takes away our free will. The Bible says:

And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient.(Rom. 1:28)

No, we must humbly and honestly look at sin through God's eyes. We must call a spade a spade, and call sin by it's real name. We must confess to Him that we have sinned, and that we are sorry for it, and will turn away from it. We must accept Jesus as our Lord, and the ruler of our life. We have to trust in God's word, and the power of the blood of Jesus Christ to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Only then can we receive the forgiveness that God is ready, willing and able to offer us.