Sin’s Consequences

 

Last week I was at a meeting and someone gave me a piece of information about a mutual friend. I am sorry to tell you that I felt the need to enlighten this lady on the deeper aspects of that information. I had it from a reliable source. I knew what I was going to say was true but it didn’t need to be said. No one was edified or built up (Ephesians 4:29) because I added “juice” to the information I had been given. God prompted me in the spirit at that moment. I knew I should stop but I was already into it so I finished the sentence.

I was wrong and had to call my friend the next morning and tell her so and seek her forgiveness! She was kind and hadn’t thought of it as gossip (she’s a good friend!). But, the Lord knew and He was not letting me get comfortable in my devotions or in my study until I had taken care of it!

We can ignore His prompting but if we pay attention to Him He will ultimately bless our obedience. My blessing that morning was peace after being guilt ridden until I made the call.

The conviction of sin is one of God’s gifts to us. He loves us too much to leave us in our sin. Continuing in sin is sure to lead to trouble. The Bible tells us that we will suffer consequences for sin. Some of them are obvious like we may cause pain to others or literally cost ourselves a lot of money (like if we get caught stealing or destroying some one else’s property).

But there are also spiritual consequences to sin that we will suffer if we don’t turn from sin when God convicts us. Consider the following:

Sin steals joy. After Nathan had confronted David about his sin with Bathsheba David asked God to create in him in a clean heart and to “restore the joy of Your salvation.”  Who would choose conviction of sin over the joy of God’s salvation?

One sin may open the door to other sins. Isaiah 30:1 says, “Ah, stubborn children,” declares the LORD, “who carry out a plan, but not mine, and who make an alliance, but not of my Spirit, that they may add sin to sin.” It is a slippery slope from one sin to the next.

Things like my little gossip incident grieve God. Ephesians 4:29–30 address some of our words like this. “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” It is much better to offer grace to others than to grieve God with our speech.

The scariest one to me is from Isaiah 59:1-2. Did you know that sin breaks our fellowship with God so that He may not listen to our prayers? These verses say, “Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear; but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.” It’s not that God can’t reach us or that He can’t hear. Our sin has caused a separation between Him and us.

The last person we want to be separated from is our Father in heaven! He is so gracious that He has provided a way for us to “get right” with Him – back into fellowship. As Christians, when we believed in Jesus Christ, He took the penalty for all of our sin.

In Psalm 32:1-2 David said, “Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the LORD counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.”

What a gift Jesus gave us when he took that penalty. But what about that sin that we commit everyday, like my gossip? God left us with a remedy for that in the same sacrifice of Christ, all of our sin is covered, but in order to be free of the guilt and the pain of sin we must confess it and turn from it.

1 John 1:9-10 teaches us how to stay right with God once we have believed. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.”

This time I need to confess and turn. I am praying that the next time I am tempted to give more information than is needed that I will heed the prompting of the Holy Spirit telling me to stop BEFORE the words are out of my mouth!

He loves us too much to leave us in sin. What a great God!