:: in.a.mirror.dimly ::

We continue to look at how Christians can stop sinning. Previously we identified persistent sin as a problem and then talked about the information we need and the desires that drive us. Today we’ll talk about the spiritual battle of sin.

If that sounds a little far out or unnecessary to you, then you really need to keep reading and give this some thought and prayer…

Solving The Enforcement Problem with Sin

So, if you’re following me now and you have your facts and desires straight, perhaps you still feel like sin has you under its dark, smudgy thumb. I’m with you on that. It’s nice that God wants you to be free and that God is able to offer us greater intimacy and joy than anything we can find here on earth, but don’t you wish it was easier to wipe the power and effects of sin from our lives?

He’s given us everything we need for godly living and we love him deeply, but somehow we still can’t connect our facts and desires with reality. Sin is a tricky little bugger.

This is where we need to get spiritual. We are in a spiritual struggle with evil spirits that want to wreck us, as in that guy prowling like a roaring lion seeking to devour us. Peter knew a thing or two about that when Jesus warned him that Satan wanted to tear him apart. There are spiritual forces in this world who desire to control us, who want nothing more than to become idols who receive worship and loyalty.

Now, in moving forward we can make two mistakes. One is the intellectual mistake of ignoring this spiritual warfare business because we once saw a preacher on the television wearing a snappy suit who hit a lady over the head with her crutch to heal her.

I’m from the intellectual tribe, and I’ve been in churches where I’ve had to dodge flailing plastic swords and waving flags while people shook and wept—stuff that has left me suspicious of this spiritual warfare business at times. However, whether we encounter the fraudulent or the odd, the scriptures make it abundantly clear that we are engaged in spiritual warfare that requires God’s spiritual resources if we want to win.

You do want to live a holy life in intimacy with God, don’t you?

The other extreme leaves the intellectual behind and moves more according to emotion, feelings, and finds spiritual significance in things like rocks, a word from God, and, if you’re really a lost cause, toast. That isn’t to say that God can’t speak through prophetic words or through unusual means. A charismatic friend of mine once said that God used a donkey to speak his message and he’s been using asses ever since.

Speaking of which, God has even used to share specific messages with folks.

However, we can lose our grip when delving into the spiritual. Some have clung to a supposed “word from God,” that only ruined their lives completely. We have scripture and fellow believers to keep us grounded, and while we should fight sin by spiritual means, we should not forget the teachings of scripture and the church when we engage in these spiritual struggles.

And so, keeping these extremes in mind, we can engage in the enforcement of God’s will and power with the sin that plagues us. Christ has broken the power of sin with his Resurrection, and so we have his power at our disposal because the Spirit is in our lives. So, for starters, we can claim the power of the cross and Resurrection. And even more than that, we are free from the dragging influence of sin when seeking out God. And this is where we will find the victory over sin.

We don’t defeat sin by fighting it ourselves. We defeat sin by letting God defeat it as we cling to him. Sin cannot touch us when we our heavenly father is residing in our bodies, his new temple. Therefore, the trick to living in holiness is to seek God with stubborn tenacity whether or not we feel like it.

We have the information at hand: he loves us and desires that all people should know him. There are no caveats, no loop holes that exclude you or me. And therefore, we are welcome into his presence because of his Son’s work and the Spirit’s ongoing influence.

As we enjoy intimacy with God, we can ask him to expose sin for what it is. In other words, as I’ve prayed about my own struggles with lust and anxiety, they have been revealed as spirits of adultery and fear. Claiming the biblical truth of Christ’s victory as my own, I told the spirit of fear and the spirit of adultery to leave.

While they pester me from time to time, in the years that followed those decisive moments of revelation I have experienced new-found freedom from these sins that nagged me for years because I’m entrusting the spiritual battle against sin with God. My time with God that resulted in renewed spiritual insight into my sin struggles brought about a decisive breaking of sin’s hold in my life.

Now we know the facts about holiness and sin, the emotional end of things, and the way we fight sin, but must sin always be an ongoing struggle? Can’t we move beyond this daily fight against sin? I’d suggest that we can, and that’s what we’ll discuss tomorrow…

When thinking about sanctification and the call of God for us to be holy, there is more going on than simply setting ourselves right with God. While God certainly wants to know us and to have fellowship with us, God also wants us to be useful as his people on earth.

We will never represent God unless God is able shape us into his kind of people.

So in our daily work to live holy lives, to discipline ourselves, to hear God, and to let God work in us, we are no longer acting as individuals just trying to better themselves. We are drawing near to God in order to be more effective as God’s people, as his ministers, as his body.

When it comes to spirituality and holiness, we have a lot more at stake than our own salvation. The world is depending on it.