Sin

At the conference, Jerry Bridges encouraged us to pick up his book entitled, "Respectable Sins", and of course I went down and bought it. I really love Jerry Bridges because I feel that it's readable to even me, Stephanie, the non-theologian. So, anything that Jerry Bridges writes, I love. I think.

I went home and started to page through the book. I was super excited about reading it because it talks about sins that we tend to tolerate and accept in our daily Christian walk. He addresses sins that aren't the "big" sins--but really are serious offenses to our God. Some of the sins that Jerry talks about are; Ungodliness, Anxiety and Frustration, Discontentment, Unthankfulness, Pride, Selfishness, Anger, Worldliness, etc...

Sin is horrible. Sin is ugly. Sin is gross. Our sin is huge. This is nothing new. We should be so grieved by our sin. Jerry writes, "All of our sin is done openly in the very presence of God. It's as if we are acting out all of our sin before Him as He sits on His royal throne." Wow.

Jerry also encourages readers to deal effectively with their sin. He says, "As we struggle to put to death our subtle sins, we must always keep in mind this twofold truth: Our sins are forgiven and we are accepted as righteous by God because of both the sinless life and sin-bearing death of our Lord Jesus Christ. There is no greater motivation for dealing with sin in our lives than the realization of these two glorious truths of the gospel."

I love this verse:

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God." -Hebrews 12:1-2

And, ohhh...go get the book. It's good!