Agreeing with God about your sin
by Gini Crawford, MSW
www.BecauseOfGod.com
1/14/2008
revised 1/22/2022
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There is a dangerous trend in America, even in some churches. This trend is to not mention the word "sin". You would think it was a cuss word how some people react to this word. This is because, heaven forbid, we might make someone feel uncomfortable. As the saying goes, "If we are worried about making someone feel uncomfortable about their sin problem, what we are doing is making that person feel comfortable about their journey to hell."
The dangers of not acknowledging sin
The world needs to know about sin so they will want to be saved from it. Think about it: If people don't feel they need to be delivered or saved from something, then of course, they will think you are rather ridiculous talking about them needing to be saved. People need to know that sin is a real problem and that the consequences of it are death and eternal punishment in hell (Romans 6:23; 2 Thessalonians 1:8-9). If people don't understand that, then why would they see a need for our Savior, Jesus Christ, to save them from their sins (Matthew 1:18-25).
This devotion is aimed at Christians who have the best fire insurance policy in the universe, the shed blood of Jesus Christ. So I am not saying that if a Christian sins they are going to hell – we are completely saved from all sins because of Jesus. What I am saying, and emphasizing in this devotion, is how important it is to let God deal with our sins as Christians and not whitewash them by not agreeing with Him about them.
It is vital we don't make sin a forbidden subject. Sin is disobeying God and if we are truthful with ourselves, we still naturally disobey God, so the subject of sin is very necessary (James 1:13-15). When the Holy Spirit is trying to show us a sin and we are resisting His voice, what we are doing is going against God's help in halting that sin. As you can imagine this isn't a good state to be in! Instead we should be fighting against the temptation to sin through the Spirit's warning and power. (Romans 3:23; Galatians 5:16-25, 6:7-9). In actuality when we are not willing to acknowledge sin in our lives, we are allowing the cancer of sin to destroy our healthy relationship with God, Who, loves you and died for those sins. If you think about it, not wanting to deal with your sin, is like acting like a non-Christian.
Confession
You might be wondering, what does agreeing with God about your sins mean? Agreeing with God is what the word "confession" means. It also means you are yielding to God's will, wanting what He wants, and listening to His Spirit. You are also saying to God, "I love You," because agreeing with God, of course, makes you close to Him again. Think about confession this way, confessing your sins is the grandest and easiest way God could give you to be so quickly close to Him again.
When we think of confessing our sins, most of us think of the verse, 1 John 1:9. Let's read 1 John 1:5-10 to put the verse in context.
Now the message that we have heard from his Son and announce is this: God is light, and there is no darkness at all in him. If, then, we say that we have fellowship with him, yet at the same time live in the darkness, we are lying both in our words and in our actions. But if we live in the light - just as he is in the light - then we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from every sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and there is no truth in us. But if we confess our sins to God, he will keep his promise and do what is right: he will forgive us our sins and purify us from all our wrongdoing. If we say that we have not sinned, we make a liar out of God, and his word is not in us. GNT
What is the Apostle John saying in 1 John 1:5-10? Darkness means sin in this passage. Remember, God can't have fellowship with sin because He is holy. God is Light (John 1:4-5, 3:16-21, 12:46), and will reveal sin to us if we choose, just like a light reveals something in darkness. Our responsibility from this passage is to live in the light of God by listening to Him about sin in our life, so we can be forgiven and cleansed from that sin, and have fellowship with Him. If we tell Him we have no sin, the result of that is: We are choosing to live in the darkness of sin and not living as one saved by Jesus' blood. We are also deceiving ourselves, calling God a liar, and disregarding God's Word that lights our way (Psalm 119:9-11, 105). In reality because of Jesus' death you live in God's forgiveness as Christians. When you sin, it affects your relationship to God, but never your eternity. When you deny and keep sin in your life you are trampling under foot, Jesus' love and sacrifice. Confess your sin and walk on with your Savior!
Sin should be feared
I do believe it is so important to treat sin as something to be feared! Here is a gruesome but true illustration. Many years ago, when we lived in Southern California, there was a serial killer called "the Night Stalker". This killer would break into a home about once a week. He seemed to gravitate towards yellow homes and would break into the home through a window. He would torture and kill his victim or victims. He tended to write and draw eerie Satanic stuff on the wall near his victim. (Was he led by demons? Anyone that does what he did, I would most definitely say, "Yes!") As you can imagine everyone was paranoid and kept their windows shut and locked no matter how hot it got, even during the day. I remember even though we were fairly far from his murderous territory, we were very careful to make sure our house was locked up even during the day. This was because who knows what a man like that would do next.
Sin is like a serial killer; it comes after us, and is out to kill us. The killer consequences of sin, as you know, are death and eternal punishment away from God (Romans 5:12, 6:16, 23; 1 Corinthians 15:56a; Ephesians 2:1-5; 2 Thessalonians 1:8-10). God doesn't mess around with sin, He gave His life to stop our killer - sin. We all need to remember sin is more dangerous than a serial killer, so we will work hard to stay away from it.
Prayer and confession go together
Intentional prayer is the key to getting sin out of your life. And how can you even hear God to agree with Him about your sin if you aren't communicating with Him? Communicating as you know is talking and listening. Frankly, I need to be listening to God regularly because sin can get the best of me if I am not close with God. You listen to God by reading His Word. If you are learning God's Word, you will have a good grasp on what is sin in your life. You should also be talking with God regularly. Ask God daily to show you any sin.
God will always help us get sin out of our lives. Probably my most common sins at this point in my life are sinful thoughts and motives. What about you? Ask God's Spirit to search your actions, words, thoughts and motives for sin (Psalm 139:23-24; John 16:7-15). Be honest with God. He knows everything you are thinking and have done anyway (1 Corinthians 4:5). Don't let your mind be on auto pilot either. To battle sin in our lives we must be alert to it and face it, then confess it.
Life Application: You need to have the mindset Paul had in Romans 6:10-13 to keep as much sin as possible out of your life. Mediate on these verses.
For the death that He (Christ) died, He died to sin, once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God. Even so consider yourselves to be dead (or separated) to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey its lusts, and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. Romans 6:10-13 NASB®
When He shows you a sin, don't fight Him but agree with Him about it. Believe me, I know by experience He will enable you to deal with your sin. Ouch, it can hurt at times because some sins are mightily engrained in us! Yet, just as you would want to get cancer out of your body, you need to get sin out of your life.
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