In my church, we are studying Donald S. Whitney’s book Ten Questions to Diagnose Spiritual Health. The chapter this week is entitled “Do you still grieve over sin?” That so many professed Christians practice sin and don’t seem to be concerned about it has troubled me for decades. In my understanding of scripture, all sin is bad, all sin is major for a believer in that it breaks the fellowship with God and our Lord.

Sin is really bad. Perhaps, as sinners, we have become desensitized to just how bad it is. But, it is so bad that Holy, righteous, and just God cannot bear to even look upon it. “Thou art of purer eyes than to behold evil, and canst not look upon iniquity” (Habakkuk 1:13 KJV). Upon confronting the holiness of God, Isaiah proclaimed, “Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts” (Isaiah 6:5).

Before trusting in Christ, as sinners, we were totally ruined, condemned to death, hell, and eternal separation from God. As believers, we have experienced God’s forgiveness based on Christ’s suffering and death on the cross to pay for our sins. God’s gift of salvation to each of us was because, in an attitude of repentance for our sins, we trusted in what Jesus did for us.  Now as believers, what does God expect our attitude toward sin to be? Are we to use our salvation as a license to keep sinning? May it never be. As Jesus told the woman caught in adultery, we are to “sin no more.”

According to Whitley, not only do we remember and grieve over our sin thanking God every day for His forgiveness, but as we grow in Christ-likeness, our sensitivity to sin will grow and our grief over sin will keep increasing. Though Jesus commanded us to stop sinning, we will never get to the state of perfection here on earth. Even trying our best, we sometimes will fail and sin. When we do, it should break our hearts – we have just added to our Lord’s pain. It should deeply grieve us – any sin whether you think it great or small. I agree with Whitley, the closer you get to becoming Christ-like, the more a sin will grieve you. To me, it is similar to the truth that the more you know the more you realize you don’t know. The greatest of Christians, such as the apostle Paul, became so sensitive to sin that they considered themselves to be among the worst sinners.

As believers, we must not be cavalier about sin, thinking “God will forgive me” – we must realize that when we sin we are disobeying our Savior whom we want to please. Showing our gratitude toward Christ is more than just saying we are grateful – it is doing those things and living the way He wants us to. Yes, when we fail Him and sin, it ought to grieve us deeply, more deeply the closer we are to Him. But, I’ll end on this wonderfully positive note: 1 John 1:9 gives us this awesome promise, “If we confess our sins, God is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Praise God!