In our last reflection, we looked at the “shattered glass”—the moment the Fall changed everything. But if the Fall was the event, Sin is the ongoing condition.
More Than Just a Mistake
We often treat sin like a “foul” in a sports game—a temporary lapse in judgment. But the Bible defines it much more broadly. Sin is everything in our thought, word, and deed that is contrary to the will of God. It is “missing the mark” of His perfect standard. Sin is the failure to be what we ought to be and could be. It is universal
As Leviticus 5:17 reminds us, even when we aren’t aware of it, if we do what is forbidden in any of the Lord’s commands, we are guilty. It’s not just about the “big” things; it’s about the alignment of our hearts. At its core, sin is a failure to love God—or worse, a choice to love things more than Him.
The Mirror of the Law
When we look at the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20:1-17, we see the blueprint of a righteous life. It tells us it is sinful to lie, cheat, steal, or disobey our parents. But the Law acts like a mirror; it doesn’t just show us the rules, it shows us our spots.
Most of us can say we haven’t committed a major crime today, but have we loved God with all our heart? Have we put no other “idols” (like our phones, our careers, or our comfort) before Him? When we are honest, we realize that sin isn’t just about what we do; it’s about who we please.
The Inheritance and the Slavery
The hardest truth to swallow is that sin isn’t just a choice we make; it’s a condition we inherit. Romans 5:12 & 19 explains that through one man (Adam), sin entered the world, and through his disobedience, the “many” were made sinners. We don’t become sinners because we sin; we sin because we are born with a nature that is bent away from God.
Jesus described this reality with sobering clarity in John 8:34:
“Very truly I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin.”
Apart from Christ, we are essentially “slaves” to our own desires and the influence of Satan. We live to please ourselves, trapped in a cycle of trying to find satisfaction in things that were never meant to fill a God-sized hole.
The Reality Check: Recognizing that we are “slaves to sin” isn’t meant to make us feel worthless; it’s meant to make us realize we are helpless to save ourselves. We can’t “self-help” our way out of slavery. We need a Redeemer.
Next Step: Now that we’ve diagnosed the depth of the disease, we can finally turn our eyes to the Cure. In our next post, we look at the One the Creed calls the “Light of Light”—Who is the Redeemer?
Read all blogs in the We “the Faith People” Series here. Below is the list of what we have covered so-far