The Normalization of Sin

The Normalisation of Sin

Corinth and Perrytown CoC

1/27/19

We have been created in God’s image.

We are His image bearers.

Christ is God in the flesh,

Christ is our example for how to live,

By following the example of Christ we more fully reflect God’s image in His creation.

One of the examples scripture gives us of who Jesus is that, He is the light.

, This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

, Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life.”

The problem, however, is that, people have loved the darkness rather than the light.

Jesus explained it this way.

, And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. 20 For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. 21 But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God.”

Sin is darkness.

Those that disbelieve, live in darkness.

Jesus is the light that drives out darkness.

People don’t like their darkness/sin exposed by the light.

But those who believe or “does what is true comes to the light” and their works are clearly seen in the light and that they are “carried out in God.”

When we come into the light, that is Jesus, our lives demonstrate that we walk in the light, which is Jesus.

, But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.

It is through this process of conforming to the image of Jesus, walking in the light, that we, through our lives, shine a light into the darkness of the world.

We become the lighthouse in the harbor.

We become the flashlight for the lost camper trying to find his way in the night.

We become the street light that is on lighting the way home.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

But we still have a problem.

Even though we walk in the light, we still sin.

, If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

Often times, when we read this verse, we use it as a crutch, an excuse for sin.

Which, at that point, sin becomes premeditated.

But John is describing the person who is walking in the light, yet sinning.

Let’s back up and pick up verse 7.

, But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. 8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Here, John is showing us what a person walking in the light looks like.

A person walking in the light is striving to be like Jesus, and when they sin, they confess it, and Jesus is faithful to forgive us.

We tend to skip right to the end.

We sin, then jump right to the part where Jesus is “faithful and just” to forgive us.

We ignore confessing our sin.

If we are to walk in the light, part of that “walk” is acknowledging our sin, confessing it so that we are forgiven.

This sets a righteous example for others in the light to follow, for those in the darkness as well, which makes us, even though we have sinned more and more the light!

Amazing isn’t it?

How we react to our sin can be light!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

But, sin is still a problem.

Even though there is a righteous way to deal with it, we are still called to put it away.

We are to strive to be more and more like Jesus.

But when we do fail as we are maturing, we can receive forgiveness of those sins.

Not using that forgiveness as a crutch for sin but growing beyond it and moving to maturity.

However, moving past sin, maturing, putting sin away, and becoming more like Jesus is not necessarily an easy task.

Perhaps in an effort to move beyond sin, we should identify it, or define it.

Throughout the Old Testament and New there are multiple Hebrew and Greek words used to describe sin and define it.

It is defined mostly in the New Testament as a “missing of the mark.”

Like a marksman, aiming at the bullseye, yet not quite hitting it.

So, in this instance, it would be as one trying to do God’s will, but falling short.

Sin is also defined as rebellion against God.

One knows what God desires and makes a conscious decision to do otherwise.

In this case, one chooses to leave the light, to walk in the darkness.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This morning, I want to discuss a particular way that sin works itself into our lives.

It is especially scary to me.

Let’s begin by looking at the Pharisees.

The Pharisees were the conservative branch of the sanhedrin, the Jewish high court.

Here is a brief rundown of the Pharisees and their perception of obedience to God’s law in the 1st century.

· God’s original commands were the 613 laws of Moses (called “Torah”) that guided the ancient nation of Israel.

· The Mishnah was an oral tradition of commentary on the Mosaic Law that introduced additional, man-made rules that “built a fence” around the Mosaic Law so people wouldn’t even come close to breaking God’s commandments.

· The Pharisees were concerned with keeping these additional commandments and especially with having the outward appearance of keeping them.

· Jesus’s critique of the Pharisees was that they were legalistic – only concerned with the external appearance of keeping the Law rather than the inward spirit of the Law.

, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. 28 So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

The Pharisees accepted the oral law along with the Torah,

It was believed to be equally inspired and authoritative, and all of the explanatory and supplementary material produced by and contained within were the oral tradition.

This material began to emerge during the Babylonian Captivity that was brought upon the Jewish people.

The Captivity was explained as divine punishment for the neglect of the law, and many during this period earnestly turned to the law. During the Captivity or Exile, detailed commentaries on the law appeared in the form of innumerable and highly specific restrictions that were designed to "build a hedge" around the written Torah and thus guard against any possible violation of the Torah by ignorance or accident. The situation that the Jews were in (Post-Exilic Period), and how they were to deal with it exactly, was not clearly written in the Torah, according to some Jewish authorities.

You see, they didn’t thing the law applied very well in this new situation.

A new legislation had to be produced from that which already existed.

It was like an evolution of traditions that would continue to grow, and would finally achieve written form as the "Mishnah" in 200 A.D. During the time of Jesus the oral law came to be revered so highly that it was said to go back to Moses himself and to have been transmitted over the centuries orally, paralleling the written law that also derived from him.

This is exactly what the Pharisees believed, and also it was these "traditions" that Jesus condemned.

Jesus continually referred to the oral law as the "tradition of the elders" or the "tradition of men" (; ; also see Josephus, Antiq. XIII. xvi. 2).

A famous passage that demonstrates the conflict between the oral tradition and God’s law is:

, Then Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, 2 “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? For they do not wash their hands when they eat.” 3 He answered them, “And why do you break the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God commanded, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever reviles father or mother must surely die.’ 5 But you say, ‘If anyone tells his father or his mother, “What you would have gained from me is given to God,” 6 he need not honor his father.’ So for the sake of your tradition you have made void the word of God. 7 You hypocrites! Well did Isaiah prophesy of you, when he said:

8 “ ‘This people honors me with their lips,

but their heart is far from me;

9 in vain do they worship me,

teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.’ ”

The Pharisees had allowed their hedge laws to take preeminence over God’s law.

This tension set the Pharisees against Jesus on many occasions.

The tithing of herbs (; ).

The wearing of conspicuous phylacteries and tassels ().

The careful observance of ritual purity (e.g., :l ff.).

Frequent fastings ().

Distinctions in oaths (23:16ff.).

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You see, the Pharisees, over time, accepted the teachings of their forefathers as valuable and authoritative as God’s law.

It began as way to draw them closer to God by eliminating the possibility of sinning which resulted in their exile from the land of Israel.

Their intentions we good. They wanted to be on God’s good side.

But overtime, they became so focused on their traditions that they lost sight of the intentions of God’s law.

This is one of the reasons they had such a hard time with Jesus’ teachings.

He addressed the motives of the heart, while they were obsessed with the outer performance of the law.

They did not understand, that a transformed heart, one that would not be angry with a brother, and therefore the sin of murder would never take place, is what God desired from His people.

A heart that would not look upon his neighbor’s wife to covet her, therefore the sin of adultery would never take place.

The Pharisees put so much effort into strict outward obedience of the law, that they missed the point, that is loving God, and loving others.

Which are the two greatest commands!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The scary thing about the Pharisees, and the way they sinned, is that it can easily happen to us.

Normalized behavior is defined as ideas, attitudes, and actions that over time, become the new standard of measure.

How about a few examples.

One example would be the view that, “children are not as respectful to their parents now as they used to be.”

My personal example is that, I grew up with a healthy fear, or respect, mostly fear of my parents.

I knew then and I know now, that they love me very much.

My fear of them created the very urgent need to say, “yes, ma’am, and no ma’am, and yes sir and no sir.”

There was no such thing as talking back, that would have been dangerous to my well being.

I learned respect for my parents, and then, through that, respect for others such as teachers, bosses, policemen, and others in authority over me.

It was the normalized behavior of the time.

Many would assert that that is not the normalized behavior of today.

Parents don’t earn their children’s’ respect by teaching them manors, so they grow up not respecting any other authority figure, and then society plunges into chaos because there is no respect for anyone.

This is the new, normalized behavior, it is the standard.

These behavior changes are often subtle until one day we are looking around trying to figure out how things have gotten like they are.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For the Pharisees, the oral law was imbedded into their culture generations earlier.

They followed it, even added to it, and turned it into a burden no man was able to bear.

Sin can creep into our lives the same way.

Great, great, great grandpa sinned in a particular way, and then his son after him, and his son after him and now through the generations, sin has become normalized, and no longer offensive.

It’s passed off as acceptable practice because a precedent was set for it, generations ago.

And so, like the Pharisees, we inherit a sinful pattern of behavior but can’t see it because we are blind to what runs in the family.

Sin creeps in the same way through culture, not just family.

Attitudes, ideas, and actions continue to change in our society.

Seventy years ago, the thought of killing a baby would have been abhorrent by and large through-out society, not so anymore.

The normalization of sin in culture is seen everywhere the discerning eye looks.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jesus’ revelation of what God desires in His people was so foreign to the Pharisees, it hurt them to look into it.

They were angry with Jesus and his teachings.

We set ourselves against God with the same attitudes.

We will argue within ourselves that if dear ole dad, or papaw, or mom or mamaw, or whoever did it, it must be ok.

Anything less than that would be admitting that that dear loved one did something in err, and sinned.

And it hurts think that a loved one we respect, sinned.

So, we will build walls around those error-filled notions of righteousness and hold on to them even in the face of truth.

Just like the Pharisees.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Jesus ministry was based on Love, grace, mercy, compassion, kindness, and hospitality.

The Pharisees laws were contrary to these.

If your religion is contrary to these, if it has become a burden no man can carry, perhaps you need to unload that burden on Jesus.

Receive his grace and mercy and share it with others.

Cut through your tradition of sin and walk in the light of Jesus’ example.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is a lot easier said than done, recognizing sin, recognizing faulty religion, that is contrary to Jesus,

If we can help…

https://www.bible-history.com/pharisees/PHARISEESTradition.htm

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Pharisee

http://www.pursuegod.org/rules-pharisees/