Safe Sin Management

The term was coined in a sermon which we heard preached by Mark Sumpter of Faith Orthodox Presbyterian Church in Grants Pass. It sums up the modern Christian's approach to sin. It sums up our every tendency to dilute the concentrated cleansing power of the blood of Christ. I'll try to paraphrase the sermon here as it marked a turning point for our family in the latter part of this year:

When Jesus restores Peter in John 21, He does so after Peter has gone back to fishing. His denial of the truth is now only a distant memory; the scab has hardened. At first, the scab only hurts a bit when Jesus prods Peter: "Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me more than these?" We can only imagine the look on Peter's face: a mix of "Oh, c'mon Jesus do we really have to go here?" with a pinch of startled guilt mixed in.

The sinful scabs that we wear around are most revolting and painful to those around us because they see them more readily than we do. Isaiah (Ch.3) says "...they declare their sin as Sodom; they do not hide it. Woe to their soul! For they have brought evil upon themselves...Because the daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with outstretched necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they go, making a jingling with their feet, therefore the Lord will strike with a scab the crown of the head of the daughters of Zion, and the Lord will uncover their secret parts."

Peter's still not getting it that Jesus won't be content with cursory treatment. He says to Peter again "Simon son of Jonah, do you love me?" My surmising only but I'm imagining that Peter is getting a little irritated at this point--the sort of irritation that precedes complete humiliation. After all, it's Jesus' business to forgive. It's why He died, isn't it? Let's just forgive and forget--get on with life. Put the fun back in dysfunctional, right? Peter answers Jesus again, "Yes, Lord, you know that I love you." Maybe Peter is gaining insight--an unforgivable sin against an infinite God--but it's not yet recovery.

Jesus then gets really obnoxious with Peter. Which of us 21st century pragmatists would dare to ask our brother the same shameful question not twice but THREE times? And yet there Jesus is--sitting down with Peter, right at his level, loving him with methodical love, questioning him in a methodical sorting out of vice from virtue. We moderns abhor this sort of loving. We don't want a loving father; we want an indulgent father.

But Jesus had to get Peter beyond the safe management of his denial so that he could be useful for the kingdom. If we want to do great things for God, we do well to begin with our sin and with our futile "confessions." We need to stop chuckling about it and using words like "struggle, trouble, problem, and poor choices" and use the real words that remind us of our desperate need for cleansing. Sin is "a scab, prostitution, and iniquity" that mars our entire being. It's not just a blip on the continuum; it's a completely wrong state of things. It permeates everything and leaves it with the rottenness of a dead body. Joshua the high priest sat before Satan and God the Father in "filthy garments" (Zechariah 3). Sin is a corruption that requires a complete remediation, not just plastic wrap to quell the stench.

We do well to let Jesus' spirit sort out for us the vice from the virtue. After Jesus questions Peter the third time, Peter finally repents: "Lord, you know all things: You know that I love you." Jesus says to him: "Feed my sheep." We never get the idea that Jesus is having a little fun with Peter. It's all deadly serious and its serious end is to make Peter the rock upon which He will build the Church. Jesus doesn't tease. He probes below the foundation level of our lives so that He can find that something of value upon which to build. And when He finds it, the realization is that He put it there to begin with. He really does know all things. And He really does sit down in fellowship with us to rid us of the excess and excrement that prevents a stable building process.

This was the first of two Mark Sumpter sermons we heard in 2007 and as we drove back home on Hwy 140, Brian and I sat alternately quiet and then bursting out thoughts in ramshackle fashion. As we approached Klamath Lake, the Holy Spirit was showing me that I make so many excuses for laziness in my life--and laziness is the iniquity (oh, can't I please call it a problem?) that is holding us both back from greater use in the Klamath Basin. We discipline our children for laziness but what sort of discipline will our Heavenly Father be forced to use if we continue to ignore the scab? The fact that we're organized people and that we are productive when we choose to be does not make up in any way for the fact that there are plenty of times when we choose to sleep instead of work or we choose to be entertained rather than to think.

My cheeks burned with shame as I confessed to Brian this sin that he could already see so plainly, this sin with which he himself was struggling. The minute I confessed it, I wanted to get back to fishing. I didn't want to think anymore about it, but there was Jesus, questioning me with patience and love: "Cara, do you love me? What will you do about this? What steps will you take not tomorrow but this evening to be rid of this entanglement with the demon that has plagued you so long?" For how can I feed his sheep--even those in my own home--if I don't first get out of bed?