Sin: You CAN walk away!

Here is the addendum to yesterday's post. Yesterday I put out there that when we who call ourselves 'Christians' continue to live in sin, we are basically saying that Jesus' death on the cross was not enough. As the author in Hebrews put it in chapter 6 verse 6, we are "crucifying the Son of God all over again and subjecting him to public disgrace" when we claim Christ yet continue in our sin.

But we don't have to! We can walk away from sin.


There is a story in John 8:1-11 that everyone should read. It's about a woman who has been caught in adultery. Adultery in those days--and today in some countries--is punishable by death. The Pharisees and teachers of the law were prepared to stone her right there in front of everyone, probably to make an example of her. "Do what this woman did and you will die a horrible death."

The Pharisees also had an ulterior motive by bringing this woman to Jesus. They wanted to put him in a difficult position. If he said stone her, then her blood was on his hands. If he said let her go, then he wouldn't be following the letter of the law.

I love, love, love what Jesus told them in verse 7:

"If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her."

Sometimes we all need to be reminded of that! I honestly don't mean to cast stones on this blog or in my conversations with people about sin. Truly! Like the Pharisees and others standing around the woman, I am not without sin. I have no grounds to be throwing stones at anyone. Yet I do feel like God is teaching me things and showing me truths as I study His Word and that is what I hope to share here.

This is the truth I learned from reading this scripture: Jesus didn't save that woman from certain death and then tell her it was okay to go back to her life of sin!

He told her to leave it. "Go and sin no more." We cannot have an encounter with Jesus Christ and then go back to our sinful life! We have to walk away from it. We have to leave behind certain people, certain relationships, certain beliefs, certain habits. We have to accept the life-giving sacrifice Jesus offered on the cross and say, "Not my will, Lord, but thine."

I imagine that woman may have believed herself in love with the man she was having an affair with. Did Jesus say, "I see you're in love with this man. It's okay to continue sleeping with him." No, he didn't. That woman had to give up her adulterous relationship if she was going to "go and sin no more." The Bible doesn't tell us what happened to her. I hope she made the right choice.

Jesus died on the cross to save you and me from our sin. He didn't do that so we could continue to live in sin.

Again, I think the question each of us needs to ask ourselves is:

Was the cross enough?