Christ
alone is God's answer to the sin problem. Yet I have heard other
solutions to the sin problem. One is to try a little harder. Another
is to avoid temptation like the plague and thus overcome. Still
others involve more of what the person can do than what God has
promised to do. Worse yet there are some who deny that there is a
problem. Only Christ can heal the sin sick soul, nothing else will
do.
In the
book of Romans Paul shares his experience with overcoming
covetousness or rather his failure to do so. Most if not all
Christians can relate in some way to the words he penned in Romans 7.
He tried his best to overcome it, but found he could not. “For I
know that in me (that is, in my flesh,) dwelleth no good thing: for
to will is present with me; but how to perform that which is good I
find not.” Romans 7:18. Paul went through the myriad forms of the
works and willpower formulas
to find that ultimately nothing good came from him. Through that
discovery he was able to make another. “O wretched man that I am!
who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
I thank God
through Jesus Christ our Lord.” Romans 7:24,25.
Paul
struggled with covetousness; a sin that is
esteemed as small. Logically we know it is not, but if it was
esteemed as greater than it has been we would hear more sermons about
it. I can count on one hand the number of times I have heard about it
from the pulpit. Yet these small sins, these heart sins seem to be
the most difficult to lay aside. We have formulas for reforming a
smoker or a drug addict, but to reform the heart we have not. A good
portion have been able to lay aside supposedly great sins, but these
small ones are something else. Yet Paul found the solution for his
heart sin, it is Christ. The heart sins seem to be truly the
greatest, and if Christ can take care of those surely he can take
care of the others because “there is none other name under heaven
given among men, whereby we must be saved.” Acts 4:12.
Christ
alone saves from sin. The only way that He will save from sin is if
we receive Him. This means giving up on the other solutions. Some of
these solutions have a right place in receiving Him, but “the god
of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest
the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God,
should shine unto them.” 2 Corinthians 4:4. Until we place our
trust in Jesus, we are of them who believe not and will continue to
be blind to the solution for our sin. Trust that Christ can take away
your sin and live out His life in you. Now may our study be as to how
He is received.
