The Foolishness Of Hidden Sin

The Foolishness of Hidden Sin

John 15:22

John 15:22 -- “If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloke for their sin.”

Ps 19:9-14 -- “The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether.” “More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb.” “Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward.” “Who can understand his errors? cleanse thou me from secret faults.” “Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me: then shall I be upright, and I shall be innocent from the great transgression.” “Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.”

Psalm 139:23-24 -- “Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:” “And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”

l. INTRODUCTION -- NOTHING CAN COVER SIN

Truth exists, only falsehood has to be invented. – Georges Braque

What is more enchanting than the season of fall in a small New England town, when small children criss-cross each other underneath the leafy prism of colors and geometric gables of brooding clapboard houses? Mix in a whiff of salt-taffy air, a whisp of the Atlantic mist and a harvest moon, and we have true Americana caught as if in an old photograph come to life. There it is, Norman Rockwell on a living canvas.

But what happens when a killer sneaks onto the scene? The whole mystical scenario falls flat before it begins, the magic disappears under chaos and the tranquility that is called the American Dream seems to rot quicker than the wet windowsill.

When 15-year-old Martha Moxley was killed on the until-then-safe streets of Greenwich, Connecticut, on October 30, 1975, no one simply knew how to react. The neat and pristine-clean confines of Belle Haven, the richest corner of town, had never anticipated murder. Its citizens became frightened and perplexed. And its police force, totally unprepared for this, found itself in a new and foreign world where issuing a simple parking ticket and fining a someone for drunk-and-disorderliness couldn’t wipe away the misdemeanor.

Martha Moxley was savagely killed in a manner that Belle Haven townspeople would have expected only in a horror novel. Suspicion pointed not to a monster, but to one of the most powerful families on the East Coast; a family that had connections that reached loftily to the Kennedys of Hyannisport, a family that wined and dined the town officials, a family that……well, a family that you just didn’t accuse of murder.

For more than 20 years, the killer has evaded punishment, although suspicion heavily points to at least one member of this family, the Skakels. Because Rushton Skakel, the patriarch, is the brother of Ethel Kennedy (widow of the assassinated Bobby Kennedy), many believe that the identity of the killer has been known by authorities these past decades –– but conveniently covered up to protect a name that was already pockmarked by enough scandal. Others are of the opinion that the unsolved murder is merely a case of simple small-town police inexperience. Factions support each theory.

But on a hot day in June of 2002, twenty-seven years later, Michael Skakel was found guilty of murder and will apparently spend the rest of his life in prison.

-It really does not matter what we may clothe ourselves in, if there is sin in the heart it is only a matter of time before it will come to light and ruin you.

ll. THE TEXT OF JOHN 15

-The facts are these: Once Jesus Christ steps into your life, whether by invitation or by accident, His law and actions now show our sin to us.

-Sin is always disguised when it tries to enter our lives. It comes in decked in the finest of clothing, it comes perfumed, and it masquerades itself into our lives.

-Sin came silently into the Garden of Eden. Sin was quite comfortable with Jesus at the pinnacle of the Temple. When sin enters our lives, it never comes as a monster, but it comes as a wooing friend who has the ability to fool even the best men.

James 1:13-16 -- “Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:” “But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed.” “Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.” “Do not err, my beloved brethren.”