The Power Of Sin Series

“The Power of Sin”

Introduction:

Does anyone struggle to live the Christian life? Do you ever look at the Scriptures and see that your life just doesn’t match? Do you ever wonder if the Christian life really can work? Do ever feel like you do things that you really do not want to do? Do you have any habits and sins that you have tried earnestly over and over again to overcome and you just felt that you cannot do it? Little Johnny’s father caught him in telling a lie. Dad said, “Don’t you know

the difference between right & wrong?” Johnny told him that he did. His

dad said, “But you always choose the wrong!” Johnny said, “I know, dad.

And here you thought it was all guesswork.”...

I will have to tell you that I feel some of those things sometimes, and I would imagine that you can understand where I am coming from.

Last time I preached we began talking about sin, and we talked about how we as the church should respond to a brother or sister caught in sin. This week I want to talk about the power of sin. Sometimes I feel that in our society and even within the church we shy away from talking about sin. We, however, need to understand that before we can understand very much about God, before we can understand anything about Jesus or the Bible, we have to understand some things about sin. We have to understand that before we can ever come to Christ we have to realize that we need him and that we are sinners. We have to understand the consequences of our sin, which is eternal death.

I hope that you will realize that sin is a big deal in the mind of God and it should be a big deal to us as well. I hope that you will learn there is some power in sin that we have to confront and deal with. That power of sin is what causes the Christian life to be a difficult life to live at times. There is a certain power that sin has to control our lives and to dominate our minds. Do you ever wonder what makes people do the things that they do? I wonder that quite a bit. What makes a mother decide to kill her children, either born or unborn? What makes a tyrannical political leader decide to mass execute a whole race of people? What makes people say and do the things that the do?

Clever drug traffickers used a propane tanker truck entering El Paso from Mexico. They rigged it so propane gas would be released from all of its valves while the truck concealed 6,240 pounds drugs. They were clever, but not bright. They misspelled the name of the gas company on the side of the truck. Why in the world would someone do that? One lady was arrested in Lake City, Florida for robbery of a Howard Johnson’s motel. She was armed with only an electric chain saw, which was not plugged in. Why in the world would someone do that? As I read first accounts in the Bible and read of Adam and Eve in the Garden, and when I get to the part of Eve eating the forbidden fruit and sharing it with Adam, I just want to shout, “Why is the world would you do that?” As I read of God’s faithfulness in leading Israel out of slavery in Egypt, of how he provided a way for them by parting the Red Sea I amazed. Then I read of Moses up on Mount Sinai receiving the law as the Israelites began to worship a Golden Calf and called it the God that lead them out of Egypt. When Moses questions Aaron on it, he said that the calf just popped out of the fire. When I hear of that I wonder, “Why in the world would they do that?” When I read in the gospels of Judas betraying Jesus for thirty pieces of silver I wonder, “what in the world was he thinking?” When I read of Ananias and Sapphira lying to the Apostle Peter about the money they received from selling their home, I wonder, “Why in the world would they do that?” When I hear of people in the church today who do not live totally for Jesus Christ, but rather live with one foot in the world and one foot in the church, I wonder, “Why in the world would they do that?”

There are many people that teach that we as human beings are born in sin because of the sin of Adam and Eve. They say we inherit that sin, and that is why we struggle with sin. I do not believe that is totally true. I believe that we all by our own free will choose to sin and violate the law of God. I believe that the Bible teaches that we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Sin is powerful and we are tempted to sin because sin is a part of the world and there is a Devil whose primary goal is to get us to live a lifestyle of sin.