Truths About Sin

III. How about Joseph’s brothers? It cost them heartache, pain, years of guilt. And may I suggest it cost them the very thing they desired too - a close relationship with their father. I doubt it was possible for any of them to have a close relationship with their father after they sold Joseph into slavery because every time they were near Jacob, they were reminded of the pain and heartache they had cause their father.

In their story though we can see how God will forgive sin as it is confessed to Him. It appears the brothers had a real and sincere repentance and change of heart and character but not without first costing them more than they were willing to pay.

Here are some illustrations I have used at different times with this message as well.

I felt a suspicious "bump" as I pulled my car into the driveway and came to a stop in our carport. Sure enough, one of the rear tires was flat, exposing the metal cord of the steel-belted radial. The next morning, when I visited the tire dealer, I noticed that the same brand of tire on the other side of the car showed no such wear. I asked why. My friend explained that a nail had stuck in the rubber and transferred rust to the steel belts, weakening the interior of the tire. That in turn caused the belt and the tread to separate. Just a nail and a little rust!

How easily spiritual "bumps" can develop in the life of a Christian! Unconfessed sin in the heart is like rust on the steel belts. At first, nothing appears to be wrong, and we may even consider it of no consequence. But our love for the Lord wanes; interest in God’s Word declines; prayer becomes less important. Soon spiritual progress comes to a bumping halt.

It may be some bad sin you are tempted to do, but it may be what we would call "just a little thing." But that little thing is still sin and if it is sin, it will take you further than you want to go and keep you longer than you want to stay and cost you more than you want to pay. Sin must be rejected, whether it is something big or small.

Billy Sunday, the baseball evangelist never spared himself nor those he wanted to help in the vigor of his attacks on sin. He thundered against evil from the Gay Nineties through the Great Depression. He preached Christ as the only answer to man’s needs until his death in 1935. "I’m against sin," he said. "I’ll kick it as long as I’ve got a foot, and I’ll fight it as long as I’ve got a fist. I’ll butt it as long a I’ve got a head. I’ll bite it as long as I’ve got a tooth. When I’m old and fistless and footless and toothless, I’ll gum it till I go home to Glory and it goes home to perdition."

He wasn’t going to tolerate it in his life. Maybe cause he understood that:

Sin will take you further than you want to go!

Sin will keep you longer than you want to stay!

Sin will cost you more that you want to pay!