The artist presumed that it would make the viewer laugh. It was a cartoon showing a man standing at the gates of heaven. An angry-looking St. Peter is blocking the man’s entrance to heaven, holding a long list of his sins. Bewildered, the man responds, "Sins? What do you mean sins? I thought those were lifestyle choices!"
Dr. Laura Schlessinger is a talk show host who refuses to let people get away with irresponsibility. People who call her expecting a pat on the head hang up the phone feeling more like a whipped puppy. Recently she wrote, "Everyday on my radio program, I talk with people who have gotten into all sorts of troubled, unhappy and unworkable situations because they put aside questions of what was sensible, good, right, legal, moral or holy and turned instead to what they thought were worthy, viable alternatives. And always, they have excuses–excuses that may sound good but don’t stand up to careful examination. ‘This is the New Millennium, you know. Things are different now,’ people say to me."
"I have sinned," is seldom heard today in accounting for our misdeeds. In the Bible Pharaoh said, "I have sinned" when the plague of locusts covered Egypt. He wasn’t alone, either. Tracing the use of that phrase chronologically in the Old Testament, the next person to voice those words was a sort of New Age guru before his time, Balaam, whose donkey had more sense than he did. King Saul and his successor David cried out, "I have sinned greatly." And in the New Testament both Judas, who betrayed Jesus Christ, and the prodigal son confessed, "I have sinned."
Dr. Laura suggests that people believe things are different now. And who would argue with that? While things may be different now, the issue of moral and spiritual wrongdoing has never changed. We are still born to live, die and face the consequences of our moral actions.
To acknowledge your personal responsibility for wrongdoing (which the Bible calls sin) may be difficult, but in doing that, you open the door to life and forgiveness. Reflecting on his affair with Bathsheba, David cried out, "But there is forgiveness with Thee, that Thou mayest be feared" (Psalm 130:4, kjv). God forgives sin. Refusing to admit personal irresponsibility is unforgivable. "For the wages of sin is death," says Paul, quickly adding, "but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord" (Romans 6:23).
Forgiveness is the solution to our human failure but until we are forthright and honest enough to admit the reality of sin, we play word games with ourselves and still walk in darkness. Think about it. - Resource Reading: Romans 6