Sin is a cage, and a sickness. It is chains and anxiety. It is obsession and compulsion. For a moment, it provides pleasure, but that pleasure turns to bitterness, rot, and heavy weight. It isn’t always in the forefront of our minds, but it lurks about in the recesses of our grey matter, and occasionally comes to light. It’s awareness prevents us from attaining victory, moving forward, or having a true quality of life. Sin’s dark effects impact our lives from every direction. We are shackled by the general sin of all men, and certainly by the specific sins that we individually commit. In all senses, we deserve the consequences of sin.
One of the most horrifying things about sin is that we are incapable of avoiding it — at least in our own strength. This is because our bodies crave sin, our minds are focused on it, our hands are occupied with it, and our broken hearts seem to pump its blackened tar through our veins. Escaping it in a natural sense isn’t possible, and you know it. To escape it requires something supernatural.
Often, we are quick to say that Jesus saves. But we never really think about what that statement means. Saved from what? Well, most importantly, we are saved from the wrath of God that certainly falls on people who don’t know him (Romans 1:18 and John 3:36). The ultimate end of that wrath is separation from the goodness of God in the fires of hell. But we are also saved from something that is almost as terrible — our own sin. Consider how the prophet Isaiah points out that we are saved by the willful sacrifice of Jesus. Isaiah, poetically tells us how Jesus was crushed for our iniquities, pierced for our transgressions, how his punishment brought us peace, and how his wounds bring us healing. The life of Jesus separates us from the ultimate consequences of our sinful natures. We are healed and restored to our proper form by the destruction of his! If our bodies crave sin, then Jesus’s wounds fix those bodies, and provide us with new and better hungers, freeing our bodies for true life (1 Peter 2:24). If our minds are obsessed with sin, and caged by anxiety, then the thorns on the crown of Jesus provide us with peace (Isaiah 26:3 NKJV). If our hands are preoccupied with sin, know that the nails that impaled the hands of Jesus have given you power to occupy your hands with righteous deeds (Hebrews 9:14 NLT). If your heart is broken by sin, know that the heart of Jesus was stopped (John 19:31-34) so that yours could go on beating with his life giving blood (Psalm 147:3), and your truest life could be recentered.
The death of Jesus saves you from the wrath of God, and frees you from the ravages of sin. He was wounded so that you don’t have to be. Will you accept that reality? If so, where are you going to go, and what are you going to do with that healing and freedom?
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