Although we may not phrase it this way today, the question of sin in believers is one that we still wrestle with in the church. We may cast it in other terms, by pointing out how often the world looks at those of us who follow Jesus and maybe finds us wanting in displaying any characteristics of that. Their view of Christians -- people who say they're perfect and good and better than anyone else -- is wrong, but they'll still apply it to us and expect us to live up to it.
And there's still an important question buried under the simplistic misunderstanding the world has of us, one that we need to think about and try to find a path through: Why do we who follow Jesus, who orient our lives around his reality as the reality, still sin? If Paul's right that sin has no dominion over us, why do we find ourselves mixed up with it again and again?
Different views of our Christian reality influence how we talk about this. If we believe, for example, that salvation is something that matters to us only after we've died -- that Jesus' only purpose in coming to us and offering his life is to prevent us from spending eternity in hell -- then the only thing hurt by believers who sin is our witness. If I talk about a God of love, justice and righteousness but I practice none of those things then why should anyone who hears me talk care?But we can
But we can guard our witness pretty well and still "present our members to sin." John Wesley liked to use the example of people "reviling him." If he learned about that he might resent those people and become angry and hateful towards them. Aware of his responsibility to witness to his faith he wouldn't display that publicly. Inside, though, would still be feelings of hate. And as Jesus makes clear, while there's a difference between hating someone and harming them as far as they're concerned, there's none where we're concerned: "I tell you, those who hate another person have already committed murder against them in their heart."
Instead, in v. 19 Paul urges the Romans to "present their members as slaves to righteousness for sanctification." Now when he says "righteousness" he means being right in relationship to God much more than he means the kind of legalistic self-righteousness we too often picture when we hear that word. He acknowledges that it's hard, because the tendency to sin remains in us.
This comes from seeing salvation as something that indeed happens after we die but also goes on right now. That eternal impact works its way backwards into our lives so that we start to change now, even if we won't finish in this lifetime. If that way of seeing salvation holds, we clearly need to "present our members as slaves to righteousness for sanctification." And we all know how easy that is, right?
Why is it hard for those who were slaves to sin to become slaves to righteousness? I suppose part of the problem comes from the different expectations righteousness presents us. We're expected to act and speak differently. Getting used to the change and a completely new set of actions and priorities is no picnic. But is that the only problem? Learned behavior is exactly that, learned. What can be learned can be unlearned. It takes work -- generally behavioral psychologists say we need a minimum of 21 days of intentional effort to make a new habit -- but it can be done. Except it very often isn't. I can't speak about your experience, but I'm working on about a half-century of more or less intentional effort and I have yet to lose the habits of sin.
I think the real stumbling block comes because slavery to sin rarely presents itself as such. It almost always characterizes itself instead as freedom. It's freedom from rules, freedom from restrictions, freedom from authority, the opportunity to do what you want and be the master of your fate and the captain of your soul. We don't necessarily rebel against the change in masters because we've been under the illusion we've never had a master and we rebel against the idea of having one now.
We have no experience with this kind of master so we reject him. A Master whose goal is our growth and flourishing? Gotta be a catch. A Master who will actually let us do what we want even when he knows better? Sure, right. A Master who is first a servant? A Master who will wash our feet? Yeah, pull the other one, buddy. And yet it's true. That Master exists. But so does the other, and we will follow one or the other no matter what we think about the power of our own autonomy.
Even though my writerly character rebels against the idea of clichés I'm about to commit a big one by being a middle-aged dude who quotes Bob Dylan: "You're gonna serve somebody."
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