Inside my heart I screamed! I wanted to verbally throw a temper tantrum! It was not right, and he would be held responsible.

These emotions can erupt whenever I feel my husband has disrespected me. Just to be clear, I am not talking about any form of abuse from which to be rescued. I certainly thank God that I did not marry someone like that because I know he probably would not have lived long. Instead, God gave me a man with a sinful nature minus the volatile. However, these times when I feel sinned against are the perfect training ground for learning to respond in a loving, forgiving spirit. Godly communication is key here. My role, to be his helper, was given to me by God. And I am no better if I lash out in anger at a disrespectful remark. Sin is crouching at the door for me (Genesis 4:7).   

Years ago, my husband and I were teaching at a men and women’s conference. I was explaining away in one room while he was presenting his study down the hall. A husband, of one of the women sitting in my lecture, passed our door overhearing the topic. After we let out, he jokingly broadcasted what he had heard: “Sin is Serious!” The Lord had been impressing on me the seriousness of sin in the life of a believer. I felt the need to pass it on. However, Satan wanted to silence my message and with the help of the gentlemen who found it amusing and my conclusion being, it was a juvenile message, I was silenced.

Now years later, I am obeying the Lord and making it my message once again.

While auditing a class at Carolina College of Biblical Studies in Fayetteville, North Carolina, I have found myself smack-dab in the middle of the theology of sin.

“As we turn to the issue of sin, we arrive at a consideration of the most horrifying reality in the entire universe. In fact, we must be careful in thinking and writing about sin, as it can be easy to think of it as an abstract concept instead of the ghastly reality it is, ruining everything it touches.”     

Heath Lambert, A Theology of Biblical Counseling

“In counseling, sin never appears in the muted gray of abstraction. It always comes in the shocking detail and alarming colors of names and faces experiencing real life, real consequences, and real pain. Sin is truly wretched.” 

Lambert

Until it is seriously understood just how wretched sin is, no freedom can be gained from the tentacles-feeding frenzy in our lives! Ever.

Sin must be removed (confessed and forsaken) daily in a believer’s life (1 John 1:8-9; Proverbs 28:13); It must be hourly, and, at times, even moment by moment. We must train ourselves whereby discerning skills are developed.

“But solid food is for the mature, who because of practice have their senses trained to discern good and evil.”

Hebrews 5:14, NASB

Through this 6-Week Retreat, what I eat is not nearly as important as what the Holy Spirit desires to accomplish!

“It’s not what goes into your mouth that defiles you; you are defiled by the words that come out of your mouth.” 

Matthew 15:11, NLT

“The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is? But I, the Lord, search all hearts and examine secret motives…”

Jeremiah 17:9-10a

Sin is truly a serious matter (James 1:14-15)! The whole world stands distorted by it (Romans 8:20-22). We live enslaved to it, unless we put off the old self and put on the new (Ephesians 4:17-24; Romans 6:6; Hebrews 12:1-3). Let us not grow weary and lose heart from doing good (Galatians 6:9)! And let us experience freedom from a tentacles-feeding frenzy.