There are countless ways we Christians sin. We have called someone "you fool", even under our breath when they pull out in front of us on the highway. We have been angry with our siblings without justifiable cause, or even with justifiable cause but we are consumed with anger and bitterness rather than forgiveness. We have taken communion while being angry at a sibling. We have taken the LORD's name in vain, we have lied, we have stirred up strife. We have held a thing or a person higher than the LORD. We have stolen. We are not without sin.
Habitual sin, however, is a different color because rebellion and arrogance and deliberate disobedience fill in all the cracks making the heart like granite. The words that Jesus spoke in Matthew 5, are to bring to fruit that the LAW cannot change a person's heart. Only Jesus can circumcise and tenderize at heart, and bring him to God.
Adultery is sin... but, so are all the other things Jesus mentions. Being angry without cause is murder. In the literal sense, when someone is murdered, there is no repenting of that murder because the deed is done. We can be sorry for what we did, but we cannot undo it. Restitution is impossible because we cannot give back life where there is no life.
How can we say, "Oh, I repent of the murder. I'll not do it again!"? It is done and cannot be reversed. Divorce and remarriage is done and cannot be reversed. We must stay in the place we are when God called us.
Peter asked Jesus if he should forgive his brother 7 times for any offense. Jesus told him that when a brother comes to him in repentance he must forgive 70 times 7 (Luke 17). Does this mean that Jesus put a limit on forgiveness? No. How much more God forgives us when we repent.
God did set a precedent for the "non-punishment" of adultery in Hosea 4:14. He has also set a precedent for having compassion upon whom He shall have compassion because we are not God. His thoughts are not our thoughts and His ways are not our ways, even though we strive every day to look more like Him.
God searches the hearts of men (see 1 Chronicles 28:9 and Revelation 2:23). Out of the heart comes the issues of men, and God knows the heart better than He knows the number of hairs on the head. This is why Jesus said if a man looks at a woman with lust in his heart it is adultery. This is why pornography is exactly the same as fornication/adultery. Therefore, adultery is much more than the sexual act. God called idolatry, adultery.
Repentance is easy, the practice of repenting is not. When faced with an addiction, a person has to do much more than just decide "I'm not going to do that sin any more." A person has to go through a process and this is what God sees when He searches the hearts of men... whether they truly repent and are trying to stop, or whether is was just lip service to the woman in their life. Even if you are not caught in the web of addictive behavior, you may have a loved one that is. Sometimes, all it takes is the empathetic listener to help the addicted one to see the Light.
I had a friend named Gary who compiled all kinds of information about 10 years ago to help people break sinful addictions. I have lost touch with him, but his work has helped many people. Gary told me that he had culled the following list from many different websites and books to help him leave behind the slavery to pornography. He graciously gave me permission to use this in anyway I could to help others be freed. This begins a series on "How To Break A Sinful Addiction."
Please read into the blank whatever has you, or someone you love enslaved.
The Addiction
In the natural, the addiction to __________ is very difficult to break. Here are some reasons:
Warning: This addiction can lead to more aggressive and violent acts such as rape, incest, child sexual abuse, sodomy, masochism, and sadism. Christians are not immune, just because they are Christian. Satan knows our weaknesses and will never hesitate to plunge his fiery darts into those weaknesses.
Part 2 is located here.
Gina Burgess has taught Sunday School and Discipleship Training for almost three decades. (Don't tell her that makes her old.) She earned her Master's in Communication in 2013.
She is the author of several books including: When Christians Hurt Christians, The Crowns of the Believers and others available in online bookstores. She authors several columns, using her God-given talent to shine a light in a dark world. You can browse her blog at Refreshment In Refuge.
If you'd like to take a look at some Christian fiction and Christian non-fiction book reviews check out Gina's book reviews at Upon