Sin Lies: Know Thy Enemy

By Rob Gardner

Sin is a struggle that we all face on a daily basis, the battle often times comes down to the lies we believe the moment before we decide to sin. In Sin Lies, we cover the top lies we fall for, and how to combat them so we don`t keep falling into the same trap.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rob Gardner
• Release date: Feb 18, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311446756

Book preview

Sin Lies: Know Thy Enemy

Rob Gardner

Copyright 2014 by Rob Gardner

Smashwords Editions

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Smashwords License Statement This book is licensed for personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard word of this author.

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Chapter One – Sin Beginnings

Chapter Two – The Lie of no Consequences

Chapter Three – The Lie of Peace

Chapter Four – The Lie of Invincibility

Chapter Five – The Lie of Justification

Chapter Six – The Lie of Hopelessness

Chapter Seven – The Lie of Solitude

Chapter Eight – The Lie of Spirituality

Chapter Nine – Conclusions

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Acknowledgments

This book is dedicated to my parents, who have supported me through my bad times and worse, my four beautiful children, who make parenting such a joy, my wife Megan, who I am still convinced is real, my mentor Uncle T, who taught me what really mattered in ministry, enduring many of my mistakes, and last but not least my savior Jesus Christ, who has been the king of endless second chances for me.

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INTRODUCTION

While writing this book, I had a graphic object lesson of sin. If you are an animal lover, who cannot make it through Bambi without crying, you may want to skip ahead. Early one morning I was returning from dropping off my wife at school, as I often do on these mornings, I had the CD in the player, and was taking advantage of the rare break from humanity to pray and get focused for the day.

I was really shocked in this particular morning. Experiencing God, worshipping, and feeling good about my day. It was the way we always picture how things should be. Then something caught my eye. On the other side of the highway was a deer lying in the road. Only this deer was not dead, at least not yet. Lying on his side he was struggling to try and stand, to no avail. Everything I was experiencing was gone in an instant. I was overcome with this, for lack of a better word, crap feeling that I could not shake. Miles down the road the picture was stuck in my head and I could not shake it loose.

As time drew near to return to pick my wife up, I was literally anxious. I knew I would have to return to that spot, I would have to get a closer look at that deer, and what had happened. I remember thinking why on earth God, would you allow me to experience that, at a time that was going so well, on a morning that was starting so smoothly. I tried distracting myself with a variety of tactics, but the image was locked in.

On the way to pick my wife up, I was thinking about when and where I saw the deer, trying to anticipate and prepare myself for what I was about to see. Without going through specifics, I was preparing myself for all scenarios…except the scenario that presented itself.

As I drove back down that stretch, there was no deer to be found. There were no signs of an accident. No blood, no skid marks, nothing. I literally could not find any traces of where it had happened. Did the deer survive somehow? I have no idea. My anxiety however immediately disappeared. My day was back in hand and oddly the image and its haunting memory had left me.

It was in that moment, that the parallels to sin really connected with me. We know Jesus forgives our sin, but God’s forgiveness is not the only issue. Forgiveness of ourselves, consequences, hurts, fears. Sin has such a sticky and ugly effect. Yet when we do truly yield to God, he can restore us, cleanse us, and help us to look past the sin that he has so willingly forgotten.

Hate the sin. Love the sinner

Ah yes, those famous words that so many Christians utter, and as is typical in Christianity, we love to apply to others but not to ourselves. The phrase is a catchy picture of this ideal where we as Christians stand against the sin of the world, but we love the world in spite of their dastardly sin. While many Christians have heard this phrase, how many of us have practiced self-reflection of this thought?

If we are truly honest with ourselves, and I hope as you go through this book you will be honest with yourself. We truly love sin, and hate the sinner (ourselves). We can all say we hate sin; it is easy though to fly off the tongue, without much forethought. Yet hating sin is not a mere decision, or a simple understanding that sin equates to wrong. Truly hating sin requires a deep understanding of what it tries to accomplish, and how damaging it truly is.

Why do we love sin so much? Sin is the fastest way to find temporary solution to a permanent solution. Until the day comes where we are free from these physical bodies and we face our eternity, we are flawed. We have a desperate need for peace in our lives. In fact, we were created with that need. We were always intended to work with God as our driving force, our energy source, and our fuel. As life plays out and we face stress, challenges, hurts, and needs, we drain quickly. It’s in this moment that sin offers a very quick and instantaneous peace. As humans, especially in this day, we love the quickest solution.

As such, we love sin. Most sin requires little work up front, little effort; it is the path of least resistance. In the sin experience we find a temporary freedom from this lack of peace. Our fears, and pain subsides, and in that moment of self-indulgence we feel on top of the world. In that moment sin becomes our greatest asset, and our closest friend.

It is however, the aftermath of sin where it goes horribly wrong. As reality returns to our heart and mind, we find we have sunk even further into despair and deeper into the emptiness. It is here where we truly hate the sinner. We look upon ourselves with shame and disgust. We begin to compare our misery and mistakes with the obviously clean public lives of others. We lose our self-worth, and we lose our identity. The truth of how Jesus looks at us in those moments, as far from our hearts. Like the image of the deer stuck in my head, we cannot separate ourselves from the disgust we have for what we did.

This experience is one we all have, and regularly, if we are being honest. It is this experience that I want you to keep in the front of your mind as you traverse this book, for it is this experience, that I want to drive you towards declaring war on sin.

If we are truly to hate sin, we cannot simply make the decision that sin is wrong. We must declare sin as an enemy. An enemy that has already declared war on us and already determined itself to spend every last resource it has to capture us in bondage and destroy every aspect of our lives.

As you read through this book, and the realization of how many ways sin deceives us on a regular basis starts to sink in, commit yourselves to war and sin. Commit yourselves to learning sin’s tricks and trades, and prepare yourself to overcome. A war is made of many battles and we wont win them all. If we commit though to the war, and do not give in to the other side, even though battles will be lost, the war will be won.

If anything has been a challenge in writing this book, it has been how many of these concepts have challenged me personally. None of us have sin mastered, myself included. Whatever you are facing, whatever you are struggling with, let me assure you, you are not alone. So let us go to war together, and take on this enemy we know as sin.

Know Thy Enemy

"It is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you will not be imperiled in a hundred battles; if you do not know your enemies but do know yourself, you will win one and lose one; if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in every single battle."

- Sun Tzu

Know thy enemy. This truth from 6th century general Sun Tzu envelops our struggle with sin. While our strength and victory over sin comes from Christ and Chris alone, our free will still loves to get in the way. This is the complex dynamic that takes place in a Christian’s struggle with sin.

On the side, we cannot fix ourselves. In fact often times when we try to flex our willpower muscle and engage sin head on, we often stumble out of the gate only to fail miserably. It is in spending time with God, through prayer, time in his presence, and reading His Word that we come to be more like him, that his desires, and will become more and more apart from who we are. At the same time, the Bible makes a clear case for the value and importance of wisdom. The key is, understanding that in knowing wisdom or perhaps a better word truth, we know more of God and in turn we again become more like him.

Back to Sun Tzu’s words, think how they apply to sin. If you do not know sin and you do not know yourself, you will fail every time. If you do know sin but you do not know yourself, you will fail some of the time, and if you know sin and you know yourself, you will have victory. When it comes to sin, knowing yourself is important. While there are some very clear black and white issues in the Bible, there are also many gray areas, and what is severe temptation to one, can be non-existent temptation to another. When we surrender ourselves and allow the Holy Spirit to speak to our hearts about where our personal boundaries must be, we learn about what we can and cannot handle, and prevent ourselves from situations and take us out of our control. Jesus promised us that we would not be tempted beyond what we can handle, but if we choose to place ourselves in that temptation it is a different story.

The focus of this book lies knowing our enemy of sin. Over my life I have noticed a pattern in my personal battles with sin. A majority of the sin I commit come from acceptance of lies shortly before making a bad decision.

But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.

- Hebrews 3:13 (NIV)

Sin has this startlingly effective way of giving us tunnel vision for the moment, and then slipping in non-truth to make us believe we are making a good decision. How quickly after sin’s process is complete does that tunnel vision evaporate leaving the stark reality of our decisions. It is sin’s deceitfulness that is at the heart of this book, and thus why we are talking about Sin Lies. My goal and heart for this book is to take you through some of the lies I have encountered and fell for, in the hope that when you face these lies, you will remember them and not fall for their tricks.

As we take this journey through the lies that sin presents, think about past situations where these lies have been true to you, think about the steps that lead to these situations. If you are struggling with sin in a particular area of your life (who is not?) you may need to reevaluate the boundaries of you life, and take the time to write down the lies you start to believe prior to the decisions you make.

Journaling is a great way to take on this struggle, in fact I recommend considering journaling shortly after you make a mistake. While often times we are not in the mood to write when we screw up, it is great way to learn from your recent failure, and get your focus off the shame of your sin that is already forgiven and onto how you can