The Weight of Sin

and the reality of our souls apart from God

In the book of Romans, the Apostle Paul tells us that the wage earned for any sin is death (Romans 3:23). But he also notes in the same verse that God’s gift that He offers is eternal life. If the gift is eternal so too is the wage. If you were to count my wages earned for sin, I would be very rich in damnation. Yet by God’s grace and Jesus’ blood payment, all my Hell-bound investments have been redeemed. Praise be to God for this blessed fact!

There is still an issue though, despite knowing this glorious fact I find myself at various times forgetting the weight of sin. When I do this my heart finds itself in wretched places where I do not in my spirit wish to travel. For a believer to delight in where they are heading (eternally), we must think about where we have been, hate the thought of that old sin, and kill it completely. We must not forget the weight of sin, because when we do we lose sight of God’s immaculate glory.

What is sin?

To understand this weight, we must first understand the “what,” what is sin? According to the scripture sin is “breaking the law” (1 John 3:4). But whose law is it that we are breaking? When we look at what the Bible says we see, to our dismay, that the Law of God is what we have broken. Considering this we see that sin is any wicked nature one keeps in their heart and mind, any action one takes, any thought one thinks, and any word that one utters that opposes God’s commandments. But, all these sinful forms leap forth from something deeper. It is not some whim or flight of thought that leads us into sin, it is inborn.

Original Sin

That deeper issue is our sinful nature. We have all received this nature from Adam (1 Corinthians 15:22, see Genesis 3). It is a poison that has so altered our spiritual state that from birth we are separated from God and spiritually stillborn (Colossians 2:13, Romans 5:8). There is a gracious glimmer of God’s hope in these passages, where once we were dead we can be made alive in Jesus Christ. Understand what is at stake here though, Paul mentions a “you” in these passages, there is some exclusivity to this eternal life. If you are not found in Christ you are a husk, living on the outside but that external life is only a façade for the rotting corpse of the soul. It is only when we know Him, and have a true relationship with Him, that we truly begin to live. So now with these two pieces, we need to see what happens when we put them together.

The full reality of sin

So, what is the full reality behind sin then? When we take all that has been said we get this picture; Sin is separation from God that is furthered and deepened every time we commit an act of sin or foster its nature in our hearts. It is also spiritual damnation if it is not healed and forgiven by the work of Jesus. And this is where we begin to understand the weight that sin truly imposes.

God is holy (set apart, in the fullest sense of the word) and righteous (right and just). His nature is totally of this substance and no sin can be found in Him (James 1:13). Because of His nature God will not bear to dwell with wickedness (Psalm 5:4). We see this in the institution of the sacrificial system, which allowed the Father to dwell amid the camp of Israel. So now our plight is coming into better focus. God will not dwell with the wickedness of sin, and yet apart from God’s work, we can do nothing to remedy our sin because we are dead in our trespasses (sins, failures).

This separation from God, if lifelong, becomes permanent in the fires of Hell. That means that if we continue down this path our division from Him will not only be everlasting, but this tragedy is coupled with the knowledge that the only aspect of God the reprobate will know fully is wrath, poured out in its greatest measure.

An eternal burden

This is the weight of sin, an unbearable and eternal burden. Yet as has been mentioned there is one hope, The Hope. It comes in the person of Jesus, the son of God who humbled Himself and died in our stead (Philippians 2:8). It is He alone who can reform broken sinners and bring them full circle into glory (Romans 8:30). So dear brother or sister, I implore you to turn to the only one who can lift this eternal burden of sin from your broken back and follow Him. But as you walk after Him do not forget the weight of sin, the wickedness from which you are being drawn into that better country of light. Not to reminisce on the wicked pleasures of this world, but so that we never forget the mire from which we have been drawn, and always look with joy to the throne of our King.