What Is Sin?

In my last blog I made a connection between sin and self-centeredness. They are not the same because some things self centered can be good. But sin finds it's home in self centeredness. Self centeredness is the stream in which sin spawns. I also made a sin connection between self, group and country. Sin affects all of these. Although Eve sinned alone, Adam waited for others to sin before he did, thus hiding behind numbers.

Finally, I mentioned that sin is falling short of God's requirement to love Him above all and to love others as we love ourselves.

Here are some other facts about sin:

-"Sin" is a state of being in which we all exist; "sins" are actions and thoughts or lack of actions and thoughts that radiate naturally from the state of sin. In other words, we sin because we are sinners.
-Sin deceives us hiding behind self justifications (Ex: "Everybody else does it!" or "Just as long as it doesn't hurt somebody."), excuses (Ex: "I didn't have a choice"), and blaming others (Ex: "It was her fault for getting me mad."). Sin can also hide behind selective memory... that is we focus on the good things we do and skim over or ignore those not so good areas of our lives.
-Part of sin's deception is that we think we can control sin and that it does not control us. In reality sin cannot be controlled. We are slaves to sin. We cannot choose not to sin.
-The end result of sin is death. It may promise better life in the short run, but will always end up in death.
-Some sins destroy us physically, some emotionally, but all sins destroy us spiritually - seperating us from God.

I need to repeat that we sin because we are sinners. I can find temporary or even permament solutions to individual sins such as drunkenness or adultery, but because I am a sinner, other sins will crop up in other areas of my life whether I know it or not, whether I like it or not. I will sin because I am a sinner!