There stood Adam and Eve. Naked and hiding. Their covering of fig leaves and hiding in the bushes could not keep them from the discovery of the Almighty Creator. He came to them as usual and found them not at the meeting place. Though God knew what had happened and where they were, He called to them and asked where they were. The game was up. Adam and Eve knew they were doomed.
I can only imagine the intense horror that Adam and Eve must have felt in those initial moments as they stood before Holy God. A fate which they had never experienced loomed over their heads like a menacing monster waiting to crush them. Death was new. What would it be like? Worse, how would they survive away from the One they had known and loved and had spent time walking in fellowship through the Garden? In the midst of horror, Adam developed a plan. He blamed Eve. In turn, Eve blamed the serpent. In truth, God looked past their lies and to the heart. Adam and Eve were in desperate need of a radical remedy - personal exposure!
While it is imperative that the sin which runs rampant through our churches is exposed the greatest need is the face-to-face confrontation with the evil that resides in the heart of the person staring back at us in the mirror. Yes, they warm, loveable, friendly, familiar lug who greets us each time we stare into a mirror is in dire need of radical adjustment. So often we strut around our churches with Pharisaical sanctimony as we point out the wrongs in the lives of others all the while carrying around a steaming pile of sin that looms over us like a dark, foreboding, seemingly unconquerable mountain. In our arrogance we imagine that we are doing God a favor by bringing the sinning to repentance through our “humble service” when the truth of the matter is that we are desperately masking our sin with fig leaves.
In Matthew 7:1-2 Jesus tells the mass listening to His sermon, “Do not judge so that you will not be judged. For in the way you judge, you will be judged; and by your standard of measure, it will be measured to you.” So many times this passage of Scripture is misused as a shield we bring to bear to protect us from being exposed in our sin. In 7:3-5 Jesus then tells those listening that the imperative to judging a brother or sister’s sin is that you yourself judge yourself first. He tells us to get the beam out of our eye first so we can properly see the speck in someone else’s eye. This, dear friend, requires humility. It requires that we fall to our knees to do battle with the evil that rages in conflict in our own redeemed souls and bring it under subjection to the holiness of God (Romans 7:14-25). It requires that we first look inward before looking outward. It requires that we confess our sins first (1 John 1:9) in order for God to prepare us for the battle for the hearts of our fellow soldiers and the lost of the world. A good soldier should have his mind fixed on the battle and not on the civilian affairs (2 Timothy 2:4). A good soldier of Christ should be battle ready.
I have seen the horrors of sin perpetrated on others. I have seen the greater horror of Christians who ruthlessly bring to bear the sin of others while viciously defending their own sins. I have watched as broken saints of God fall out of ministry and out of churches due to the arrogant, self – righteousness of some believers.
Friends, we have been called to love our fellow believers. Part of that display of love is to humbly point out the faults with the intent of restoration. The greatest act of love, aside from laying down your life for another, is to humbly love a brother or sister who has sinned by pointing out their sin and lovingly bringing them to restoration through grace and mercy. We, you and I, cannot do that great task with sin in our own hearts. We must regularly bow before Almighty God and beg Him to radically search our lives for the fortresses of sin that we have erected and to demolish those fortresses. Often, God will bring those refuges low through the acts of another. With tender and strong hearts we must live boldly before God. With humility we must search our hearts for the hindrances to ministry. With mercy and grace we must minister. With God’s love we bind up the soul that is wounded by sin. With God’s love, mercy, and grace with minister reconciliation to the fallen.
Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them and He has committed to us the word of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, as though God were making an appeal through us; we beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. (2 Corinthians 5:18-20, NASB) Bretheren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself, so that you too will not be tempted. (Galatians 6:1, NASB) All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness. Therefore, strengthen the hands that are weak and the knees that are feeble, and make straight paths for your feet, so that the limb which is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed. (Hebrews 12:12-13, NASB) My bretheren, if any among you strays from the truth and one turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins. (James 5:19-20, NASB)Holy God, You have laid before us the great responsibility to love our fellow believers in Christ. You have called us to minister reconciliation to the lost sinner and the sinning brother. Father, I cannot do that without help. I am incapable of being what You have called me to do. Search me, God, and find the secret fortresses of my sin and destroy them. Change my heart with Your radical love, grace, and mercy. Tenderize my heart to understand who I truly am and to understand the hearts of others. Build in me a bold courage to first look at my own sin and remove the beam in my eye so that I will be fully equipped to engage the battle for holiness in the hearts of my fellow believers. Strengthen my dependence on You so that I will never forget that You are the Source of all I need. May I and those who have named Your holy and matchless name not grow weary in the battles that lie ahead. May we find in You strength to endure and rest to fight the sin that slinks in the shadows of our hearts. Above all, may Your name be glorified in what You accomplish in and through me and in and through those who dare to engage the battle. Now to Him who is able to keep [me] from stumbling, and to make [me] stand in the presence of His glory blameless with great joy, to the only God our Savior, through Jesus Christ our Lord, be glory, majesty, dominion, and authority, before all time and now and forever. Amen. (Jude 24-25, NASB)
