Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous. He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.     1 John 3:7-8 NKJV

Most of us consider death to be a very serious matter, but we don’t take sin very seriously. If our doctor tells us to stop doing something or it will cause us to die, we will likely strive and do our best to stop doing whatever it is. When the preacher tells us to stop sinning, we tend to ignore that.

What we fail to consider is sin leads to death. Romans 6:23 tells us the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Jesus Christ our Lord.

We had a guest pastor last night who said something I had never thought about. God told Adam and Eve they should not eat of the tree of the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil or they would die. However, they had never experienced death. They didn’t even really know what death was. We don’t have that excuse, we know what death is.

And then in chapter 3, the serpent tells Eve, “Surely you won’t die.” The serpent lied. Sin leads to death. Death is separation. We know when a loved one dies, we are separated from them. But praise God if they are saved and we are saved, we have hope knowing this is just a temporary separation. We will see them again.

Adam and Eve didn’t immediately fall dead when they ate the fruit, but they immediately experienced separation from God and all the goodness of the Garden of Eden. They were cast out of the garden. There were generational curses imposed like having to sweat to toil the land for food and the pains of childbirth.

My friend if you have a sin that you consider no big deal or just a little sin, you need to know there is no such thing as a little sin. We like to categorize them by thinking a little white lie is not so bad where murdering someone or committing adultery is awful. All sin is awful because it creates a barrier between us and God. We are told in Isaiah 59:1-2 that God’s arm is not too short to save us nor his ear to deaf to hear but our sin creates a barrier so that He doesn’t listen to us.

Unrepented sin leads to death, it’s important that you understand this. God doesn’t overlook our sin. He doesn’t tolerate our sin. Sinners don’t go unpunished.

If you have unrepented sin in your life you can make things right with God. You can repent and draw near to Him. You can ask Him to strengthen you against temptation.

The most important thing for us to understand is that now is the time. Tomorrow or even five minutes from now may be too late.

Hebrews 10:26-27 tells us if we sin intentionally after knowing the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for our sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire about to consume the adversaries.

God takes sin very seriously. If you know what’s good for you, you will too.

Have a great day!