The Good Thing About Sin

Now that's a title that will get your attention. You might be thinking, Rick is crazy--there is nothing good about sin. God hates sin. Satan tempted Adam and Eve; allowing sin to enter the world and it's been broken ever since. Sin is what damaged the perfect fellowship between God and man.

There really is one good thing about sin and no, I'm not talking about the temporary pleasure we may get from accepting Satan's substitute for God's best. The one good thing about sin is that it reminds us of how great and powerful God is and how fallen and weak we are. Sin reminds us of how much we need God's mercy and grace. Sin reminds us that God spared not even His own Son to save us from our miserable state.

The ten commandments (also referred to in Scripture as the Law) are the best measuring stick we could have to show us how much we can't possibly measure up without Christ. Let the truth of Romans 5:20-21 sink in deeply: "The law was added so that the trespass might increase. But where sin increased, grace increased all the more, so that, just as sin reigned in death, so also grace might reign through righteousness to bring eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord."

By accepting Christ's sacrificial death, burial and resurrection from the grave as payment for our sin debt, we are no longer bound by sin and can boldly claim what the apostle Paul did in Galatians 2:20: "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me."