Sinned

“O Lord, be gracious to me; heal my soul, for I have sinned against You.”  Psalm 41:4

Sinned – We are a culture of lists.  Do you know anyone who doesn’t have a “TO DO” list somewhere?  We have lists for nearly everything, from grocery shopping to career building.  Our thought patterns are conditioned by a reductionist view of the universe – a view that breaks everything down into smaller parts so that we can get a handle on each piece of the bigger picture.  This isn’t the only way to look at things, but it is certainly our dominant way.  Even when it comes to thinking about sin.

For most of us, sin is a long list of things we aren’t supposed to do.  The Ten Commandments are a primary example.  Don’t do this.  Don’t do that.  Jesus met a man once who was a real list freak.  He wanted to know what he needed to have on his list in order to get into heaven.  Jesus replied, “Keep the commandments”.  This man instantly responded, “Oh, yes.  I know that list.  I already do everything on that list.”  His statement revealed that he had no real understanding of the commandments.  They are not list rules.  They are reflections of God’s character.  We can see this better if we know what the Hebrew root chatha’ means.

Chatha’ is the usual word for “sin” in the Old Testament.  It literally means, “to miss the mark” or “to fall short of the goal”.  The picture points us toward a 100% standard.  Anything less is sin.  Anything!  God is not interested in lists.  God is interested in holiness because He is holy.  The commandments are simply the behavioral implications of a holy character.  Keeping the rules without the internal character is just as much missing the mark of holiness as breaking all the rules.  That was the point Jesus made with the Pharisees when he said they were like whitewashed tombs.  They looked good on the outside because the could answer, “Oh, yes.  I know that list.”  But on the inside, they didn’t reflect God’s character at all.

It is so easy to tie our Christian values to rule lists.  It’s so much more convenient to simply have a checklist for being good.  Then we don’t have to deal with inner attitudes, deep-seated personality issues or hidden agendas.  But God would rather have a relationship with someone who was a murderer, an adulterer, a liar and a thief than with someone who kept the list but didn’t know the list maker.  How do we know this?  Just read what God has to say about David.

Next 24:  I will carefully consider if my obedience is based on rules or on the character of the Ruler.  I will break down my whitewashed walls.