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"Hate what is evil" Romans 12:9
If we took a survey of everything on the earth--we could
not find anything so vile as sin. The basest and most contemptible thing in
this world, has some degree of worth in it, as being the workmanship of God.
But sin and its foul streams have not the least part of worth in them. Sin is
wholly evil without the least mixture of good--it is vileness in the
abstract.
Sin's heinousness appears in its author: "The one
who practices sin is of the Devil; for the Devil has sinned from the
beginning." Sin is the Devil's trade, and he practices it incessantly!
Sin's enormity is seen
in what it has done to man: it has completely ruined his nature and brought
him under the curse of God!
Sin is the source of all our miseries. All
unrighteousness and wretchedness are its fruits. There is no distress of the
mind, no anguish of the heart, no pain of the body--but is due to sin! All the
miseries which mankind groans under, are to be ascribed to sin.
Sin is the cause of all divine punishments: "Your
ways and your doings have brought these things upon you. This is your
punishment." Had there been no sin, there would have been . . .
no wars,
no calamities,
no prisons,
no hospitals,
no insane asylums,
no cemeteries!
Yet who lays these things to heart?
no wars,
no calamities,
no prisons,
no hospitals,
no insane asylums,
no cemeteries!
Yet who lays these things to heart?
"The deceitfulness of sin!" Sin assumes many garbs.
When it appears in its nakedness--it is seen as a black and misshapen monster!
How God Himself views it, may be learned from the various similitudes used by
the Holy Spirit to set forth its ugliness and loathsomeness. Sin is likened to
the scum of a seething pot in which is a detestable carcass, and to a dead and
rotting body!
There is a far greater malignity in sin than is commonly
supposed, even by the majority of church members. Men regard sin as an
infirmity, and term it a human frailty or hereditary weakness.
The majority regard sin as a mere trifle.
Tens of thousands of religionists see so little
filth in sin, that they imagine a few tears will wash away its stain. They
perceive so little criminality in it, that they persuade themselves
that a few good works will make full reparation for it.
All comparisons fail to set forth the horrible malignity in
that abominable thing which God hates. We can say nothing more evil of
sin, than to term it what it is!
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