When talking about sin, it is quite easy to put ourselves in a category that is different than the lost. We can see a list of sins in the Bible, like the one we looked at a few days ago in Colossians 3:5, and disassociate ourselves from the likes of those who are still committing such sins every day. When we begin to process that "the wrath of God" will one day be fully displayed because of the sins and the sinners that practice such things, it is easy for us to sit on our spiritual high horses. It seems that God knew that we might respond that way, and He used Paul to speak directly to us. lest we fall to the sin of self-elevation. This is what our Bible verse says today:
"In these you too once walked, when you were living in them."
There it is . . . we too once walked in the kinds of sins that will eventually cause God to avenge Himself with His wrath. We are not off the hook. We must now have a special kind of patience and compassion upon those who are still walking that way. The kind of patience and compassion that God had for us when we were the ones who were stumbling on the path of sin.
This is also important for us to consider because we are to be dying to our self and the sins that we commit. To put to death all of our sins and idols is to be able to honestly say that we once walked in them. If we are not putting them completely to death, then they are still apart of our journey, a part that God clearly wants us to remove.
Who I once was and what I once did can no longer be a part of my walk of obedience, for my works were all about disobedience. I was a sinner dead in my trespasses. If I am now raised with Christ and truly focused on Him, if I am crucifying my flesh in order to live in the Spirit, then there is no sin that I am free to live in. They are dead to me, and I am dead to them.
What sins are you currently still trying to live in while trusting in the blood of Jesus? These are the very sins that belong in the "I-once-walked-in-them" category, where all sin should be. It is time for the church to get off its SIN PATH and on to the PATH OF RIGHTEOUSNESS.
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