For longer than you care to say, you've struggled with a sin issue that keeps on being a problem, keeps its hold on you. Nobody knows - at least you hope nobody knows and you hope it stays that way. You've been praying about it, asking God to deliver you but the sin in your heart or the sinning on the computer or the sinning away from home continues. Why haven't your prayers worked?
You've talked to your buddies, you've counseled with a professional or perhaps even shared your struggle with your wife/husband, but the struggle continues. Even though you've tried bringing it to the light, the sin does not shrink back, it does not let you go. You keep on yielding to its power over you. Why hasn't confession worked?
Sin is deceptive, it lays a trap and entangles our hearts not allowing us to easily be freed. Prayer releases a power within us to overcome and be victorious but it does not work independent of our own will and participation. Praying to be released from a sin that we are trying to keep hidden does not allow us to appropriate all the power God provides in prayer.
Sin also holds a powerful grip in our lives. Exposing it, weakens its hold but does not destroy it or render it powerless. A sin confessed before others or to your spouse or even before God is brought into the open to be destroyed but we lack the power on our own to destroy it, the power is appropriated in prayer.
What I'm getting at is that overcoming sin that has a real foothold in our life requires a one-two approach in our battle against it. It needs to be confessed, brought out into the open. Then it needs to be assaulted, laid before the Father in prayer. It is in the combined confessing and praying that renders sin powerless and defeated.
"Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective" (James 5:16). Jus Sayn.
No comments:
Post a Comment