Every day I begin my devotion in prayer. I ask God to clear my conscience so I can bask in the wisdom of His words. After reading the Word, I begin to go into a deep prayer and then write that prayer in my prayer journal. This journal has all of my thanks, all of my requests and all of my sin.
Each day, I write down my sins and ask for forgiveness. I try to remind myself not to commit that sin again. But yet it seems I am asking for forgiveness for the same sin again and again and again—not every day, but way too often.
But what would happen if people were to announce my sin or your sin? What if your sins were posted on the Internet or TV or newspaper? More than likely you would become fearful of that sin.
“Those who continue in sin, rebuke in the presence of all, so that the rest also will be fearful of sinning” (1 Tim. 5:20, NASB).
Timothy talks about this very thing. He reminds the leaders of the church that if any one of the elders are caught up in sin, they should confront them in a confidential manner. But if that person were to continue to sin, they should make it public. The point of making it public is to scare anyone else who might think it’s OK to sin and hopefully make people fearful to even commit a sin in the first place.
So I ask, do you fear sin? Are you so scared of sin that you avoid it? Most of us don’t.
But let me give you two ways to avoid a particular sin in your life. First, there’s accountability. Find someone you just tell your most secret sins to. Ask that person to hold you accountable and keep you from making that sin.
Second is to write down everyone in your life who would be affected by that sin if you were caught. If a sin in your life were made public today, how many people would it affect?
As a pastor, any sin that I commit has so many ramifications that I try hard not to allow myself the opportunity to get into a bad situation. I know I am weak and would be easily led astray. So I stay in the Word, pray and talk to my accountability partner on a regular basis. Don’t fall into Satan’s trap. You can’t do this alone. You need help from God and friends.
God bless, and share your faith.
Jody Burkeen is founder of Man Up God’s Way Ministries, birthed out of his desire to help change the way Christian men “do” Christianity.
