HOW TO DEAL WITH SIN (Part I)

The first step in becoming a true Christian is true repentance. Repentance is a complete turn about or change in thoughts and actions to suits the demands and will of God. John the Baptist, who heralded the coming of Jesus, started his ministry by calling people to repentance. This therefore means that the New Testament opens with the call to repentance. But after repentance can one still sin? Yes! The Bible says; “If we say, "We have no sin," we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.” 1Jn 1:8
The church teaches that we sin in four ways; by thoughts (Mt 5:28); by words (Mt 5:22) by actions and by omission. This therefore brings us to the awareness that we are sinners, and we sin everyday. Yet the question here today is how to deal with sin?
To sin is to be out of the tract of God or not to be in the will and command of God; dealing with sin therefore implies returning to the will of God and seeking to repairs the damages caused by sin in our relationship with God. (Jer 8:4-6)
Let us look at the story of the prodigal son in the Bible (Luke 15:7-32), which tells of a son that sinned against his father to satisfy his selfish desires. How he dealt with this sin is our point of attention! His experience can therefore be considered the best way to deal with sin.
Examination of Conscience: this son who took his father’s properties; went away and squandered everything came to his senses at a time and understood that he had sinned against his father and God. (Lk 1517) It becomes very difficult for us to examined our conscience because we too busy to listen to ourselves in reference to the word of God. It is only when we examined ourselves; out actions towards others, what we say to others, that we can be conscious of our sins. If this is done, then we have started the process of dealing with sin!
Acceptance of Fault: How difficult it is for us Christian to accept our faults? We will always look for reasons to justify our sinfulness both before God and man. Take an example of a man that commits adultery and justifies his act with the fact that his wife does not satisfy him or a young girl that offer herself to get a job because opportunity comes but once. This and many more examples occur in our day to day life. But do any of these reasons justify our sinning before God? Certainly not!
The child in our gospel passage came to his senses and recognised his sin against his father and God. He took total responsibility over his sin. He did not try to look for reasons to justify himself or to put it on somebody else. He said, “I will get up and go back to my father and say to him: Father, I have sinned against God and before you.” He did not say, I will tell him I sinned because of anything; he simply put it all on himself. This is what our fore parents, Adam and Eve did not do. The man blamed the woman and the woman blamed the snake. (Gen 3:12-13).