Romans 7:13 Was then that which is good made death to me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good… I. TO MANY MEN SIN DOES NOT APPEAR SIN. 1. In all men there is an ignorance of what sin is. Man will not come to the light lest he should know more than he wishes to know: Moreover, such is the power of self-esteem that the sinner seldom dreams that he has committed anything worse than little faults. 2. This is due — (1) To that dulness of conscience which is the result of the fall. (2) To the deceitfulness both of sin and of the human heart. Sin assumes the brightest forms even as Satan appears as an angel of light. And the heart loves to have it so, and is eager to be deceived. We will, if we can, extenuate our faults. (3) To ignorance of the spirituality of the law. If men read, e.g., "Thou shalt do no murder," they say, "I have never broken that law." But they forget that he that hateth his brother is a murderer. If I wilfully do anything which tends to destroy or shorten life, I break the command. 3. Thus you see a few of the reasons why sin cheats impenitent and self-righteous minds. This is one of the most deplorable results of sin. It injures us most by taking from us the capacity to know how much we are injured. Sin, like the deadly frost, benumbs its victim ere it slays him. Man is so diseased that he fancies his disease to be health, and judges healthy men to be under wild delusions. He loves the enemy which destroys him, and warms at his bosom the viper. The most unhappy thing that can happen to a man is for him to be sinful and to judge his sinfulness to be righteousness. The persecutor hounded his fellow creature to prison and to death, but he thought he verily did God service. With the ungodly this pestilential influence is very powerful, leading them to cry "peace, peace," where there is no peace. And also even John Newton, in the slave trade, never seemed to have felt that there was any wrong; nor Whitefield in accepting slaves for his orphanage in Georgia. 4. Before we can be restored to the image of Christ, we must be taught to know sin to be sin; and we must have a restoration of the tenderness of conscience which would have been ours had we never fallen. A measure of this discernment and tenderness of judgment is given to us at conversion; for conversion, apart from it, would be impossible. Unless sin is seen to be sin, grace will never be seen to be grace, nor Jesus to be a Saviour. II. WHERE SIN IS MOST CLEARLY SEEN, IT APPEARS TO BE SIN. 1. There is a depth of meaning in the expression, "Sin, that it might appear sin" — as if the apostle could find no other word so terribly descriptive of sin as its own name. (1) He does not say, "Sin, that it might appear like Satan." No, for sin is worse than the devil, since it made the devil what he is. Satan as an existence is God's creature, and this sin never was. Sin is even worse than hell, for it is the sting of that dreadful punishment. (2) He does not say, "Sin, that it might appear madness." Truly it is moral insanity, but it is worse than that. (3) There are those who see sin as a misfortune, but this, although correct, is very far short of the true view. (4) Others have come to see sin as a folly, and so far they see aright, for "a fool" is God's own name for a sinner. But for all that, sin is not mere want of wit or mistaken judgment, it is the wilful choice of evil. (5) Some, too, have seen certain sins to be "crimes." When an action hurts our fellow men, we call it a crime; when it only offends God, we style it a sin. If I were to call you criminals, you would be disgusted; but if I call you sinners, you will not be at all angry; because to offend man is a thing you would not like to do, but to offend God is to many persons a small matter. 2. Sin must appear to be sin against God; we must say with David, "Against Thee, Thee only, have I sinned," and with the prodigal, "Father, I have sinned against heaven and before Thee." Think how odious a thing sin is. (1) Our offences are committed against a law which is holy, and just, and good. To break a bad law, may be more than excusable, but there can be no excuse when the commandment commends itself to every man's conscience. (2) The Divine law is binding, because of the authority of the Lawgiver. God has made us, ought we not to serve Him? Yet, after all His goodness, we have turned against Him and harboured His enemy. Had the Eternal been a tyrant, I could imagine some dignity in a revolt against Him; but seeing He is a Father, sin against Him is exceeding sinful. Sin is worse than bestial, for the beasts only return evil for evil; it is devilish — for it returns evil for good. 3. It would appear that Paul made the discovery of sin as sin through the light of one of the commands (ver. 7). III. THE SINFULNESS OF SIN IS MOST CLEARLY SEEN IN ITS PERVERTING THE REST OF THINGS TO DEADLY PURPOSES. "Working death in me by that which is good." God's law, which ordained to life, for "He that doeth these things shall live in them," is wilfully disobeyed, and so, sin turns the law into an instrument of death. It does worse still. It is a strange propensity of our nature, that there are many things which we lust after as soon as they are forbidden. 1. How many there are who turn the abounding mercy of God, as proclaimed in the gospel, into a reason for further sin! 2. There are individuals who have greatly sinned, and escaped the natural consequences. God has been very longsuffering; and therefore they defy Him again, and return presumptuously to their former habits. 3. Look again at thousands of prosperous sinners whose riches are their means of sinning. They have all that heart can wish, and instead of being doubly grateful to God they are proud and thoughtless, and deny themselves none of the pleasures of sin. 4. The same evil is manifested when the Lord threatens. 5. We have known persons in adversity who ought to have been led to God by their sorrow, but instead have become careless of all religion, and east off all fear of God. 6. Familiarity with death and the grave often hardens the heart, and none become more callous than grave diggers and those who carry dead men to their graves. 7. Some transgress all the more because they have been placed under the happy restraints of godliness. As gnats fly at a candle as soon as ever they catch sight of it, so do these infatuated ones dash into evil. The younger son had the best of fathers, and yet he could never be quiet till he had gained his independence, and had brought himself to beggary in a far country. 8. Men who live in times when zealous and holy Christians abound, are often the worse for it. When the Church is asleep the world says, "Ah, we do not believe your religion, for you do not act as if you believed it yourselves," but the moment the Church bestirs herself, the world cries, "They are a set of fanatics; who can put up with their ravings?" Sin is thus seen to be exceeding sinful. The Lord brings good out of evil, but sin brings evil out of good. (C. H. Spurgeon.) Parallel Verses KJV: Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good; that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. |
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