Safe Sin

TEXT: Ezekiel 18:4

TITLE: SAFE SIN

This phrase “SAFE SIN” is what is called an oxymoron. Oxymorons are expressions or statements, which seem to contradict themselves but nonetheless make a point.

Some examples are: “Cruel kindness,” or “clean dirt,” or “tough love.” As a rule these words just don’t go together.

“Safe Sin” is one that can be added to this list. These are good sins, acceptable sins. Sins that are laughed about. As a matter of fact, if put to a vote, these sins would quickly be removed from the list of sins altogether. In other words, there are some sins that people are saying are alright to do.

For sure, sin has gone through quite a change over the years. It use to be that sin brought with it a certain fear that the hand of God was going to descend on it heavily and very soon. At one time people really feared God’s judgment if they committed sin.

At one time sin included all of the “Thou shalt nots” of the Bible, plus numerous “Thou shalt nots” of man (here some change was needed). Later on sin became known as a social ill which we call crime not sin.

Then sociologists and psychologist got into the act and sin became a disorder, a disease, a product of one’s heredity, a problem with roots in unemployment, poor schools and single parent homes. We want to blame the problems on the world on everything but sin.

The tendency now is to smile when someone says they are sinning. Sinning is taken as a joke anymore.

Is it any surprise that some sins have come to be seen as being “safe” sins? Who cares? No biggie. After all, we sure don’t want to be seen as narrow minded do we? Because you see, when a person is narrow minded it’s like being legalistic.

But listen to me. I want you to know that sin is still sin no matter how you label it. God’s Word has never changed and it never will change.

Now, instead of naming specific sins let’s look at some specific categories of what would be called “Safe Sins.”

First, Good Sin. These people base their goodness on what they do not do.

They say things like this: “Hey, I’ve never hurt anyone.” “I’m a good person.”

People who say such things will admit they aren’t perfect, they do sin, but not as bad. Rather than repenting of what they do, these people base their goodness on what they don’t do. They don’t steal, they don’t run around on their mates, they don’t commit acts of violence, they don’t take drugs, etc.

They are safe because their sins are not the worst. They could never go to hell, they are good sinners. It reminds you of the rich young ruler that came to Jesus and kept all the commandments but still was missing something.

An example of these so-called good sinners can be found in the Pharisees of Jesus’ day. These were the men who were respected as “good.” Their name means to “separate” and so they did. They separated themselves from anything they perceived as evil. They intended to obey every precept of the oral and traditional law.

They would sometimes wear large rolls of parchment on their forehead & wrists which contained certain words of the law. Their clothes were distinctive. When it came to prayer, some prayed an hour. This was done three times a day, making 9 hours of pretentious devotion. They seemed to be “good” people. They would have made great holiness people. But Jesus never commended them for their righteousness. Instead, He rebuked them and warned them that they were lost.

Listen to Jesus – Matthew 23:25-28 (read).

Matthew 5:20 warns: “For I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Goodness and good works will not take a person to heaven. Only repentance, confessing of our sins and asking God to forgive us, that is the only way and it still works. When we stand before the Lord, good works want determine whether we enter into heaven or not. He wants to see if the blood has been applied, not just too a few sins, not just to the outside but to all of our sins, those on the inside as well as the outside. He wants to know if the blood has been applied not just to those we consider the worse sins but to the lesser sins as well, because sin is sin no matter how you look at it.

The Pharisees thought they were safe in their own righteousness. They felt safe in their observance of certain laws, rituals and religious activities. But they weren’t. Listen: there will be a lot of “good” people in hell! Some who even thought they were Christians.