An article from Beginning and End.It answers certain questions like: Why Do I Keep Sinning? How Do I Stop Sexual Sin? What Are Ways to Stop Backsliding?It's quite long but is totally worth your time. Please read on if you are interested:
These are all valid questions that Christians face. No matter where you live, your age or your background, all Christians will be tried and tested with sin in their lives. Living in a world full of sinful temptation makes the battle for Christian purity that much tougher. But the Bible of course, holds the solution to battling and in some cases, eliminating certain sins in your life. This article will explore one of the methods to overcoming your worst sins and keeping them away for good.
Know Your Condition
The first step to stopping sin is to recognize it. Lying, stealing, being covetous and blasphemy are all evil in the sight of the Lord just as worshiping a pagan god. Sexual sins – whether it be pre-marital sex, watching pornography, adultery or lusting for another person who is not your spouse, are all sins that are can pull a person into a feeling of addictive behavior, where it seems like there is no way to stop the urges to disobey the Lord.
If you are a born again Christian, your body is literally the temple for the Holy Ghost, who you received at the moment you believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. Notice that the the Apostle Paul explains this concept in the context of sexual sin. Fornication, which is sexual activity outside of marriage, is just as sacrilegious and disrespectful to the temple of God as Manasseh setting up satanic altars. How have you treated the temple of the Holy Ghost? Have you protected your body from sin? Have you kept it pure from demonic and satanic influence? Have you kept your eyes and mind away from sinful sexual imagery and thoughts? Have you used your body to seduce others into evil? We all have committed these sins in one form or another. So understand that The Lord sees this as pure rebellion against Him and will judge any Christian who is committing such sin.
Put your focus on The Lord:Despite the rampant sin around him, Josiah was seeking God. He walked “in all the way of David his father”, meaning he was not going to serve false gods, but only worship the true and Living God of the Bible. And he wanted to repair the temple, that had was neglected and damaged over the years of his father’s and grandfather’s reign. In order to overcome sin, a Christian has to acknowledge it and have a heart to get right with God. If you are reading this article, that is a sign that you want to remove sin from your life.
Repent
You cannot change your behavior on your own. Every person, Christian included, has a sin nature that continues to desire sin as long as we are in our earthly flesh. But it is The Lord who has changed you through faith in Jesus Christ and will continue to work on you through the presence of the Holy Spirit within you.
The refining of a Christian is a supernatural process and trying to use “willpower” or “determination” alone will lead to failure. It is The Lord who works change in us and seeking Him daily is essential to living for Him. Jesus Christ taught: “the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” (John 6:63). Fill yourself with God’s Spirit! Reading the Bible daily and praying several times a day make it very, very hard to live a wild life of constant sinful rebellion. It is God’s Word that will increase your faith, convict you of sin and bring you to repentance and seeking forgiveness from The Lord.
Now some people at this point may say “I do these things. I acknowledge my sin. I truly feel bad when I commit them and I confess them to God. But yet, I still fall back into the same old sinful habits.”
Commit To Live Holy
Are you ready to stop sinning? Tell people. You do not have to tell them all of your business, but you should let your family and friends know that you have committed to living holier and no longer sinning in the ways you have in the past. This not only holds you accountable to those around you, it is a way to serve as a witness of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. As a Christian, your life is your testimony. How you live can affect the ways those around you see the Christian faith. What do those close to see as your Christian testimony?As long as we are still in our sinful flesh bodies, we have a constant war between our born again Spirit, which only seeks to serve God and the sinful lust that remains in us. And if you are of Christ, the command is to “crucify the flesh” – or in other words, destroy the sinful ways in your life. But notice that same verse commands the crucifying of the “affections and lusts” as well. And this is where more of a challenge comes in – are you ready to stop sinning backsliding? Do you really desire it enough to stop going to the places that lead you into sin? This is what the Bible commands Christians to do who want to live after the Spirit and not the flesh.
Get Rid of Your Idolatrous Priests:Many of the toughest sins to overcome involve other people. Whether it is a someone from a relationship that involves fornication, friends who lead you into sinful behavior, someone you enjoy gossiping about others with or maybe fellow gang members, there is no shortage of people in one’s life who can serve to pull you away from following the Lord Jesus Christ and instead serving sin. There are even people you may not speak to who lead you into sinful thoughts whether they be sexual, feelings of envy, racist hatred or mockery. King Josiah was well aware of the many people who were assisting Satan in providing temptation into evil and made it his mission to remove every last person who was leading the nation into sinful rebellion and idolatry. This was not a casual effort. Josiah traveled the nation removing and in some cases killing those wicked priests. And this of course is an example for our own lives, that while we should not harm anyone who leads us into sin, we should certainly no longer have them as major factors in our lives.
Again, the question arises: are you serious about overcoming your worst sins? If so, then the people in your life who participate, contribute or help lead you into rebellion against God should not be so influential in your life. If this sounds extreme, it should beloved. Look at the extreme lengths that Josiah went to in order to reconcile his nation back to God and end the downward spiral of sin. Friends can be a major influence in leading a Christian into rebellion. So if they are a major source of continuing in your worst sins, limit the interaction with those people. Share the Gospel with those friends and let them know you have no desire to participate in those sinful acts with them anymore. If the pressure from those friends is too great to bear, then cease from spending time with them.
In some cases you do not have to, or sometimes cannot, disassociate with people. If there is a family member who you are angered with, cannot stand or leads you into sin, reconcile with them. If this is not possible at present, then try to limit interaction with that person. If it is your own spouse that is driving you to extreme anger, bitterness and resentment, forgive them. God has forgiven you for all of your worst, most evil sins and thoughts, without condition.
If you are in a sinful dating relationship and think: “I love my girlfriend/boyfriend. How am I supposed to just end our relationship?”, there is a simple solution: marry them. The Bible says: “Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband…for it is better to marry than to burn.” (1 Corinthians 7). If you are so attached to a person who you are in a sinful sexual relationship with, the Bible commands you to get married. If you are not ready to marry that person, then you are just using the relationship to serve your own rebellious lusts and it should be ended if it cannot be kept holy (as in dating without fornication).
Call Upon The Lord
When you find the temptations of challenging sins returning, call upon the name of Jesus Christ. Pray to God for help with that specific sin in your time of testing. In any sinful temptation that seems too hard to resist, pray to The Lord for that escape at the time you are experiencing the temptation. King David, after falling deep into the sin of adultery and murder said: “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” Pray for a right spirit when Satan challenges you.
The Blessing
There is no sure-fire way to remove all the sins in your life. The account of Josiah is just one of many examples in Scripture that show that individual sins can be conquered. Before being saved, the Apostle Paul spent years hunting down Christians, delivering them for punishment and execution. And it took one encounter with Jesus Christ to bring that horrible sin to an end. The Apostle Peter denied even knowing who Jesus Christ was three times and then went on to proclaim the name of Christ to the point that he was killed for being so outspoken. Did they ever sin again? Of course. The great men and women of the Bible were just human beings going through the same daily fight against sin like we all do. But through Jesus Christ they did overcome certain sins and were blessed for deciding to live for God over living for the world. God will bless you for committing yourself to battle against sins that are plaguing you. And while every Christian (this author included) will continue to sin as long as we are alive in these earthly bodies, we can trust and know that God will forgive us and give us strength and faith to fight even harder.
culled
Know Your Condition
The first step to stopping sin is to recognize it. Lying, stealing, being covetous and blasphemy are all evil in the sight of the Lord just as worshiping a pagan god. Sexual sins – whether it be pre-marital sex, watching pornography, adultery or lusting for another person who is not your spouse, are all sins that are can pull a person into a feeling of addictive behavior, where it seems like there is no way to stop the urges to disobey the Lord.
If you are a born again Christian, your body is literally the temple for the Holy Ghost, who you received at the moment you believed in the Lord Jesus Christ. Notice that the the Apostle Paul explains this concept in the context of sexual sin. Fornication, which is sexual activity outside of marriage, is just as sacrilegious and disrespectful to the temple of God as Manasseh setting up satanic altars. How have you treated the temple of the Holy Ghost? Have you protected your body from sin? Have you kept it pure from demonic and satanic influence? Have you kept your eyes and mind away from sinful sexual imagery and thoughts? Have you used your body to seduce others into evil? We all have committed these sins in one form or another. So understand that The Lord sees this as pure rebellion against Him and will judge any Christian who is committing such sin.
Put your focus on The Lord:Despite the rampant sin around him, Josiah was seeking God. He walked “in all the way of David his father”, meaning he was not going to serve false gods, but only worship the true and Living God of the Bible. And he wanted to repair the temple, that had was neglected and damaged over the years of his father’s and grandfather’s reign. In order to overcome sin, a Christian has to acknowledge it and have a heart to get right with God. If you are reading this article, that is a sign that you want to remove sin from your life.
You cannot change your behavior on your own. Every person, Christian included, has a sin nature that continues to desire sin as long as we are in our earthly flesh. But it is The Lord who has changed you through faith in Jesus Christ and will continue to work on you through the presence of the Holy Spirit within you.
The refining of a Christian is a supernatural process and trying to use “willpower” or “determination” alone will lead to failure. It is The Lord who works change in us and seeking Him daily is essential to living for Him. Jesus Christ taught: “the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” (John 6:63). Fill yourself with God’s Spirit! Reading the Bible daily and praying several times a day make it very, very hard to live a wild life of constant sinful rebellion. It is God’s Word that will increase your faith, convict you of sin and bring you to repentance and seeking forgiveness from The Lord.
Now some people at this point may say “I do these things. I acknowledge my sin. I truly feel bad when I commit them and I confess them to God. But yet, I still fall back into the same old sinful habits.”
Commit To Live Holy
Get Rid of Your Idolatrous Priests:Many of the toughest sins to overcome involve other people. Whether it is a someone from a relationship that involves fornication, friends who lead you into sinful behavior, someone you enjoy gossiping about others with or maybe fellow gang members, there is no shortage of people in one’s life who can serve to pull you away from following the Lord Jesus Christ and instead serving sin. There are even people you may not speak to who lead you into sinful thoughts whether they be sexual, feelings of envy, racist hatred or mockery. King Josiah was well aware of the many people who were assisting Satan in providing temptation into evil and made it his mission to remove every last person who was leading the nation into sinful rebellion and idolatry. This was not a casual effort. Josiah traveled the nation removing and in some cases killing those wicked priests. And this of course is an example for our own lives, that while we should not harm anyone who leads us into sin, we should certainly no longer have them as major factors in our lives.
Again, the question arises: are you serious about overcoming your worst sins? If so, then the people in your life who participate, contribute or help lead you into rebellion against God should not be so influential in your life. If this sounds extreme, it should beloved. Look at the extreme lengths that Josiah went to in order to reconcile his nation back to God and end the downward spiral of sin. Friends can be a major influence in leading a Christian into rebellion. So if they are a major source of continuing in your worst sins, limit the interaction with those people. Share the Gospel with those friends and let them know you have no desire to participate in those sinful acts with them anymore. If the pressure from those friends is too great to bear, then cease from spending time with them.
In some cases you do not have to, or sometimes cannot, disassociate with people. If there is a family member who you are angered with, cannot stand or leads you into sin, reconcile with them. If this is not possible at present, then try to limit interaction with that person. If it is your own spouse that is driving you to extreme anger, bitterness and resentment, forgive them. God has forgiven you for all of your worst, most evil sins and thoughts, without condition.
If you are in a sinful dating relationship and think: “I love my girlfriend/boyfriend. How am I supposed to just end our relationship?”, there is a simple solution: marry them. The Bible says: “Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband…for it is better to marry than to burn.” (1 Corinthians 7). If you are so attached to a person who you are in a sinful sexual relationship with, the Bible commands you to get married. If you are not ready to marry that person, then you are just using the relationship to serve your own rebellious lusts and it should be ended if it cannot be kept holy (as in dating without fornication).
When you find the temptations of challenging sins returning, call upon the name of Jesus Christ. Pray to God for help with that specific sin in your time of testing. In any sinful temptation that seems too hard to resist, pray to The Lord for that escape at the time you are experiencing the temptation. King David, after falling deep into the sin of adultery and murder said: “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.” Pray for a right spirit when Satan challenges you.
The Blessing
There is no sure-fire way to remove all the sins in your life. The account of Josiah is just one of many examples in Scripture that show that individual sins can be conquered. Before being saved, the Apostle Paul spent years hunting down Christians, delivering them for punishment and execution. And it took one encounter with Jesus Christ to bring that horrible sin to an end. The Apostle Peter denied even knowing who Jesus Christ was three times and then went on to proclaim the name of Christ to the point that he was killed for being so outspoken. Did they ever sin again? Of course. The great men and women of the Bible were just human beings going through the same daily fight against sin like we all do. But through Jesus Christ they did overcome certain sins and were blessed for deciding to live for God over living for the world. God will bless you for committing yourself to battle against sins that are plaguing you. And while every Christian (this author included) will continue to sin as long as we are alive in these earthly bodies, we can trust and know that God will forgive us and give us strength and faith to fight even harder.
culled
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