“Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according to your great compassion blot out my transgressions.”
Psalm 51:1
There are countless times when I get impatient with my husband, Ken, over little things. Like when he uses my good pair of scissors to trim his fishing line. Small irritations like that build until I snap at Ken. I get mad at him, but I also get mad at myself for failing to hold my tongue. Soon the spat is forgotten, and God, I feel, has hardly entered into it.
We have a way of sweeping small sins under the carpet of our conscience without ever considering how they affect God. A spat with a friend. A slip of the tongue in gossip. A white lie. An impatient response. An insincere word. A snide comment.
We almost ignore them, thinking that God is there only to handle the big offenses. It’s up to us and our self-control to handle the small sins, we think.
You might say that small offenses such as white lies or silly spats do not actually offend God, that he is quite content to have you sweep little things under the carpet. But not so. Perhaps half our problem is that we do not take sin seriously enough. When we line up all of our offenses, major and minor, against a holy God, we are then able to say with the psalmist, “Against you, you only, have I sinned.”
You, O God, are holy, and sin is a great offense to You. You hate sin because it cost You the life of Your precious Son. It has marred and stained Your beautiful creation, including all of the human race. Today I refuse to sweep small sins out of my conscience without bringing them before You in sincere confession. Help me to take sin… seriously.
Blessings,
Joni and Friends
