When Sin Comes Knocking 

By Stephen Leonard

“The Lord said to Cain, ‘Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.’” Genesis 4:6-7

Is sin as near as your decision-door, as Scripture and God says it is? Does sin want to have you? Sin is not a dead object. It is active and insidious. Sin invades your mind and your desires. It is an invidious, deadly poison in the hand of Satan sprinkled over God’s whole creation.

Every human creature who ever lived is invaded by sin. Sin is what feeds the nature you are born with, except for a very few filled with the Spirit in their mother’s womb, at least, John the Baptist and Jeremiah. Though Psalm 32 tells you we are “all conceived in sin.” This is to say we all have “original sin” from conception, as do John the Baptist and Jeremiah, until they are set apart by the Holy Spirit in their mothers’ womb.

Sin and Satan truly are. Some people deny Satan is. You cannot see him, per se, so the man who denies him can possibly be excused, except that these doubters do not believe God when He clearly tells you Satan is not only alive and active, but is your arch-enemy.

But sin is also ruinous to you, and you will be truly laughed at in the courts of heaven if you make a claim that sin does not really exist. Yes, Psalm 2 tells us God laughs at the foolishness of man. It is totally foolhardy to laugh while denying the existence of sin, for sin is very real and also filled with deadly poison.

The evidence of sin is everywhere. Sin is like air; it is all around us, and it is in us. Every night on the television, you see the news, and the news is all about the results of sin at work. Sin is so pervasive that it is just like the oxygen which flows in your blood. Sin simply is, and there are none who can deny it.

We know from personal experience that sin is always crouching at the door of your will, as it was Cain in the Book of Genesis, causing Cain to rise up and murder his own brother. Sin, in Potiphar’s wife in Egypt, tried to ruin Joseph’s life. But because he chose to resist sinning against God, he was sent to prison. His being imprisoned, though, resulted in God’s purposes being fulfilled; to save His people by first saving Egypt and the Jewish people from starvation.

Thus, we see God can turn the results of sin to accomplish His saving measures. God hates sin with a vengeance for its ruinous impact on His creation. But He provided a way through Jesus to destroy sin and His arch-enemy, Satan. Maybe this sounds fairytale-ish to many, but it is deadly serious.

The evidence in the world is plain to see, but sin’s ability to blind eyes to keep people from seeing this heinous truth is universally active. The Bible expresses this blinding factor of sin repeatedly, but man simply disregards it. That is, until sin almost or does destroy him when he comes face to face with it.

Sin is a tiny three-letter word, but it has the power to destroy your body and soul in hell for eternity. You can choose not to believe it, but, oh, I hate for you to come to the place where you suddenly realize God simply does not lie. What an all-consuming truth to be awakened just before you slide imperceptibly off an interminable cliff.

Do not allow sin to have the last word. It wants to have you, but you do have the power in Jesus to escape it. Being “in” Jesus, you cannot also be “in” sin. Sin still impacts you. You do not escape it in this life. Yet all the more, you must by faith cling to Jesus Christ for dear life. He is the only antidote!

Encouragement