Call It What It Is

Our culture has come up with new words for sin so we don’t feel so bad. Instead of someone saying they committed the sin of adultery, they say there has been “a moral failure.” Instead of someone saying they lied, they claim they “misspoke” or offered “alternative facts.” And instead of someone saying they’ve sinned, they say, “Well, I’m not perfect. I made a mistake.”

But there’s a difference between a mistake and a sin. According to Merriam-Webster, a mistake is “a wrong judgment: misunderstanding” or “a wrong action or statement proceeding from faulty judgment, inadequate knowledge, or inattention.”

For example, you were supposed to turn right on that street and you turned left. It was a mistake. It wasn’t deliberate, but it happened.

A sin, on the other hand, is deliberate. It’s something we do at will. We need to call it what it is. If we have been guilty of a sin, then let’s call it that.

It’s one thing when you realize that something you said wasn’t accurate and then say, “I researched this and found that I wasn’t correct in all my facts. Let me restate it.” But a lie is another thing altogether. A lie is when you know something is true but you choose to say something false instead.

Call a lie a lie. Call a sin a sin. And when you do, apply the blood of Jesus Christ. Come to Him and confess your sin and repent of your sin. Accept His forgiveness because of His blood that was shed. And then drop it. Stop dredging it up. We should not choose to remember what God has chosen to forget. That doesn’t mean there won’t be ramifications for it. But that sin is covered by the blood of Christ, and it is forgiven.