21 comments

Karen Waddles

Calling It What It Is

Posted on 01.09.13 by Karen Waddles
Topics: Relationships with Others

The first three weeks of January, we're celebrating five years of God's faithfulness here on the True Woman blog with some of our favorite posts. Here's one by Karen Waddles from February 24, 2011 (originally titled, "Prettying Up Our Sin").

We love the depth of Karen’s honesty in this post—something we value in True Woman bloggers. Answer her questions below, and we'll choose one of you on Friday, January 11 to receive Brokenness: The Heart God Revives by Nancy Leigh DeMoss.

In my previous post, I shared about how God healed my heart of unforgiveness. As I re-read that post, I was challenged to re-examine my heart. Dig a little deeper. It struck me how it is so easy to use clean, pretty words to cover up what is really ugly and displeasing to the Lord. Have you ever done that?

Toward the end of the post I said, “I’m learning to pray for the persons who I kept at arm’s length for so long.” A more accurate rendering would have been “I’m learning to pray for the persons who I despised for so long.” I actually used this wording in the original article but edited it out because it sounded too ugly . . . too unchristian. I was embarrassed to admit after walking as a Christian for so long that I would actually despise someone, and pride kept me from being totally honest about my heart’s condition.

The writer of Proverbs has a lot to say about that: 

“The Lord tears down the house of the proud but maintains the widow’s boundaries” (15:25).

“Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall” (16:18).

There is something to be said about calling sin what it really is. When I can be honest with myself about the depravity of my sin, it helps me to become more humble. It keeps me closer to the place of brokenness where He can use me and can be glorified through my life. And it helps me to live a life of gratitude for His great sacrifice on the cross.

I’m going out on a limb here, but I think this may be true for a lot of us in the Christian community. I think we sanitize our sin so it looks a lot prettier than it is. In this era of political correctness, we have edited out strong words that evoke emotion and elicit strong responses. We hate, yet we choose to call it dislike. We are rude, yet we call it having a bad day. We lie, yet we call it stretching the truth. We are brazen and full of pride, yet we call it assertiveness.

God’s way, however, is much different. Radical, really. He calls and enables us to exchange love for hate, gentleness for rudeness, truth for lies, and humility and brokenness for pride.

In light of this, job one for me today is to call sin what it really is in my life. Like David I will say, “Create in me a clean heart, O Lord, and renew a right spirit within me" (Ps. 51:10).” Then I will thank Him for His marvelous grace that covers a multitude of sins, washes me white as snow, and allows me to know and experience the freedom of forgiveness . . . that same forgiveness that I am constrained to readily share with those who have offended me. It is a whole lot easier to do that when I’m in touch with how dark my own sin is.

What about you? How have you been prettying up the sin in your life? What would calling sin “sin” look like in your life?

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).

Comments

  1. The results of being honest about the depravity of our sin, not a sanitized classification, are inviting-- more humility, a brokenness that keeps us closer to God, a deeper gratitude in life. I love word definitions and *think* I'm okay with specifics. I think my danger is assigning a naivity to my choices and an agression to others. What I do or think was reasonable or justifiable or innocently self-protective while surely, others are really hoping to hurt me but hatred is not passive or innocent whatever the cause and wounds however entered in to. This is how I sanitize, thinking my motives less harmful. Not so.
    posted by Kat
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 7:24 am
  2. There is something putrid about sin, isn't there? If a rotten, decaying food article is left in the back of a refrigerator, it will continue to smell until it is removed. If a trap has been set for the mouse that entered the house and is now caught, it will begin stinking in a short period of until it is removed appropriately. Sin has a way of spoiling our lives until it is identified, confessed, and nailed to the cross. I have been allowing myself to accept a mediocre level of behavior in the home with young adult children who are living here until the degrees are finished. My husband has ignored and accepted a destructive pattern for so long that our marriage relationship has been greatly wounded. We finally confronted this yesterday and will continue until the sin is rooted out of the home relationships.
    True Woman
    posted by Carole Santiago
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 7:25 am
  3. Why is it I am so much more willing to minimize the sin in my life, while magnifying it in others? Thank you for your transparency. I needed this today.
    posted by Sharon
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 8:20 am
  4. Sometimes the hardest people to forgive are other believers whose sins affect us. We tend to put certain believers (our spouse, parents, pastors, etc.) on a pedestal and when they fall, knowingly or in our minds, we begin to build up walls of bitterness and hate. May we realize that our sin of unforgiveness is just a great at the sin perpetrated against us.
    posted by Tamra
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 8:58 am
  5. I used to kind of think well what I "DO" is one thing so I would try not to sin outwardly, but my thought life...well, that was my own, and I could hate a person in my heart as long as I was nice to their face. Over the past few years though, God has been showing been the great error in that. I'm embarrassed even as I write it.

    I also tend to be forgiving of my own short falls but very critical when others do the same. God has shown me how very deeply evil my heart can be and how my sins even the ones I think are so "little" are deeply grievous to him.

    I have also been more faithful in actively confessing my sins. Once again this probably seems so basic, but I used to kind of "skip over" those I thought were "Little" or "acceptable" sins.

    I have to quit looking around me to and start looking UP because when I compare myself to other people, even other Christians it's easy to think to myself, "I'm not so bad compared to them." Yet compared to Christ? Ugh I'm a wretch!
    posted by jdbemama
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 9:15 am
  6. I struggle with discerning my limitations from my laziness. My inabilities from my avoidances. What is it that I can not do? What is it that I refuse to do? I think I excuse a lot of sin with my physical or mental limitations. But that is sin! God says that His grace is sufficient for me, that it is in my weakness that He is strong.
    posted by Adie
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 9:33 am
  7. Thank you Lord for forgiving my sin and still loving me so deeply. Enable me to do that for others in my life. Thank you that my neediness drives me to you and that is Your heart's desire for me. I love you, Lord.
    posted by bev
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 9:53 am
  8. Love this blog. Challenged and encouraged by your honesty :)
    posted by Gail Owen
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 10:21 am
  9. I've been a willful participant in the hypocrisy of minimizing my own sin while being so hateful and critical of others. It seems so much easier to sweep things like anger, bitterness, laziness, and more under the rug than to look at myself in the mirror, unclouded and clear, and see my sin for what it really is. This article was a blessing and a reminder of how I need to look at myself and get real.
    posted by Lauren
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 10:29 am
  10. If we can't be honest with OURSELVES, HOW can we be honest with GOD? If we can't be honest with ourselves or God, we can't be honest with OTHERS! Then how can we have meaningful relationships with others? It's like the fly in the ointment! SOMETHING will creep in & SPOIL EVERYTHING! We need HONESTY AND HUMBLENESS OF SPIRIT before God AND OTHERS so we can have those relationships God wants in our lives! We HAVE TO CALL SIN FOR WHAT IT IS!!! To rid ourselves & others of CONFUSSION! WHO is the author of "confussion?" SATAN! Whenever there is CONFUSSION, take a closer look...!
    http://tladydesigns.blogspot.com/
    posted by Becky Green
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 10:43 am
  11. My desire to beautify my sin stems from a lifetime of performing, perfection, posturing, pretending all in the ugly name of acceptance and the praise of men. However, at the cross, I have been freed from that bondage and to live for an audience of One. I was up at 3 this morning broken over my sharp tongue to my little girl yesterday and yet I spoke truth into the heart of another girl at the store after her mom crushed her with her words because the girl did not get change in dollars instead of coins. Oh, Lord, thank you for reminding my of the plank before me and not leaving me to remove it by my own devices that daily fail me! When I am repentant over my sin, I see a direct correlation to the response of my children's response to theirs. The gospel is beautiful and when I regard how big my sin really is, the cross becomes that much bigger and more precious to me!! Thank you for boldly speaking truth into our hearts that categorize our sin!
    posted by Missi
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 11:15 am
  12. I love the honesty of this post. I find I am often startling people with my confession of my putrid sin. But what I know is really true is that I don't know the half of it when it comes to my sin. Recently, I have struggled to believe I am not a victim of my circumstances and that those who have possibly wronged me are merely being human sinners, sinning in ways I am fully capable of. I can say it but I don't believe it. I need to go on to believe even the things I don't like are from God's hand and his great love for me is expressed in them.
    posted by Brooke
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 12:02 pm
  13. This post just really hit it home for me. There are so many times in my life that I can recall where I've tried to justify my sin. Make it sound like it's really not that bad - but it is! It's horrible, ugly and utimitly seperates us from Christ. God said sin will bring you death, but you will gain life through Christ.
    If sin = death, then why are we choosing to "pretty it up" There is nothing pretty about death!
    Praise the Lord for His Saving Grace!
    posted by Mandy
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 12:21 pm
  14. It is so easy to categorize sins into difference levels of "sinfulness". Then when we see someone sin a "bad" sin we feel better about our little sins. But every sin is missing the mark of the high calling to holiness, righteousness, and purity. We need to clear the fog off the mirror and take a look at our sins...my sins!
    posted by Patricia Armitage
    on Wednesday, January 9, 2013 at 3:41 pm
  15. What's really bad, is that when you get to this point where you are willing to humble yourself and confess your sin as it is and go to God and maybe to another "spiritual" person, that "spiritual" person looks at you and says "Oh, that's not so bad...". Then you realize why the church is in such sad shape...sin is not considered sin anymore...just a mistake, or a bad day, or "hormones"...If we are going to have the favor of God in our lives and be the church once again...we have to call sin, sin.
    posted by Jodi
    on Thursday, January 10, 2013 at 8:32 am
  16. How well have I thought that I “prettied up” my sin in my life! Gossip, pride, malice are all sins that I have spent time wallowing in, but called it “venting, assertiveness, and protecting myself.” It was an easy pattern to follow when I compared myself to my religious but abusive parents. I felt that I was not only victimized and justified in my hatred (though I called it setting boundaries) toward my parents, but also that I had “come a long way” in healing from hurt. Instead I had constructed a world view that made it nearly impossible to reconcile the horrors of abuse toward children and the forgiveness of a loving God. I had set myself in high esteem, and esteemed not my parents, honored them not. When I grew into adulthood, I saw some of my ugly sins, but dealt with them by beating myself up for the ones that produced the most shame, and by downplaying the ones that are culturally acceptable. Recently, by the great mercy of God, I have truly begun to learn what it means to bring my filthy rags to the foot of the cross and leave behind my human methods of justification. Then and only then can I truly accept God’s forgiveness and find unspeakable joy and gratitude in the sacrifice Jesus has made for us. Then and only then can I humbly see my parents through the eyes of love and forgiveness.
    posted by Amber Hall
    on Thursday, January 10, 2013 at 5:17 pm
  17. I am so glad for this blog. I just freaked out on my husband because he did something that hurt me. Then I went to the computer to look up divorce lawyers but instead looked up this site. I am so glad I did because I try hard to live an honest life with myself, with God, and with others but reading these blogs made me realize how dishonest I really have been. Who am I to get angry with my husband when I have a bunch of "little sins" in my life. God says himself that sin is sin. There is no sin greater than the other. I always minimize my sin or just say to myself "I will deal with it later" and never really do. I really need to go and apologize to my husband and ask God to forgive me for my sins instead of asking Him to change my husband. Thank you all for being so honest. God bless.
    posted by Cassie
    on Thursday, January 10, 2013 at 8:21 pm
  18. Wow, thank you Lord for this....i too am guilty of using words thats are more palliable, and less harsh to describe MY sin, and even making excuses for it, like I was hurt. However when im speaking of someone else perhaps doing the same thing, I call it what it is. But thank God for his Mercy and his Word. Lord, Help me to see my sin as you do, and through your Word call it what you call it (pride, sexual immorality, lies, gossip, bitterness, etc) Addressing my log,before looking at anothers speck...forgive me Lord!
    posted by Stacie
    on Friday, January 11, 2013 at 4:30 am
  19. Woe to me...for I am a woman of unclean lips! It seems daily more evident to me the sin in my life. Even the good things I do, I wonder if they are done with pride and self-righteousness. Help me, God...search my heart and see if there be any wicked way in me. Make me more like you each day.
    posted by kathy
    on Friday, January 11, 2013 at 5:50 am
  20. Wow, Amber! What a beautiful post; what a beautiful testimony of God's faithfulness to pour out grace as one humbles herself to allow Him to work! May you indeed know freedom and joy unspeakable! Blessings to you as you follow Him and His ways!
    posted by Sarah, with the TW Team
    on Friday, January 11, 2013 at 10:24 am
  21. Congrats, Jodi! You just won a copy of Nancy's "Brokenness: The Heart God Revives." Check your inbox for more details.
    posted by Paula Hendricks
    on Monday, January 14, 2013 at 9:29 am

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