What flavor is your sin?

I was listening to a sermon this morning called “Living in the Tension” by Robert Madu. He taught on the story of the woman who was brought to Jesus while she was caught in the act of adultery. As I listened to this preachers point of view, he challenged us listeners to put our selfs in the woman’s shoes. Then place ourselves in today’s times. What would we be wearing? Who would be looking at us ? What would the church people in our church be whispering about? Would there be a big gasp when we were threw in front of them? Would they be laughing or pointing? Who would pick up the first stone? As o was placing myself in her shoes, I began to feel humiliated, dirty, as all eyes were gazing upon me in shame. I felt as if I needed to hide under a rock. Then he said, notice the tone of the pharisees in the passage – judgmental, harsh, and arrogant. If we watch Jesus’s tone- it’s quiet, slow to respond, calm, & compassionate. He was loving her in truth & grace. After he told everyone “He who has NO sin cast the first stone.” Everyone left, but the woman remained… Jesus had to tell her to look up. Look up from her shame to see no one was left to judge her but him. Which brings me to my title: “What flavor is your sin?”. Why that title- well because the speaker also mentioned something that stuck out to me: he said “Its easy to judge someone when they share the same taste of sin with you.” Ouch!

What he said stuck with me though. It got me thinking about how we categorize sins into small, large, good, not so bad, and really bad. We categorize them like different types of ice creams: vanilla, chocolate, or rocky road. Jesus sees them all the same- Sin or in our case : ice cream. When we are choosing friends we like to pick the ones who share the same views and hobbies , but so we choose the ones that has the same sins too? Or maybe we see the ones that allow us to let our “ice cream” stay in the freezer so it’s not melting all over the place – or calling us out on it.

If we really apply ourselves to the story above, would we be the lady in sin or the ones pointing hers out? And to be honest I’ve been both. I’ve pointed out others sins because I didn’t like their flavor of sin. All sin is bad. And if we don’t ask for forgiveness our sin will just keep getting worse and worse and we will keep going farther and farther from God . That’s why it’s so important to bring our sins to God. And in order to do that, sometimes we need to melt in front of him..

Melting can be a slow process though Depending on the weather that day. Sometimes you have to be sat out on a counter top because you left it there and other days you put out in the sun because someone called you out there. Either way, no one likes when their IceCream melts. You may loose people over your flavor change. You may have people who try to put you back in the freezer because they notice you trying to melt, other times you may just enjoy your icecream without thinking about it.

In today’s world it seems like everyone is fighting over what flavor your sin is though. “Well you don’t like rocky road ? How dare you?!” “Well you don’t like my views on how we should treat each other? Are you even Christian?” It’s important that we look at how Jesus dealt with his situation that was thrown before him.

Jesus knelt down to the woman’s level, because he meets us where we are in our melting. Then he listened. He allowed the melting process to happen. He then spoke. He didn’t yell. He didn’t command- he responded. Responding is different than replying. Replying sometimes we do without thinking. Responding is answering after thinking about the question wisely. Then after everyone walked away, he comforted. He cleaned up the melted icecream puddle on the floor. Sometimes we need to do those steps especially in the times we live in, but there’s one thing we need in order to do that.

We need God to give us his eyes to see what he seen in the woman that day. He seen past her flavor. He seen past the sin , hurt, & shame. He seen her heart. Her beauty. Her soul that was needing grace and truth that day. That was needing forgiveness not a lecture or a stoning. What would our world look like if we had Gods eyes for just a second. If we had Gods eyes to actually see past flavors of sins, race, views, flaws, social status, and so forth. What would today look like? There’s riots, hurt, people crying out to be heard, but if they only knew God would meet them where they are – what would today look like?

So I ask you, when you imagine yourself as the woman thrown in front of the crowd, what would you done? Would you shown her compassion? Would you have picked up a stone? Whatever you chose- imagine doing it to your own self…. then next time your face with the same situation, take the moment to respond like Jesus and not reply like the pharisees.

I pray God will let you see things through his eyes, and that this small blog would have helped you in some way today. Thank you for stopping by and I hope you have a wonderful day!

Marli – Angel Mom to Rhett – Rainbow Mom to Selah