sin = death

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins

Ephesians 2:1

The gospel is a slap in the face to my self-centered ego. To believe the gospel is to accept my own inability and gross condition. I am by nature a dead man. I was born spiritually dead in my sin. I was in need of real life. Dead people can do nothing but rot as death controls them. And spiritually, before I came to Jesus, I was in that helpless, decaying, stinking state.

So I ask myself a simple question today: Do I see sin as death? I mean, do I view it from its spiritual reality? I have to confess that when I sin (which is all too much), I am not seeing real sin for what it is -- a rotten stench on me as a corpse. I dress up anger, or pride, or sensuality, or any of their limitless variations. I apply heavy makeup to the zombie's dried skin and act like the skeleton of a corpse of sin is outrageously fun and attractive. But if I really own what sin is, I must see it as death.

There's a huge mental advantage for me in this reality of embracing the equation here of (sin = death). Honestly, I don't want to physically die. I naturally am reluctant to deal with my own death. And that's exactly what advantages me to see sin as death. If I believe that sin is indeed death, I'll stay clear from it for the same reasons I don't want to consume rat poison! I don't want death... I want life.

Thank God that even as I was once a dead man, He sent His Son to die and to rise again, so that by faith I might be made alive again by trusting in what Jesus has done. In Jesus I am a living man once again, not dead in sin, regret, guilt, and shame, but resurrected to walk a whole new life... fresh skin on live bones. I was dead. Now Jesus lives and gives me life.