Tiling Observations on Sin

Tomorrow I will begin a home improvement project that I've put off for way too long. I'm going to tile the walls around the bathtub in our hallway bathroom. This is the third tiling project I've done and I must confess I actually enjoy the work! I've had dreams of tiling our entry way and doing a renovation of our other bathroom, but I know neither of those projects will happen in the immediate future. In my last project (the kitchen backsplash) I had some observations as I finished the project.

You see as I got to the end I noticed that one of the tiles that I had set moved slightly. It was just one corner that slid down just a hair. If you looked at it today you wouldn't notice, nor would you think it was a big deal, but it caused some problems as I set the other tiles around it. You see once that tile moves even slightly it effects every other tile around it. Its essential that these tiles remain square and if one of them moves and is no longer square the other tiles around it have difficulty being square as well.

I couldn't help but think about the effects of sin as I finished up the project. Our sin always has consequences and we're foolish if we don't see that we are not the only one's who feel or experience those consequences. Those close to us are effected by the consequences of our sin. Going all the way back to Adam, his sin effected every individual who has come after him. Abraham chose not to trust God's promise and to listen to Sarah and have a son through Hagar, for all time the descendants of Ishmael and Isaac will fight as a consequence of that bad decision. David is another example, where the sins mentioned within Scripture effected the lives of others (think of the lives that were lost because of David's sin of adultery with Bathsheba or when David was tempted to number Israel and the 70,000 who died from pestilence).

Here are some specific ways that others feel the consequences of our sin;

• They are led to commit the same sin. A good example would come from Galatians 2 where Peter shows racial partiality by refusing to sit with Gentile Christians when Jewish leaders were around. Barnabas saw Peter's example and rather than seeing it as sin, likely because of his respect for Peter, instead followed Peter into the sin himself. This is why Paul warns in Galatians 6:1 that only those who are spiritual should go to restore a person who is caught in sin because of the temptation they will experience to fall into that sin as well.
• They are treated differently because of your sin. Using the same story of Galatians 2, those Gentile Christians in Antioch were treated as 2nd class citizens by Peter and Barnabas. The text said that these men, who were leaders of the church, even apostles of Jesus, were refusing to sit next to a Gentile brother in Christ because they valued the favor of the Jew more than being impartial as God is. Often times I have teens ask why lust or anger is all that bad, saying, "Its not like it would hurt anyone if its just in my heart." Jesus' equates the two in Matthew 5 because the feelings in one's heart effect our perspectives, our words, and our deeds (Jesus later expounds on this point in Matt. 15:18-20). Anger is sin and when we engage in it the effects can harm other people as it will effect the way I treat those individuals and others as well.
• They experience a break in fellowship and unity. Sin always causes a breakdown in fellowship, not only between us and the Lord, but also between ourselves and fellow believers. In this case, Peter's partiality caused a major split within the church upon racial lines. It was an issue the church repeatedly dealt with in its infancy. Sadly, his sin caused division rather than promoting unity that Christ had prayed for (John 17). The Christian teen who gossips about a fellow believer breaks unity and loses fellowship with their brother or sister in Christ. The Christian husband who has an affair not only has a breakdown in fellowship with the Lord, but also with their wife, their children, and those brothers who have walked alongside them. The Christian who decides to forsake the assembling of the church not only loses fellowship with God, but with those that the Lord has placed in his/her life to exhort and encourage them.

Like those tiles that each relied and were effected upon one another so is the Christian. When one brother or sister sins we each feel the effects. Hopefully this causes us to consider just how essential it is for us to strive for holiness, knowing others are hurt when we reject the Spirit's leading to forsake temptation. Seeing sin for what it is should also cause us to realize just how far reaching our sin truly is and when we do we can't help but have a high view of sin and of the darkness, desperation, and hopelessness we were and are in. This correct view of our depravity should cause us to see God's grace as much more grand and live as expectant and longing children for the day when sin no longer will be in our presence and we will exist in perfect peace and holiness with the Lord forever.