Next time you think what you’re doing isn’t a that big of a deal, consider that Adam and Eve’s sin was eating fruit.
It hit me pretty hard today that what I thought was being gracious by overlooking small offenses was seriously enabling sinful behavior in our home. In fact, because I’ve let the little things slide, I now have quite a mess on my hands.
It’s easy to rationalize that some sins are just little boo–boos, but the reality is that sneaking video games when you’ve been told not to play them during school time is just as damning in God’s eyes as murdering someone. The earthly consequences are drastically different, but the eternal consequences are morbidly the same. My habit of overlooking has been misleading my children to think otherwise.
The more I thought about it, I realized that the sin of all sins, the one that cursed us humans, was, by our standards, seemingly benign and easily rationalized. God didn’t mandate, “Whatever you do, don’t build a spaceship!” Instead, He made a rule that was easy to break. Adam and Eve were told not to eat fruit! (Genesis 2:15-17)
Therefore, it is pretty much impossible for us to say, “It’s not fair! My my sin wasn’t as bad as Adam’s and Eve’s!” By the smallest of sins being the worst of sins, no one can ever say that they are without sin. (Romans 5:12-20 ; 1 John 1:5-10)
I am humbled, thankful, and, regarding my tiny little parenting boo–boo, stand quite corrected.
