Now That We're A Family 188: Hormones, Sinful Nature, and Vices We Are Trying to Overcome
How do you determine if negative feelings are from hormone issues or a sinful nature?
When it comes to feelings, feelings are a physiological response to something. It’s an emotion. It’s in our body. We can’t necessarily control where feelings come from (ie. hunger). It’s not a sin to just feel a feeling. It’s what we do with that feeling that makes it sinful or not. Hormone issues can be a root of a feeling that’s sinful or a feeling that we have to surrender to the Lord, move past and choose not to act on or wallow in. There is a definitive line that is hard to identify for us humans as to when it crosses over to sin. Clearly we are told in the Bible that Jesus was tempted as every man’s been tempted and yet He was without sin. That makes it very clear that being tempted is not sining. It’s obviously a sin when you act out in those things though.
A defining characteristic of Christians is that we are not bondage to our bodies anymore in Christ. We’ve been set free from any captivity that our bodies had over us prior to Christ. Our old man is dead. We are new creations in Christ. We came to Christ in faith and are now no longer slaves to sin, but we are redeemed in Christ’s righteousness. We are learning and growing as Christians every day. The Bible tells us to grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior. Growth is a part of being a Christian.
“A prudent man foreseeth the evil, and hideth himself: but the simple pass on, and are punished.” - Proverbs 22:3
What’s one vice that you’re always praying to overcome? A scary thing a lot of Christians do is categorize various big sins like pornography, drunkenness and adultery and think that you’re good if you haven’t done those things. God’s standard is so much higher than these overt sins we like to categorize.
How do you overcome your vice? If it’s a conviction thing then you need to bring it to the Lord and know that you’re free to walk away from it. There are many things that aren’t a sin unless you make it a sin.
One things that has been helpful is being clear on what we actually want our life to look like and then being proactive and spending our time doing that instead. If you’re passionate and excited about that thing, then you won’t have the time to do those other things that were consuming your life and becoming a vice.
In our Christian walk, we should be thinking about who we are turning towards, instead of what we are turning away from. It is very easy to wallow in the sin of what we did today and the sin of the past. We have to be daily turning towards Christ. The only freedom from any vice is going to be found in Jesus Christ, in what He’s accomplished and who He is!
“Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith” - Hebrews 12:2
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