Are you committing the same sin over and over?
The question I want to talk about today, and one that I get from people that I work with, is: How do I stop committing the same sin I’ve tried to stop, but I just haven’t been able to.
Well, this is such a good question. And a lot of people struggle with this. I’ve struggled with this over years, over various things. One of the things that’s helped me the most and I know will help you, and I’ve talked about this before, you have to take an honest look at yourself. You have to be completely honest about whatever it is, the sin that you’ve committed.
Now, let’s just take one sin. We don’t have to make a list of all of them, but think of one particular thing that you’ve been struggling with and haven’t been able to get a victory over. And by the way, I could say all kinds of things about how to deal with this, but I’m just going to share a few ideas.
An exercise to help you to stop committing the same sin
As a starting place, I want you to take a piece of paper, and at the top, write down this question or one like it. Whatever works for you. Write down: What does sinning this way get me? What do I think I’m getting from sinning? Whatever this particular sin is, write it out, whatever it is.
Here’s the thing. You have legitimate human needs. You have legitimate spiritual needs, that only God can meet.
When you keep committing the same sin over and over, it really means there’s a need that’s not being met in a deep way that’s actually satisfying that need.
Counterfeits never satisfy
It’s kind of like trying to buy something with counterfeit money. If someone gave you a pile of counterfeit money and you thought you had a million Dollars, you would be all excited. But the minute you find out it’s counterfeit, it’s like, oh, I mean, it still looks pretty impressive, but it’s counterfeit. If it’s really a good counterfeit, you think, maybe I could use this. But it’ll catch up with you at some point if you do.
The problem with sin is it’s giving you counterfeit satisfaction. It’s giving you counterfeit needs being met, and we don’t realize it’s counterfeit.
Once you realize that what you get from that sin is not real pleasure, is not real satisfaction, is not real fulfillment, is not a real need being actually met, it opens your eyes a little bit to realize that you don’t have to keep doing it.
You can stop committing the same sin
So on the top of this page, write down whatever it is you think this particular sin is getting you. And I would suggest there are probably more than one or two. Maybe there are 10 things. You feel like you’re being accepted by other people. It makes you feel a certain way. It could be anything, like: I feel more important.
Let’s say you’ve stolen something from a store. You feel like you’ve got what you want, whatever it is. Write down all the things that you think you’re getting from that particular sin.
Then on a second sheet of paper, write down the opposite of whatever it seems like you’re getting from committing that sin.
Let’s say you have an addiction to pornography. One thing people feel like this is getting them some kind of love and some kind of attention. Find something Jesus said about love and write that down.
Pornography is like a burning passion you can’t seem to control. Well, what’s the opposite of that? Jesus says, blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness. You could say, who are passionate after righteousness.
What are the opposites of what sin “gives”you?
Same thing with purity. He said, blessed are the pure in heart. That’s the opposite of pornography.
So write all these things down on a second piece of paper, all the opposites, and then start looking at those opposite things and realize that that’s who God made you to be.
God did make you to be pure. He did make you to experience love, giving and receiving, true spiritual love and human love as well. He made you to be righteous. Why? Because he made you in his image and likeness.
All these things that are the opposite of the things you’re getting from the sin, that’s what God has given you. Purity doesn’t come from you. Righteousness doesn’t come from you. Love doesn’t come from you. It comes from God. God is the one who is meeting your need. All these needs can only be met by God.
Look for the opposites of sin everywhere
So once you have a sense of that, start looking for these things in yourself, other people, other situations.
Maybe you have a tendency to get angry for no reason. Well, what’s the opposite of anger? It’s joy. So look for every example of joy you can find. It could be your dog coming to greet you when you walk in the door with excitement. It could be walking past a stranger and them smiling at you. It could be the little gurgle of a newborn baby with a smile on his face.
Focus on those things. Replace those counterfeit feelings of getting what you need with these substantial and spiritual things that do meet your need that come from God.
To stop committing the same sin, understand where temptations come from
The other thing I want to talk about is the fact that these temptations do not originate in you. A lot of times we feel these temptations. It makes us feel guilty. We keep having the same temptations. We keep giving in to them. But you need to know that you are not the source of these temptations.
They are not your thoughts originally. They come from the devil, the enemy, the adversary, whatever name you want to give it. These evil thoughts come from the enemy.
And I’ll give you an example I heard someone share. There was this apprentice devil, and he was learning how to tempt people, and he wasn’t making much progress. His uncle, a very experienced devil, said, “Well, tell me what you’re saying to people. How are you tempting them?”
And he said, “Well, when I see a lady in the store and she’s looking at a beautiful scarf, I say, ‘Do you see that scarf? Nobody’s watching, and nobody would see you. You can put that in your purse and just walk out the door, and you won’t have to pay for it. And they never do. I haven’t gotten anybody to steal that scarf yet.'”
And the uncle says, “No, no, no, no, no. That’s not the way you do it. Here, what you do is you go up and you whisper in their ear very softly, ‘Oh, look at that beautiful scarf. That’s really expensive. I could just slip that in my purse. Nobody’s watching, and I could just walk right out the door.'”
Temptations are not from you
Now, that’s the way we are tempted. We think they’re our thoughts, but they are not. It’s the devil whispering in first person. So we mistake his thoughts for our thoughts. And then, well, if they’re our thoughts, then it’s a lot more likely that we’re going to act on them. But once you realize what’s going on, you can stop and say, “Oh, wait a minute. Those aren’t my thoughts. I’m not going to fall for that lie again. I’m not going to fall for that temptation. I see what you’re doing there.”
Remember this the next time you feel tempted on whatever it is. Those temptations are not your thinking. They are the devil’s thinking, trying to disguise themselves as your thinking.
How do you see yourself?
A lot of this comes back to, and we’ve talked about this before in these Freedom Friday episodes is how you see yourself. If you think of yourself as a miserable sinner and that you can’t stop sinning, that’s going to be a self fulfilling prophecy. The more you begin to see yourself as a child of God, made in the image and likeness of God.
Okay, you’ve made some mistakes, you’ve sinned, we’ve all done that. But it’s learning to see yourself from the perspective of how God made you originally in His image and likeness that gives you the strength and the awareness to realize, hey, those sins are not part of my natural identity, my original natural identity.
And so if it’s not part of you, you don’t have to keep holding onto it. But if you think of it as part of your identity, it’s kind of hard to stop.
So those are just a few things to think about. I would love it if you’d make this little list, I’m talking about both lists, of the things that sin seems to give you and then the opposites of that and focus on how God is meeting those needs instead of whatever the sin is.
If you’ve found this helpful, I’d love to hear from you.
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James Early, the Jesus Mindset Coach, is a Bible teacher, speaker, and church mentor. He conducts Bible workshops online and in person. His focus is on getting back to the original Christianity of Jesus by learning to think, pray, and love like Jesus. Contact him here.
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