SIN

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The greatest obstacle to Christians regarding growth in the Spirit is sin. From the biblical viewpoint, sin is the rupture of the covenanted relationship between God and his people. The sinner thus, loses his friendship with God and sets another relationship with someone other than God. He has decided to be wilfully withdrawn from the covenant of love and given a new orientation to his life. Our life in the Spirit can

In the Old Testament, the grace of God was lost through sin and Yahweh loved his children and continued to call them when they strayed into idolatry as he lamented:

"The more I called them, the more -they went far front me". (Hosea 11:2).

The peoples' sin contrasted sharply with the covenant of God's love:

“…The children, Yahweh raised up have revolted against him ", (Isaiah 1.02), "They are children in whom
there is no faithfulness and Yahweh, has decided to chastise them by hiding his face from them: He spurned
his sons and daughters " (Deuteronomy 32:19-20).

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Here, God 'hiding his face' from them means that the sinner has lost the grace of God through sin. God always loves his people, irrespective of our sinfulness, but it is the sinner who loses the indwelling of the Spirit through sin. But sin is more than a violation of a code of rules, rather it should be 'thought of in the light of a failure to arrange one's life in response to God's love. In other words, it is not just having a moral sense of right and wrong that should bring people to an awareness of their sinfulness. Rather, sin should seen as something that prevents
People from seeing and arranging their lives in response to God's love for them.

Sin is also conceived as, a betrayal 'that disappoints the Father's hope On the children. God's love has been to obtain faithful love from his children and through sin that love can be lost, Sin is also Unreasonable

not only that it sets the creature in opposition against the Creator, but also, it is a rebellion of a child against his Father. Such attitude of a sinful people seems to call into question the Fatherhood of God. Being a child of God makes sin more grievous. This is the reason why Yahweh says

"Woe to those rebellious children, says the Lord, 'who carry out a plan, but not mine; who make an alliance but against my will, adding sin to sin " (Isaiah 30:1).

Lamenting further, Yahweh says,

"For such children are faithless children who refuse to heed the instructions of the Lord" (Isaiah 30:9).

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Since, in the new dispensation, the in-dwelling of the Holy Spirit has interiorized the covenant man and God, when man deliberately breaks the covenant through sin, he loses the indwelling. But not every sin destroys the in-dwelling. According to John, it is only mortal sin that makes us lose this God's grace in us. John puts it this way:

”If any one sees his brother committing sin, if the sin is not deadly, he should pray to God and then he will give him life. This only for those whose sin is not deadly, There is such a thing as deadly sin, about which, I do not say that you should pray. All wrong doing is sin, but there is sin that is not deadly.(l John 5:16).

On the other hand, God's love abounds and we can have hope again because of the redeeming power of love through our Lord Jesus Christ. God is ever ready to accept us and restore the indwelling each time we approach him at the confessional, through the Sacrament of Reconciliation. And as Christians, if we wish to remain under the in- dwelling of the Holy Spirit, we must make frantic efforts to deliberately avoid committing mortal sins.

GOD BLESS YOU