Pastor John:
WoW! I really felt convicted by your words last night. How much I hate sin is directly correlates to how much I love Jesus!
I know I was a sin tolerator before Jesus blessed me with holy Spirit, but I realized last night that that sin tolerator is not completely dead. While I thought I understood and lived by hating the sin and not the sinner, it was put on my heart last night that I really didn’t hate the sin. My desire to not hate people – being a person who sometimes felt hated just because of the color of my skin – kept me from really hating sin. I could feel that I hadn’t separated the two in my heart. Flashes of my responses to instances where my patient and loving husband had questioned me about my attitude towards certain sinful ways came before me. I knew I needed to repent for not hating sin enough!!!
I pray that Jesus gives me a heart that knows how to hate sin with the same vigor with which He loves me! I can already feel a shift happening, and I pray that he allows me to want to want that shift more and more.
Praise God for the fellowship I felt last night! I could feel the grief that the body felt when Sandy was lost. I feel that now for a few brothers and sisters, and I’ve only been a part of the body for a few years. I’ve said it before, but I’ll say it again – I am so grateful Jesus put me in this body
Now I’m not so sure about this hate the sin not the sinner…
I did a Google search on that, and it seems that sentiment is not biblical I read Proverbs 6:16, and if I am to hate the things God hates, then how could I not hate the person who has haughty eyes or a lying tongue, who kills, devises wicked plans, runs to evil, lies or sows discord among brothers? I doubt Jesus would want me to only hate the persons’ eyes, tongue, hands, etc…
Perhaps where I’ve been going wrong is in the belief that I should hate the sin and not the sinner?
~Allison
===========
Hi, Allison.
Yours is a great testimony. I am glad you are still growing and learning. In Christ, that never stops!
That phrase, “hate the sin, but not the sinner” is OK. It certainly is not as bad as such Christian cliches as “join the church of your choice” and “we have to love everybody” and “we have to forgive everybody”, etc. God loved us when we were sinners, and sent His Son to die for us while we were in sin. So He certainly loved us, but not our sin. So, there is that.
But we also have such scriptures as these:
“Do I not hate them, O Jehovah, who hate you, and abhor those who rise up against you? I hate them with perfect hatred. They are become my enemies” (Ps. 139:21–22).
“Braggarts will not stand in your sight. You hate all evildoers” (Ps. 5:5).
“The Lord tries the righteous, but the wicked man and him who loves violence, His soul hates” (Ps. 11:5).
So, there is that, too.
The simplest and safest thing for us to do is to live so that we give God no reason to hate us, and not to keep company with those who do provoke His wrath.
Thank you for writing. I hope that clears up what the Bible says about the issue of “hating the sin, but not the sinner”.
Pastor John