Fifth Wednesday in Lent.
THE GRAVITY OF SIN.
We come now to consider why Sin is in itself so grave. There are several reasons.
1. It is a revolt against God. 2. It is a setting at naught of the Work of Christ. 3. It neutralises the Work of the Holy Ghost. 4. It is an attack on Society.
1. It is a revolt against God. In the first place because God is the supreme authority, the Lord over all Creation, and that creature which sets up its own will against His, is thereby a rebel. Man regards, may be, the laws as unjust, or as tyrannical, that God has imposed on him; unjust because they limit his freedom, or are beyond his power to obey; tyrannical because they oppose the desires of his heart and animal appetites.
In the next place it shows a disregard or disbelief in God’s promises and warnings, it is therefore grave because it shows indifference to God’s goodness and to His severity. In the first case it robs God of the obedience due to Him, in the second case it robs Him of the respect due to Him.
Then, again, Sin is a revolt against God, as it makes man seek another end than that which God has ordained. God would have man seek Him, make Him the object of all His aspirations, all His efforts. By Sin a creature is substituted in the place of God, and man labours for, thinks of, cares for this created object, a person, or a thing, and makes of it an idol. It turns a man away from God as the object of life and its energies to a perishable and unworthy end.
Once more, Sin is a revolt against God, inasmuch as it robs God of the love, fear, reverence, worship, the thoughts of the mind, and the affections of the heart, that properly belong to Him.
Sin therefore is a state of rebellion against God, in that it refuses to acknowledge Him as king, and in that it sets up another sovereign in His place. It takes away that obedience, homage, love that should have been given to God, and gives it to something or someone else.