blindness

I scoured the shelves of Oxfam (a pretty neat charity shop in Cambridge, which sells second-hand goods), hoping to find a meaningful book on Christianity. There was C.S. Lewis’ ‘The Four Loves’, which I endeavor to read one day, but something else caught my eye, and that was a book called ‘What’s Wrong‘, written by Mike Starkey, subtitled “understanding sin today”.

You might be wondering why I’m so interested in understanding what sin is. After all, isn’t sin a dreadful thing? Most people would rather read about evangelism, or prayer. But I found myself drawn to reading this book that expounds on the subject of sin, and especially on the relevance of sin in the modern world.

You see, several days ago, I emailed a friend regarding my having witnessed to an atheist. Recounting my 3 hours long discourse with the other party, I recollected the various arguments that transpired, the many questions that were raised. It was a furious battle of logic, and eventually neither really emerged on top (as with all things, there can never really be a definite answer without faith). Well, my friend replied with an email saying this, and I thought it very apt to share:

…fighting aethists with logic will never work because the great misunderstanding is that Christians think [that] we [can] cause [an atheist] to become a christian if you manage to beat him at his points. But [the atheist] sees [it] merely as an intellectual exercise, that even if he loses he blames it on his ill thought arguments, because he does not see a need to be involved personally and emotionally with the topic at hand (ie the existence of God).

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I realized then, that the problem wasn’t so much whether there was a God, but whether there was a severed relationship with God. Even if one proves the existence of God, people might see no need to be reconciled to Him if they don’t recognize the problem of sin.

The heart of the Christian message is the justification of sinners and subsequent adoption, but we need to include the portion about SIN! horrible thing that is. But the thing is that many people see this as legalistic. Many people feel these days that it is a sin to be intolerant toward sin (like accepting homosexuality, stuff like that). But is this true?

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the ironic thing is, as I queued to buy the book, I ended up cutting the queue by accident. The person I had carelessly ‘overtaken’ had not said a word, but I believed he was pretty appalled at my lack of respect. I had in some way sinned ‘unintentionally’, i pray the man will forgive me. haha.

The thing is, that’s how it is for all of us. I think we sin all the time, but unknowingly. May the Lord prod deeper into our hearts to reveal this.

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in other news, i’m starting to realize what it means to be alone.

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