In spite of everything I have said previously about sin being the state of our hearts rather than the sum of the ‘bad’ things we do, the Bible seems to put plenty of emphasis on right behaviour and behaviour that goes against God’s ways. If sin is essentially the condition of our hearts, why then does the Bible talk a lot about sin in terms of behaviour?
Perhaps it is helpful to see human behaviour as a set of three concentric circles, one inside the other. Right in the middle, at the centre of everything, is the heart. Not the physical heart of course, but the seat of that which governs us. The condition of our heart affects our values (the next concentric circle) which in turn affects and directs our behaviour (the last and outer concentric circle). Our actions are always defined by our values and the condition of our hearts. Jesus spoke truth when he said that out of the overflow of our heart, our mouth speaks and that that which we treasure will define who we are and what we do.
The meaning for the word “sin” is actually “to miss the mark”. According to the Bible, we have all missed the mark. Which mark have we missed? I grew up believing that it is the mark of his perfect standards we have missed. The Bible however says that we have all missed the mark of His glory. (Romans 3:23) What is God’s glory? Is it his perfection? Is it his holiness (which many understand to mean his separateness and his intolerance of the things we do wrong)? Is someone’s glory not that which makes them great? If God is Love, is his glory not simply his nature, his character, the essence of who he is? Is it not his Love in all its fullness that marks him out, that makes him different to everything else, that makes him glorious and that therefore is his glory?
For me it is helpful to understand it in this way: we have all missed the mark of God’s wonderful and unconditional Love. We fall short of living in the fullness of it and according to it! When we turn away from God, when we live turned away from him, we are unable to receive his Love. Not because he withholds it, but because we refuse (or do not allow ourselves) to receive it. His Love is not able to touch our hearts. It is not able to shape our values and our behaviour follows suit. If we refuse to respond to his Love, if we remain turned away from him, he is simply not able to build the relationship with us that he longs to have because God never forces himself on us. But so we fall short of his glory, his Love. And so our sin, the state of our hearts that are turned away from Him cuts us off from Him.
Because God is Love, he never stops pouring his Love in our direction. He continues to extend his Love to us. Sometimes it only warms the back we have turned to him. But as we begin to turn towards him, even a tiny bit, his Love begins to touch us, which has direct repercussions on our values and later on our behaviour.
I expect there are not that many people who live fully and completely turned towards God, fully basking in the light of his Love, fully saturated by his Love. Perhaps Jesus is the only one. Most of us are probably partially turned to God to one or other degree. We partially allow his Love to enter our hearts; our values and our behaviour are partially touched by his Love.
I believe God delights in every degree that we turn to him and meets us accordingly. Yet he also constantly invites us into deeper, invites us to turn towards Him in a fuller and deeper measure so that his Love is able to saturate our hearts in increasing measure. It is only in this way that our lives become truly full.
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