Sin Boldly

When you pass through the waters I will be with you;
and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;
when you walk through fire you shall not be burned,
and the flame shall not consume you.

Isaiah 43:2

A rather controversial quote from Martin Luther is his counsel to “sin boldly.” The complete quote is variously translated from the original German as “Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly.”

Superficially, there is a certain realism to Luther's counsel. We are sinners, after all.

People are, I have observed, frequently stubborn and stiff-necked, particularly about sinning. Perhaps the most common reason we give for not doing what we know is right is that we simply do not want to do it.

Not wanting is, of course, never a good reason for not doing. Not wanting is, however, a major reason which I perceive as being behind much of the bad behavior I see in the world around me.

We know what we should be doing, but we say it is too hard, or too time consuming, or simply too unpleasant, and so we simply do not want to do it. The outcome is that we simply do not do what we should, despite knowing we should.

People are quite stubborn and stiff-necked that way!

The Apostle Paul lamented this very thing about himself in Romans 7. He was honest and forthright about his failures to do the right thing, even when he knew quite clearly what that right thing was. The temptations of the flesh Paul openly acknowledged were stubborn temptations that refused to leave him, and frequently bested him—or, as he put it, “I of myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.”

Paul knew when he sinned. He knew when he was doing a wrong thing. He did that wrong thing anyway.

By his own admission, Paul was unquestionably very stubborn and stiff-necked.

Yet being stubborn and stiff-necked does have one redeeming aspect: stubborn and stiff-necked people tend to be the last ones to just quit. Stubbornness quite often is a key ingredient to survival, and an essential ingredient to victory.

Of course, people who are stubborn and stiff-necked for the right reasons aren't usually called stubborn or stiff-necked. Rather, even in the Bible they are described using words such as “steadfast”.

Yet the mindset of both stubbornness and steadfastness is foundationally the same: a simple refusal to stop, to surrender, or to change direction. The distinction between the two traits even in Scripture comes down to why one refuses to stop, to surrender, or to change direction.

There is Jonah, who stubbornly refused God's calling, and spent three days in the belly of a fish regretting his choice.

There is Job, who stubbornly refused to blame God for his many troubles, even as he cried out to God to understand why he was being afflicted, and was ultimately rewarded by God for remaining faithful in the face of adversity.

There is Daniel, who spent a night among lions for refusing to cease his prayers to God.

There were Ahab and Ahaz, who despite warnings from the prophets persisted in leading Israel into sin and ruin.

Each, in their own way, stubbornly refused to quit what they were doing. Whether what they were doing was good or evil, a defining characteristic of each of these men was that refusal to quit.

Nor can we overlook the Apostles themselves, who endured prison, torture, and ultimately death as they worked to fulfill the Great Commission given them by Jesus, to preach the Good News of Jesus Christ and make believers of all nations.

The two billion Christians around the world today are a powerful testimony to their success. The two billion Christians around the world today are a powerful testimony to their stubbornness, even when facing torture and death.

If we are striving to serve God, being stubborn and stiff-necked—being “steadfast”—is demonstrably supreme among the virtues we might hope to have.

If we are defying God, being stubborn and stiff-necked is arguably among the worst sins we might commit.

Proverbs 11:19 teaches this very point: “He who is steadfast in righteousness will live, but he who pursues evil will die.”

For all his struggles with sin, Paul’s refusal to give up, his stubbornness in not ceasing to pray and work to rise above sinful temptation, are the reason we have the bulk of the New Testament today. Had Paul simply given in and stopped reaching for righteousness, his letters would never have been written, and the Bible would be considerably shorter than it is.

That Paul's letters were written, and comprise the bulk of the New Testament Christians receive today as Scripture, as God's Sacred Word, tells us something important about stubbornness: being stubborn is often an important characteristic of being consequential. We achieve the most, and have the greatest impact on the world around us, simply by not stopping, not surrendering, not changing direction.

If we are striving to serve God, being stubborn and stiff-necked—being “steadfast”—is demonstrably supreme among the virtues we might hope to have.

If we are defying God, being stubborn and stiff-necked is arguably among the worst sins we might commit.

Being stubborn matters because the reality of a great many trials and tribulations is that we can survive them. We can go through the fire and come out on the other side. All it takes for us to survive is for us to simply not quit—to not stop, to not surrender, and to not change direction.

Being stubborn matters because, as Isaiah prophesied to Israel, God does not abandon us in the middle of any trial or tribulation. If God wants us to survive, we are going to survive; in every crisis understanding the outcome is really that simple. If God wants us to survive, we need only stay the course to prevail.

Our challenge in every trial and tribulation is being certain whether what we are doing is in service of God or in defiance of God.

Job was blameless in all of his sufferings, yet his outwardly righteous friends were convinced he had sinned grievously, and was compounding that unknown error by stubbornly refusing to admit to his sin. Job was certain he had not sinned, and cried out to God for explanation; if Job had sinned, he wanted to understand how. In the end, God rebuked Job’s friends for not considering the possibility that Job had been right, that Job had not brought God’s wrath upon himself with sin, but that God was testing him for another purpose.

Daniel was blameless, yet political adversaries of his sought to orchestrate his death at the hands of King Nebuchadnezzar II. Had Daniel been overtly political, he perhaps might have avoided being put into the lions’ den, but Daniel was as doggedly apolitical as he was decidedly devout. Despite that, simply by keeping to his course as a loyal member of Nebuchadnezzar’s government and a faithful servant of God, Daniel ultimately triumphed over his adversaries, who were not so fortunate when it was their time to be thrown into the lions’ den.

Jonah, on the other hand, was unquestionably the architect of his own suffering, as he even acknowledged to the sailors who threw him overboard to be swallowed up by a great fish. Only when the fish had taken him down to the depths of the ocean did Jonah finally conclude that he should do as God called him to do. After the fish vomited Jonah back onto dry land, he went to Nineveh, a sprawling metropolis which took some three days just to walk across. With the same doggedness with which Jonah had fled God’s calling, Jonah carried out God’s calling, and the city of Nineveh was saved from its own sin and corruption.

How are we to know whether we are serving God or defying God? While we should look to Scripture for guidance, the ultimate answer will always lie in our faith.

If we are to be steadfast rather than stiff-necked, we must have faith that we are being led by God and not being led away from God. We must trust that, through our faith, we will see the path God wants us to take. Whatever that path is, and through whatever twists and turns it takes us, we must have faith that it will lead us to a good ending.

What we must always do, however, is walk whatever path is put before us. We must confront every obstacle, suffer through every trial, endure every tribulation.

We do not have the luxury of simply doing nothing. As God has put a path before us, it is certain He means for us to walk that path. We cannot therefore simply lay down and not walk that path.

We must walk the path. We must act. We must do. We must have faith that God will guide us rightly through each and every step we take.

As Martin Luther put it, we must sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly.

Because we must act, we must bear the risk of choosing the wrong action, which is to say we must bear the risk of sinning. Because we will act, we must accept the reality that some of our actions will be the wrong action, which is to say we will sin.

Yet if we keep our faith, if we believe in God with all our heart and all our soul and all our mind, we will be guided rightly, and even when we do not follow God’s calling for us, we will still be forgiven.

We must be stubborn and stiff-necked—we must be steadfast—in our pursuit of Godly goals if we are to realize God’s calling for us. We must also be stubborn and stiff-necked—we must be steadfast—in our faith, that as we repent of our many mistakes along the way, as we repent of our sins, we can receive God’s forgiveness already offered each of us.

My prayer on every day is that I will see clearly the path God has put before me, that I will not be misled by earthly temptations and distractions. My prayer on every day is that I will find the courage and conviction to walk whatever path I see before me, that I will find the courage to act even when the outcome is not clear. My prayer on every day is that I will not waver in my faith, that I may keep myself open to receiving God’s forgiveness already offered.

My prayer for you on every day is that you will see clearly the path God has put before you, that you will not be misled by earthly temptations and distractions. My prayer for you on every day is that you will find the courage and conviction to walk whatever path you see before you, that you will find the courage to act even when the outcome is not clear. My prayer for you on every day is that you will not waver in your faith, that you may keep yourself open to receiving God’s forgiveness already offered.

If we are striving to serve God, being stubborn and stiff-necked—being “steadfast”—is demonstrably supreme among the virtues we might hope to have.

If we are defying God, being stubborn and stiff-necked is arguably among the worst sins we might commit.

We must be stubborn and stiff-necked—we must be steadfast—in our pursuit of Godly goals if we are to realize God’s calling for us. We must also be stubborn and stiff-necked—we must be steadfast—in our faith, that as we repent of our many mistakes along the way, as we repent of our sins, we can receive God’s forgiveness already offered each of us.

Truly, we must both sin boldly, and believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly.