There is a song called Eden by a woman named Ali Rogers. Part of it says:
Aware of all that I am
My hunger led me to your hope
Paul writes in Romans (chapter 7) these familiar words:
But what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. …As it is, it is no longer I who do it but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. … So I find this law at work: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; but I see another law at work in the members of my body…What a wretched woman I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God–through Jesus Christ our Lord!
When God begins to reveal the depths of sin in your life and just how far those roots go down, it HURTS. You feel naked and exposed; disgusting and not to be pitied. It is painful. It doesn’t feel fair (even though you asked for it in prayer) because you feel singled out. It makes you despair over the condition of the heart of humanity, knowing your own heart is just as black as those of all humankind.
But in Hebrews 12 we get to see a new perspective to this painful process of uncovering sin. It quotes Proverbs 3, and I take the liberty of substituting “child” for “son.”
“My child, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a child.”
Hebrews goes on to say: Endure hardship as discipline; God is treating you as sons. …How much more should we submit to the Father of our spirits and live! Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they thought best; but God disciplines us for our good, that we may share in his holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.
