Incurvatus in se
(Latin for Turned/curved inward on oneself. St. Augustine’s definition of sin.)
Sin is, in truth, the hardest of all masters. In its service there is plenty of fair promises, but an utter dearth of performance. Its pleasures are but for a season. Its wages are sorrow, remorse, self-accusation, and too often death. They that sow to the flesh, do indeed reap corruption.
~JC Ryle
Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. … So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.
~ paul, The Least of The Apostles, in Romans 7
Oh beloved, it is true.
Even the worst of us, if we have even a shred of sanity, have a moral compass. We have a conscience.
G_d has given us a sense that Truth and Life and Good are bigger than us. They are. They are infinite. And so, the only way that we can truly tap into them is to live in the only eternal space we can inhabit: right now. And in the present moment, we open ourselves to the unchanging beauty and goodness of the One Who inhabits forever.
Further, in opening our soul and spirit to that which is bigger, our eyes come up out of the pit of our own miseries, and they can catch the gaze of others who may be in need. We, in Loving G_d, and looking to Him, suddenly have a perspective that is much wider than we could ever have known before.
And, in opening ourselves to the wide-open spaces of His Grace, there comes a lightness to our being. We begin to see that one Day, we really will be able to fly. There will be nothing to hold us down. Like the angels, we will (as G.K. Chesterton said) take ourselves quite lightly.
Can we see it?
Sin is simply us, looking in the opposite direction.
Yes, sin is a destructive choice. Yes, it has terrible consequences. But, sin is actually a secondary symptom of a much deeper problem. For, when we stop looking outward and upward in wonder, we really only have one other place to gaze.
And that is inward, into the dark little rooms of our despair.
We stop looking and believing, and we quickly see that in disconnecting from the Source of our Life and Power, we quickly have to start trying to create and burn our own fuels. But, in our panic, we find that we do not really have anything extra to give.
So, as we take whatever we have, and throw it on our own putrid and puny little fire, the smoke further clouds our vision. But worse, the tiny little structure of our own self-existence weakens as the pieces are torn out of the wall and thrown on the flames.
Eventually, and much more quickly than we thought possible, we curve in fully on ourselves and collapse in a burning heap. Yes, sin is bad. But, it is much more bad and destructive than we can even begin to imagine.
So, do you feel your life collapsing in around you? Are you thinking that you need to try and start doing some extreme things just to make it through. Hold that thought beloved. Reject it. Throw it out. And then, do what really is the only thing that will work:
Look away from yourself. Look at Him. Let Him expand everything back to the wide eternal perspective you (and this fool of a writer) have been Designed to inhabit. Tonight is your night. Look away from yourself.
Sin makes man a coward; but a life in the Truth of Christ makes Him bold.
~St. John Chrysostom
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