J.S. Park

Question: So About Being “Stuck In Sin” and Breaking Free

Anonymous asked (edited for length and anonymity)

I often hear or read things about “habitual sins.” … I know that I will always be sinful, and even if it’s not porn, I’m going to sin in other ways. However, I guess I’m wondering if it’s different because this sin is a habitual and cyclical one?

Thank you so much for your honesty here. In case you’re interested, I have a podcast and blog series on porn addiction here.

The short answer is that “habitual sin” usually has three traits:

1) Premeditated: you plan it out or you purposefully lower your guard to triggers and situations.

2) Preoccupied: it’s always on your mind and you make no effort to re-prioritize your central thoughts.

3) Unrepentant: you refuse to stop because of some rationalization or you just don’t want to, despite the destruction it’s causing.

While I hesitate to label things so quickly, if you have the above: it’s possible you might be in a habitual sin.

Let’s also remember what “sin” is because this word is so often mocked and ridiculed and misinformed.  Defining it will also help us overcome it.

Sin is simply the entire human condition of brokenness that causes our hearts to be divided from our design and Designer.

You’ve probably heard that “sin is doing bad” or it’s “total depravity,” and while I understand what they mean, I don’t think it’s helpful to leave it there.

Sin did begin with an act of rebellion, but the consequence is that we’ve been dislocated from God ever since. We often cover the first part about “immoral behavior,” but not the second part about being made for Christ.  We not only disobeyed; we were disconnected.

Remember: We once were perfectly whole in reflecting and receiving the Glory of God, but since Adam and Eve, that’s all been painfully fractured.

That’s why Romans 3:23 doesn’t say, “We all disobey the glory of God” — but rather, “We fall short.” The rest of humanity’s story is the desperate effort to find the wholeness that only God can give us.  Or in another way: The noun of sin can lead to verbs of sin, but we are ALL woefully broken and in need of rescue.

This helps you both overcome the behavior and the source of the issue. Sin is not only what we do or who we are, but what we’re missing. It doesn’t just explain alcoholism or porn addiction or yelling in traffic, but also explains our need for approval, our competitive cutthroat culture, and our existential self-examination of significance.

So if you’re trying to quit porn, you can’t just “quit porn.”  We must both run from sin and run to Him — to His purposes, His opportunities, His people, and His presence.

Now if you’re “stuck in habitual sin patterns,” you are willfully using and abusing people and things to fill your spiritual void — sometimes maliciously, other times mutually, but always consciously.

But here’s the thing: If you are actively fighting this sin in your daily spiritual walk, one day at a time, with your pastor or mentors or church and in confessional fellowship with others — then you’re doing something about it. Even messaging me is a step in the right way.  You’re already moving towards Him.

You must please allow yourself some grace and time on this.  These addictive patterns of sin have been your comforts for a while: so breaking free requires your full weight upon the Holy Spirit and the process will be just as painful as an amputation.  Be drastic.  Find replacement behaviors while working on your heart with the Lord.  Don’t let anyone tell you it’s “legalism,” because as I’ve said before, effort is NOT legalism.

Each day, your resolve will grow stronger as you pursue Him.  You’ll continually leave behind the corpse of your old self as you put on the new self.  If you fall, keep going. 

If you doubt your own growth, then I have a simple question —

Can you tell if a moon is waxing or waning? You’d have to look at it over a period of days before you could see it growing or shrinking. Right now, you are the waxing moon. You are growing. You are making the choice in submission to Christ to overcome this sin and reflect His Glory. If I could, I’d give you a high five. I don’t want you to see this as an affirmation to relax, but rather an encouragement to push you forward. Keep fighting the good fight on this.

To close out, I will once again shamelessly quote myself:

The Christian life is your whole life. That sin which keeps defeating you has more roots than you think, and God is patient to work in you for the surgery. Our journey of faith is a growing process of fits and starts, aches and pains, highs and lows, bliss and blisters. Jesus is going to take you all the way home on this: just keep leaning in with the full weight of your weary, desperate soul. He will catch you, always.

— J.S.

Question: I’m A Lying Cussing Smoking Sinner — Am I Still Saved?

Anonymous asked:

Hi. I know you get this a lot. Am I saved? I faced my sinful life and confessed to God. I know and believe Christ is God, came in flesh to fulfill the Law and atone for my (and everyone’s) sin. He died, rose again, and ascended. It is finished. My faith is a unmerited gift of His Grace. I want more than fire insurance. I want to know and feel Him, and do those “greater works”. But sh*t, I keep cussing, lying, lusting, smoking, gossiping, blah, blah blah. Help!

Thank you for your honesty here.  Sometimes I get questions like this that are really asking, “Can I be saved and still act like I used to?” — as if they’re reaching for some excuse to have both Jesus and everything else.  If that’s you, gut check your motives.

But in your question I really feel the earnest sincerity in wanting Jesus most.  It sounds like you really want to be this Authentic Christian but you keep getting stuck at Square One.  Your thought process might go: I thought I was doing better on this sanctification thing but then I let slip one of the bad curse words and I talked about this dude too long and I fell to porn for the millionth time and I went to the gas station but ended up with these cigarettes.

In other words, you’re basing your spiritual progress on everything that’s gone “wrong.”  If we all quantified our Christian-walk like that, then none of us would be saved.  Period.

Please allow me to share a quick childhood story: When I was a kid, I had to breathe on a medical machine for a certain amount of time everyday.  I was a sickly child and my lungs were not fully developed.  I had bouts of asthma and chronic bronchitis and was near death a few times.  The machine kept me just functioning.

My dad, being a ninth degree black belt, kicked my butt to exercise and eat right.  Eventually I got off the breathing machine and started winning trophies at tournaments. Today I’m a fifth degree black belt, I can jump kick over your head, and I can kill you in two moves.  But occasionally, I’m still short of breath and I get sick very easily.  I have never run over a mile in my life.  And I’m allergic to almost everything.

Sometimes people tell me, “Why you get sick so much?  Why you so allergic to everything?”  And I tell them, “You should’ve seen where I used to be.”  I explain about the breathing machine, the asthma, the trophies, and my two-move exploding throat technique.  From where I was to where I am, it’s a pretty big leap.

Maybe you’re way further along than you thought you were.  Every blip and spurt of righteousness in your life is nothing short of a supernatural God-made miracle, because naturally in our own fleshly skin, we’re incapable of True Good.  Before you met Jesus, you didn’t even care about trying to live right or to make a difference or to help people — and if you did care, it was motivated by self-promotion, image maintenance, social standards, and Darwin-esque survival. 

But after Jesus, you have the reason of No-Reason, because now you’re lit up by a Person who out of his own initiated love dared to die in your place on the cross and put His Holy Spirit in you to live out your true calling: which is to love him and love others without expecting anything back.  You’re re-created with a new heart to care about what God cares about, and the Father is proud even of your stumbles.  Any step forward into your purpose is like the birth of a new life: it is momentous, surprising, awesome, and worth celebrating. 

The very fact that you’re questioning your own salvation is a good thing, because you care.  The Devil will speak through false preachers and ignorant believers by making you doubt that you “have it” — when even logically, you don’t ever have it.  God has you.  True assurance is knowing the object of our faith, not our degree of it.  God keeps working through you: and if at times you feel that your faith is a very tenuous, intermittent, strobe-light sort of walk, then welcome to Authentic Christianity.  God is strong; humans are weak.  God works; humans fail.  Praise God then, yeah?

In that giant gap between who you want to be and who you really are, every other religion (including the evangelical church) tells you to “close the gap.”  That’s religion. 

Jesus is the only one who said, “I will meet you where you are.  I am running backwards through the gap to YOU.  And we will walk this together, one step at a time, me in the lead, and I will always be with you whether you feel me or not.”  Faith is being more and more sure of this reality — it is NOT being more sure that you’re sinning less.  It is not just running from sin, but running to Him.

You’ll find that the less you focus on trying to be better, you’ll automatically get better.  The less you have a morbid introspection of your failures, the more you can look towards the Only Perfection.  I’ve said it before: A Christian is a work in progress looking towards the work finished, Jesus. Stumble after him.  Don’t think you have to run this marathon in one day.  Sooner or later, you’ll be moving from trauma to trophies.  Celebrate the small victories.  Even then, be humble to recognize it’s all His work.

Question: When God Says, “You There Just Stop It”

Anonymous asked:

Paused. Can’t move past: She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “I do not condemn you, either. Go. From now on sin no more.” (John 8:11) Is Our Lord commanding, suggesting, hoping that the forgiven ‘stop sinning’?

I get this sort of question a lot, most simply: “If I’m forgiven, why should I obey God?”  This will require a little heavy theological lifting.

When God did that crazy miracle for us called forgiveness and covered all our brokenness with His grace — He also tells us about a better life. 

God not only absolutely loves you, but He wants to lead you.  Because after all, He made you and He knows how you work.  His commands are an eternal vision for your whole life.

When you hear the word “command,” immediately most of us think of restrictions or “you-should/you-have-to” or nonsensical demands. But God’s Law is ultimately for our good (Romans 7:12) and to give you joy.  There is no command that God gives which does not ultimately lead us into His Glory.

In case you never heard that in church before, here are the words of Jesus:

¹⁰ If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. ¹¹ I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. — John 15:10-11

God does not merely aim for you to be forgiven — though that’s a huge awesome act in itself — but He also wants to set you free to experience His fullness.  It’s for you to walk in the Fully Forgiven Life.

When Jesus told the adulteress, “Go and sin no more,” we can miss the subtlety of this exchange.  Think of this woman’s mind right now: she was about to be stoned to death naked in the middle of the street, and her life has literally just been saved.  This man Jesus, claiming to be the Son of God, rescues her out of a very bad situation. 

Do you think she would crawl back into her adultery?  I doubt it.  Because of her gratitude towards Jesus, she would not only follow the Savior, but the Master.  Jesus has now become Lord.  This woman has been forgiven but also beckoned to the true purpose of her life: to love Jesus and love others. 

Maybe she stumbled a bit in the beginning, like we all do.  Maybe her past came to haunt her sometimes.  There was probably all kinds of talk in the town for as long as she lived.  But I don’t think she cared.  She never got over the moment that Jesus interrupted her life with grace, and even when it got hard, she knew better to keep pursuing him.  Not out of human obligation, but a thankful, tenderized, captivated heart.

There are days though when it’s difficult to feel God’s love, and when I’m beat up by life and I want to act out and retaliate and go nuts, sometimes all I have are those simple Bible commands keeping me together.  In my head I know God gave me commands for my good, so I follow them even (especially) when I don’t feel like it. 

I don’t think that’s legalistic at all.  We’re human beings, susceptible to moods and persuasion and quick changes, and God gave us an entire arsenal to live out this daily struggle. God’s Love should always be the foundation, but sometimes just obeying Him despite ourselves gets us back to the place where we remember: God is good.

I’m sure some days that spiritual warfare and emotions and public pressure were too much, and the adulterous woman wanted to cave into her old lifestyle.  In those lowest moments, probably all she had were those commands.  It’s okay to just obey sometimes without feeling it.  It’s not great to make that a regular habit, but the Christian life isn’t always so “feel-able” in our day-to-day walk. 

When it’s toughest, it’s cool to lean completely in on God’s grace and tell Him, “I just don’t feel this today.  I know you’re good, I know your ways are best, but this is insanely hard.”  You’ll find that the power to do what God commands also comes from God.  He really is that good.

Also read:

- God’s Commands: Why Follow Them?

- The Christian: A Broken Person Who Meets Jesus

Question: How To Be Accountable On Accountability

Anonymous asked:

hello. someone asked me to be their accountability partner, because we are both struggling with the same kinds of things. i guess i am having second thoughts because 1. we are both struggling terribly and i guess i’m selfish and may want a mentor type person 2. they think i’m “further” in seeking God with these issues than i am and 3. to be honest, this kind of commitment scares me, which is prob a good thing bc of the challenge to complacency. Any advice for having an accountability partner?

My friend, first of all, a round of high fives for getting serious about your struggle and seeking accountability.  You’re doing the right thing and you made an awesome first step.  You can’t see me but I’m giving a big double thumbs up (right at my laptop).

I’d like to point to a couple posts on accountability also:

So About Accountability And Confession

The Danger of Accountability

While I am all for holding each other accountable, the truth is that it rarely works when you grab someone and say, “Hey man, for the love of God please keep me accountable …!”  It might work even less if that person is still struggling with the same thing.  It’s too easy then to let each other off the hook.  That’s why AA meetings have a mix of struggling people with mentors and leaders and ex-alcoholics: you need to know every side and not just one.

Accountability always grows out of an established friendship that has been built on truth.  It can’t really be the other way around.  While this person has good intentions to seek you out, and while it is possible it could work, you should consider 1) becoming friends with this person first, and 2) having an older mentor for both of you, together or separately. I know how hard both of those things can be, but real accountability will flourish if you’re seeking it organically.

Friendship is the priority.  If y’all are only talking about sin, sin, sin, you’ll begin to get terrified of having to meet up this person whether it’s a season of victory or failure.  Even my own mentor hangs out with me on a ratio of 2:1 for every time we meet privately.  He wants me to know his friends, be comfortable at his place, to see what he does.  That makes the actual meetings even better. Sometimes his best teaching is when I watch how he handles things. 

If someone were to ask me, “Do you have an accountability partner?” — almost always I reply, “No.  My friends keep me accountable.”  I don’t assign the task to anyone.  It just happens.  Man, does it happen.

If a person is only for accountability, the human heart naturally has a way of becoming judgmental, hyper-critical, and hyper-aware of shortcomings.  It gets really morbid and turns away from Jesus pretty quickly.  It becomes this weird sin-glorifying story hour of self-pity and secretly thrilling confessions.  People have become addicted to recovery groups for that reason.

You might want to ask this person, “Do you just want to hang out like two normal human beings?”  Eventually the permission to rebuke will flow naturally if you both become comfortable with each other.  It won’t become a contest of religious nitpicking nannies.  It’ll become a promotion of each others’ growth towards Jesus.

Don’t worry if you decide this person is not right to keep you accountable.  It’s possible they’re not for now.  But it’s very possible this person could be an awesome friend, and out of that can spring forth a friendship that encourages, builds up, affirms, and gently rebukes.  Be committed to your friend, not the discipline.  Please don’t be in a rush for it; it’ll be worth your investment.  Do seek a mentor, too.  And don’t only run from your sin; run towards Him.

Question: I Can’t Just “Love You The Way You Are” — Right?

Anonymous asked:

“We are not loving people when we’re telling them that God accepts them as they are without repentance, because we’re lying to them.” What does that mean exactly?

I see you quoted a famous theologian (whose name I left out), and I see what he’s saying.  He is being very careful to convey a Holy God who does not tolerate sin, who must uphold justice, and who requires broken on-your-knees repentance.  Or — he is just trying not to upset the doctrine-police.

I might have said something like this a few years ago.  It’s a very aggressive, preach-to-the-choir, sounds-good-on-paper slogan.  I get it: our sin is bad.  God hates sin.  Okay, check.  Am I done being doctrinally sound for the sake of avoiding the heresy label?  Should I be so afraid of Neo-Reformed bloggers that I must blindly agree with all similar statements? 

And really, this is only one quote that I could be taking out of context, so it’s only a small fraction of this theologian’s thoughts.  But by itself, it portrays such a measly, puny God.  I do know guys who preach like this without a single ounce of Christlike love in their heart for people.

My friend, the truth is: God does love you and accepts you and desires to be with you exactly as you are.  Yeah, I know.  Scary, right?  Nervous?  Do I sound antinomian?  Maybe you’re waiting for But even though He loves you  … 

The problem we have with God’s grace is that it’s all grace.  That makes us uncomfortable, and I understand that.  Our hearts are naturally built on legalism.  Everyone feels like they should do something to get something, so we contort God’s grace into a manageable legalistic machine filled with daily QT routines and spiritual progress charts and how-to-avoid-sin and religious busy-ness.  Nothing is inherently wrong with these things until they forfeit God Himself.

God’s love is NOT dependent on how you perform or even how you repent.  Changing your behavior doesn’t get God and we don’t get God by changing our behavior.  His love for you is constant.  One of my favorite verses is Jeremiah 31:3 — I have loved you with an everlasting love.  As in eternally.  Forever.  Always been the same. 

SO: Once you really encounter the love of God, it’s impossible to stay the same.  The Gospel — Jesus’ perfect life on earth, undeserved death on the cross, and his resurrection from the grave — always tenderizes us into the people we were created to be.  His love explodes our hearts.

I often tell my church people who are struggling, “God loves you, and He’s going to keep loving you to a better place.”  Repentance itself could only ever be possible when we recognize the magnitude of God’s love for us through His Son Jesus.  It’s never the other way around, or else it’s not repentance.

So please hear, my dear friend, that God loves you no matter what.  His love preempted your rejection, failure, and contempt.  His love embraces your future disobedience, too.  Look no further than the Bible “heroes” and you’ll see it.  Nothing you do can change God’s heart towards you.  He is not going to time-warp His Son off the cross.  His love is the battering ram on your sin.  It’s that very unchanging heart of God which will lead you to a changed heart.  And as tough as it is, it’s also the same way we are called to love each other.  No one is the exception with God; no one can be the exception with us, either.

 A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.

— John 13:34-35