Proposition 2: Sin Is Odious

Proposition. II.

Sin is a most odious thing. Iniquity is hateful: men ought to hate every sin. They have infinite reason so to do. For,

1. Sin is contrary to the holy nature and perfect will of God. They that have any love to God, cannot but hate sin. You that love the Lord hate evil (Psalm 97:10). There is no sin whatever, but it is an evil committed against God: and is indeed a greater wrong to God than any one else. A man by sin may wrong himself and his neighbor very much, but he is most injurious to God. David had grievously sinned against Uriah and Bathsheba, and against his own body and soul; yet he said to God, against you, you only have I sinned (Psalm 51:4). Sin is high treason against the eternal Majesty. God is holiness itself (Amos 4:2). The Lord God has sworn by his holiness: he never swears by anything less than himself. But sin is unholiness, sinners are called the unholy: so then sin is contrary to the nature of God. He cannot sin: it is impossible that he should (Hebrews 6:18). He can no more sin than he can cease to be God: nor can he be the approver or the author of sin (Habakkuk 1:13). You are of purer eyes than to behold evil, and [illegible] on iniquity. He cannot look on [illegible] with approbation or without [illegible]. Hence James speaks as in the [illegible] chapter and thirteenth verse of his Epistle, Let no man say when he is tempted I am tempted of God, for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempts he any man. Neither is there any sin, but it is contrary to the [illegible] will of God. Every sin is a transgression of his law (1 John 3:4). There is not the least sinful word or thought but the divine law condemns it. A sinner and a transgressor of the law are the same. A sinner does practically declare that the law of God is no good law: he tramples it under foot, he casts it behind his back. Sin is therefore a hateful and a horrible thing (Jeremiah 5:30). An horrible thing has been committed in the land. Did men know what an evil sin is, the thoughts of it would strike them with horror and dread.

2. Sin makes those that love and live in it to become odious. Therefore it must needs be the hatefulest evil that can be thought of. It has caused some of the most excellent creatures that ever were made, to become hateful and abhorred. This is true concerning the angels that sinned: they were once among the sons of God, the morning stars shouting for joy (Job 38:7). The morning star is a lovely creature. Sin has turned angels of light into devils of darkness; morning stars into the darkness of hell. It may be said of hell, as the Scripture speaks of Rome (Revelation 18:2), it is become the habitation of devils, the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird. The devils who are compared to fowls in the air, are hateful birds. Sin has made them to be the most hateful creatures in the world; and next to sin we ought to hate the devil, and to have no communion with him. But how odious an evil is sin then! It makes men also to become the objects of hatred (Titus 3:3). We were sometimes hateful, that is worthy to be hated of God and man. Hence sinners are said to be filthy (Psalm 14:3): they are altogether become filthy. And to be loathsome (Proverbs 13:5): a wicked man is loathsome and comes to shame. And to be abominable (Titus 1:15): being abominable and disobedient and to every good work reprobate. Sin makes men odious in the eyes of God (Psalm 5:5): you hate all workers of iniquity. The Lord abominates them (Deuteronomy 25:16): all that do unrighteously are an abomination to the Lord your God. Yes, sinners do by wickedness make themselves odious to good men (Proverbs 29:27): an unjust man is an abomination to the just. An holy man does not delight in the conversation of ungodly ones: they speak such words, and do such works as are grievous and abominable to his [illegible]. It is said concerning Lot, that he was [illegible] with the filthy conversation of the wicked; that righteous man dwelling [illegible] them, seeing and hearing vexed his righteous soul from day to day with their unlawful deeds (2 Peter 2:7-8). Ungodly wretches out of whose mouths proceed corrupt communications, that delight in filthy obscene discourse, that will revile the saints of God, scoff at religion, curse and swear, and profane the blessed name of God, a good man hates to be in their company. Your enemies take your name in vain: do not I hate them O Lord that hate you, and am not I grieved with those that rise up against you; I hate them with perfect hatred, I count them mine enemies (Psalm 139:20-21)? If sin does make those that live in it thus hateful to God and good men, it must needs be a most odious thing.

3. Sin makes men miserable. And it is therefore a hateful thing. Men hate to be miserable, but then let them hate sin the procuring cause of all their miseries. Jer. 2:17, 19. Have you not procured this to your self — Your own wickedness shall correct you, and your backslidings shall reprove you, know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter that you have forsaken the Lord your God, and that my fear is not in you, says the Lord God of hosts. All temporal judgments are the bitter fruit of sin. There are public calamities, which cause lamentation generally throughout a whole land which suffers under the weight of them; such as wars, famines, pestilential and wasting diseases which leave great desolations behind them. These are procured by sin (Micah 1:8). For the transgression of Jacob is all this, and for the sins of the house of Israel. There are judgments which fall upon particular families; sometimes a great family is brought to ruin: thus it was with the house of Jeroboam, Ahab and others whom we read of in Scripture; and it was sin that provoked the Lord to destroy them all. As for the man that shall do very wickedly, the Lord says, I will set my face against that man, and against his family and will cut him off (Leviticus 20:5). No, which is awful to consider, if a godly man shall through the power of temptation become guilty of a scandalous sin, it may be God to testify his holy displeasure at the sin of that good man will destroy all his family: what came on Gideon's numerous family after he was dead and his soul in Heaven? Because of their father's sin, threescore and ten persons of them were murdered in one day. Gideon made an Ephod, and that became a ruining snare to his house. We have another sad instance for this in Eli: a good old man, but very sinfully indulgent to his children: the Lord said concerning him, Behold I will do a thing in Israel, at which both the ears of every one that hears it shall tingle: in that day I will perform against Eli all things which I have spoken concerning his house (1 Samuel 3:12). This was fulfilled in the days of Saul, to whose bloody malice David (as I told you but now) seems to allude in the text and context before us. [illegible] being commissioned by Saul, fell upon the priests, and slew in that day fourscore and five persons that did wear a linen Ephod: and Nob the city of the priests smote he with the edge of the sword, both men and women, children and suckling (1 Samuel 22:18, 19). Thus did God perform against Eli the thing which He had spoken concerning his family: and doubtless when this was first done, it made the ears of them that heard of it to tingle. Again, there are personal judgments, which sin is wont to bring with it. Men are exposed to sufferings in bodies, names, estates, none of which would ever have been, if they had not sinned. Isaiah 42:24. Who gave Jacob for a spoil, and Israel to the robbers, did not the Lord, He against whom we have sinned. Though afflictions are sent for other causes, and not for sin only, as we see in that instance of the man that was born blind (Job 9:3), nevertheless, it is certain, that sin is the parent of all sorrow: if men had never sinned, they would never have known sorrow: nor did ever any man in the world suffer any thing, but either his own or other men's sins were the procuring cause of it. Temporal death is also the bitter fruit of sin (Romans 5:12). By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. Sin has opened the door to let in death upon all the world. Men hate death, but they have more reason to hate sin. There are moreover spiritual judgments, which sin is the woeful cause of; judgments that light immediately on the souls of men, and which are indeed the most fearful; though sinners themselves are for the present the least sensible of them: a blind mind is a dreadful judgment. John 9:39. Jesus said, for judgment am I come into this world, that they which see might be made blind. Natural blindness is a sore calamity, but spiritual blindness is incomparably a greater evil. As sight is a great mercy, but spiritual eyesight a far greater blessing. One of the martyrs said to a pious blind youth, that was cast into prison for the Gospel sake, Alas! poor child, God has taken from you your bodily eyesight, Himself knows best why He has done it. But He has given you a far better sight, He has given you an eye of faith to behold the Lord Jesus Christ. So spiritual blindness is a thousand times worse than that which is of the body only. Yet this misery has sin brought upon us: every man in his natural estate, has a soul within him as dark as Hell (2 Peter 1:9). He is blind and cannot see [illegible]. Adam's sin has brought that misery of spiritual blindness upon all his children: and they do by actual sins of their own provoke God to smite them with yet greater blindness: their foolish heart is darkened, and God has given them over to a reprobate mind. Hardness of heart is a spiritual judgment: no greater judgment can befall a poor creature out of Hell, than to be given up to sin without remorse for it. The more men sin, the more are they hardened and emboldened in sin, until they have filled up the measure of their iniquity. This is a dismal effect of sin, and of the fiercest wrath of God for it. Well therefore might the Apostle give that solemn caution, Take heed, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin (Hebrews 3:12, 13). Especially, if men sin against the clear light of their own consciences, they provoke the Lord to smite them with judicial blindness of mind and hardness of heart. There was a man who fighting a duel killed his adversary, for which murder he was in great [illegible] of conscience; after that he killed another man, then was his trouble less; after that he did in the same way murder a third man, until he had killed seven or eight, and then he had no remorse at all for his bloody crimes. I could [illegible] you of another who having made himself drunk, was in grievous horror of conscience for his sin, but when in despite of these convictions he did commit the same sin again, he was never after that [illegible] for what he had done, but lived and died a drunken sot. Here now was the [illegible] wrath of God, punishing a sinner with everlasting hardness of heart. And thus sin unrepented of brings the sinner to eternal ruin. Have not men cause to hate that which will not only hurt them, but ruin them, and that for ever? This sin without repentance and faith in Jesus Christ will certainly do. No, one sin will do it. [illegible] therefore God has said, Repent and turn yourselves from all your transgressions, so iniquity shall not be your ruin (Ezekiel 18:30). One sin not turned from will prove the eternal ruin of a man's soul: will not then his iniquity be found to be hateful?

Sin has brought a curse on the whole earth, and upon all the creatures which are in it. It was said to Adam presently after he had sinned, Cursed be the ground for your sake (Genesis 3:17). Every creature which men have to do with has a curse attending it because of sin, so as that they are liable to destruction thereby. The earth, the water, the air, or any creature therein may cause a man's death. This curse has sin brought: yes, and all the living creatures in this visible world are become miserable by reason of the sins of men, which misery they sigh under and long to be delivered from. We know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain, because it is made subject to vanity, and to the bondage of corruption. The sin of man has procured all this (Romans 8:21, 22). By these things we see that sin is almost a hateful evil.