Ephesians 5:12
“For it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret.”
When I was a boy, there was a time when candy cigarettes were the thing every child wanted. I remember asking my mother if I could have candy cigarettes only to hear her respond with an emphatic, “No!” I asked my mother why I couldn’t have candy cigarettes, and she said, “We don’t play sin in our house.” When other parents thought my parents were too strict, they understood that if you play sin, you will eventually try it for real.
God commands us in the verse above not to even “speak of those things which are done of them in secret.” God emphasizes this command in several other verses by telling us not to even touch that which is sin. He says in 2 Corinthians 6:17, “…touch not the unclean thing…” So, we are not to speak of sin or touch that which is wrong. It seems clear to me that God wants the Christian to stay as far away from sin as we can. He doesn’t want us to cozy up to sin and get used to it so that one day we partake of it and set in action the death that comes with it.
Why would God not want us to even speak about sin or touch it? God knows that sin is very patient. He knows that if we “speak of those things which are done…in secret” or touch it that it will begin to wear away our sensitivity to its danger. God knows that the more you speak of something, the more you get comfortable with it. Friend, God doesn’t want us to get comfortable with sin. God wants sin to be so distasteful to the Christian that even the mention of it makes us uncomfortable. If you never talk about those things that are done in secret, or if you never touch that which is wrong, you will never have your senses seared to the nastiness of sin.
Every parent needs to take inventory of their conversations and determine if they need to remove some words from their vocabulary. Parents should be hypersensitive about what they see on the television. You may think that I’m going too far, but if your children never see sin, they will never partake of it. Parents, when you see your children playing sinful acts in the home, stop it immediately. Just like my mother told me we don’t play sin in our home, you also should make this the rule in your household.
Moreover, every pastor needs to be careful about portraying sin to their people. I’m afraid in our attempt to use the shock factor of sin to get someone’s attention we desensitize people as to sin’s vileness. NEVER portray people drinking alcohol in a play to your people. NEVER allow sin to be something that your people get accustomed to seeing. As a pastor, it is your responsibility to be sure that sin is portrayed as ugly as you can portray it. Don’t fall into the Devil’s trap of portraying it just to prove a point. If you want to prove a point, show the result of sin. Instead of showing the bar scene, show the drunkard living on skid row. Instead of playing the rock music and showing the rock videos, tell about the end of those who have lived that life. You may have innocent motives in portraying sin, but the Devil will use it to desensitize the Christian.
Let’s not be guilty of playing sin. Instead, make sin sound as ugly as it really is. Always remember that every time you play sin or display it you are desensitizing others to its nastiness. Let’s keep sin as nasty as we can by not speaking of it or touching those things that are involved with sin.