“Why can’t I grow in my faith? I go to church. I do Bible study. I pray from time to time. I don’t get it. I try but my spiritual growth remains the same.”
Sound familiar? Maybe you haven’t just heard something similar, maybe you have said it yourself. “Why can’t I grow in my faith?”
This is the fourth article in this series that explores seven key reasons you can’t have the faith you want and what to do about it. Here’s a quick refresher in case you missed the previous three.
- You are afraid of succeeding.
- You are afraid of failing.
- You don’t know how.
None of these are deal breakers. Solutions exist that can help you have the faith you want.
In this article, we are going to be brutally honest. The fourth reason you can’t have the faith you want can hurt. But, if you are going to get beyond it, you have to face the truth.
Poor Sin Awareness
The fourth reason you can’t have the faith you want is because your sin awareness is horrible. In other words, you have sin in your life, you know it, but you don’t do anything about it. Instead, you rationalize your actions, you shrug it off as modern culture, or worse, you prefer your sin over growing in your faith.
Yes. That stings. I know. But if you don’t have the faith you want, it could be the very reason you don’t. Let’s break it down a bit.
First, we have to understand that sin is sin. If we were to create a list of sins, the list would be endless. But let’s create a brainstorm list to help us consider sin in general. Here are some sins that might spark some thought about what might be keeping you from growing in your faith.
- You like to gossip. You don’t mean to but just can’t seem to pull yourself out of a gossiping conversation. Your too worried about what your friends might think and after all, it’s a juicy conversation.
- You lie a lot. You don’t mean to lie, but it’s like you open your mouth and out it comes. It doesn’t have to be about anything serious. You just do it.
- You watch movies and shows you probably shouldn’t be watching. But after all, that is what is on tv. Everyone else is talking about the show. It is what is trending. Odd thing is if your kid was to talk like the people on the show you are watching, you would stick a bar of soap in their mouth. (Not really. Ok, our ancestors certainly would.) You get the drift though. You certainly wouldn’t watch it in your church.
- Your eyes and your thoughts like to wander. Yeah, we are not talking about just being distracted here. We are talking about a bit of lust. Oh sure, if you are married, you wouldn’t ever do anything. But hey, you know the saying, “You can look but you just can’t touch.” Not so fast. Not sure Jesus would say that. In fact, what he said had everything to do about looking.
- You can find time for just about anything but reading your Bible and prayer. You spend hours surfing and scrolling through social media. You have your favorite media celebrities you follow. You simply enjoy watching one video after another after another. Oh, they are so funny or so interesting and you learn so much. Meanwhile, your Bible collects dust on the coffee table right next to you. By the time you think about reading your Bible, or praying, your eyes are so tired from looking at the screen that you just don’t feel like reading your Bible anymore. And, if you were to pray, you would fall asleep.
- You know more about your favorite football team, or all of sports, than you do about Jesus, or the Bible. Funny isn’t it, how you know those stats, but can’t name the books of the New Testament. Heck, there are people that can name actors at a moment’s glance, and all the movies they starred in, but can’t name the twelve disciples, much less the three that wrote a Gospel.
The point is that sin can often be that we are so caught up in this world that we no longer pay attention to our faith; or at a minimum, we don’t pay as much attention to our faith as we do to everything else. Yes, blatant sins exist. But often it is the subtle sins that we are not even aware of.
What do you do about it?
The first thing you must do is begin to take sin seriousness. You must stop making excuses. Just because it is popular or everyone else is doing it doesn’t make it okay. It is still a sin.
Second, you need to be honest with yourself. If you have a problem with a particular sin, get help. Help is what the church is for. Go to someone in your church, confess your sinfulness to them, ask them to help you, and ask them to hold you accountable.
Third, if this sin is connected with so called friends, you have two choices. Choice One: Ask your friends not to do that around you and tell them why. If they are truly your friends, they will quit. If they laugh at you or won’t stop, move to your next choice. Choice Two: Get new friends. These people are not your friends. Once again, I know that stings, but it is the truth.
Fourth, you must make your spiritual growth more important than the things in your life that are preventing you from growing in your faith: television shows, love of sports, personal interests. It doesn’t matter what it is, your relationship with Jesus must come first and to the extent that you are willing to put off things you wouldn’t do with Jesus.
You can have the faith you want but you are going to have to make choices. Jesus made it clear in the call to discipleship, you are going to have to choose. You cannot love God and the world. You must put the Kingdom of God first. Putting the Kingdom first also means being alert to sinfulness. Once you identify it, you avoid it and get it out of your life.
Do that, you will most likely grow in your faith. Starting with getting sin out of your life is certainly a start.
