Have you noticed how many things are personalized these days? I saw an advertisement the other day for a personalized rolling pin. I’m not talking about those that are decorative with your family name on it. I’m talking about one that you can use to spell out special messages on the cookies you serve to your guests.
Don’t get me wrong, I think some of these things are really cool ideas. I remember on Shark Tank being excited about the pitch from a company who would make a stuffed animal of your child’s drawing. I, for one, believe the world needs more rainbow-colored-unicorn-frog-pigs. If they weren’t about as expensive as a second car, I’d consider purchasing one for our kids.
And even though I can’t seem to train them to stop playing heretical and weird worship songs, I still love my personalized radio stations on Spotify. I like personalization because it means I don’t have to deal with stuff that I don’t like. I insulate myself away from a world which disagrees with me. I can pretend l like I really am the helmsman of my destiny—complete with a personalized ship’s wheel, of course. I love personalization because it feeds the myth that I’m unique and I’m in control.
I’m trying to transition into making a point here about how our narcissistic culture shapes our view of sin. But, I’m really not sure what point I want to make. Part of me wants to say something like, “We are even personalizing our sin”. And if I go down that path I’m going to be making some sort of point about how we believe we’ve been given unique permission to engage in certain sins. “This is just the way I am”. Or even to label ourselves according to our sinful propensities (“I’m a gay Christian”) instead of the way the Bible does. But I don’t think I’m going down that path. I want to make a different point.
Our narcissism seems to pull up short of personalizing our sin. We don’t like to own it. It isn’t ours. It belongs to someone else. Our success—now that’s mine. (Of course, some still like to give a hat tip to ‘the man upstairs’ or some other vague reference). But my sin?!?!?…nope that doesn’t have my name stamped on it.
I’m not just talking about unbelievers either. Our view of grace and how it relates to our divided self often takes a turn which makes us a bit too close to the heretics spoken of in 1 John. They had a view of the body which believed everything spiritual was good and everything physical was evil. This led them to conclude that they didn’t really have sin in their life because it wasn’t connected to who they actually are—spirit beings.
Contemporary believers say very similar sounding things as it relates to our being a new creation. And I suppose there is a very real sense in which the sins which we commit are to be attributed to the old man and not to the new man. But I believe we are taking this a doctrine a bit far if we are found to not personalize and own up to our sin. We’ve gone astray if we pretend like it doesn’t belong to us or to our account. Yes, our fundamental identity is wrapped up in Christ. When we stand before the Lord it will be his account which is credited to us as righteousness—but let’s not pretend that we won’t be bring a very deplorable record on that day as well.
But that anger…it’s yours. Own it. That lust which crops up in your heart…own it. You cannot slay fictitious and un-owned sin. It is our sin which must be mortified. We are told to be to death what is earthly in us. Stamp your name on it just like you’d stamp it on those $35 customized shoe laces. And when you do own up to it—run to Jesus in all of your brokenness and personalized shame. And find in Him the only identity which is lasting and deserves to be stamped on everything.
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