He was so proud of it.  The lines were right, the joints fitted, the wood finished to a glow.  The boat drafted better than any other and its beauty inspired use.  He could remember it now looking at the vessel before him.  Where had the beauty gone?  The years had worn it so slowly he hadn’t even noticed.  Now weathered, dull and leaking, the boat’s original beauty was only a faint remembrance…

Growing up in the church a lot of time was spent on two categories of sin, namely sins of commission, those things God tells us not to do but we do anyway, and sins of omission or those things God tells us to do but we ignore.  These are important categories but with a warning:  if we focus on a checklist of things we should and should not do, we by our nature grow to rely on OUR goodness and not on God’s.  Jesus clearly stated over and over that his disciples would become children of God and be consumed with a relationship with God through him.

Jesus replied: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ Matthew 22:37(NIV)

How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! John 3:1(NIV)

Over and over the Word of God explains Christians are about relationship not rules.  Our obedience (omitted and committed) is because we love God and value His presence in our lives.  We want to please Him.  Because of this, I believe there is a far more dangerous category of sin, attrition.  Attrition is any activity that causes a slow drift away from our relationship with God.  The dangerous thing is that it can take the form of just about anything, including religion.  Sometimes seemingly harmless activities over a lifetime (or less!) lead us to a point we are separated from God and don’t even recognize it until it’s too late.

We must pay more careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away. Hebrews 2:1 (NIV)

The writer of Hebrews provides the Jewish recipients a word picture of a boat that slowly drifts away from the shore. Being a nautical culture the image of the boat surely provoked a quick understanding of the danger of failing to carefully hold firmly to the gospel.  Sidney Dekker in his book, The Field Guide to Understanding Human Error describes a similar concept:

[The mismatch between procedures and practice] can grow over time, increasing the gap between how a system was designed (or imagined) and how it actually works.  This is called practical drift:  the slow, incremental departure from initial written guidance on how to operate a system (161)

Drift in an organization is a condition where departures from the routine become routine.  Exactly the danger of sins of attrition, our ungodly behavior becomes routine and “normal” in our minds.  This is why trying to “fit in” with the world is so dangerous to Christians.  What the world considers normal are activities that place joy and comfort in everything but God.  Anything we put our trust in or find spiritual comfort in other than God is an idol (a separate discussion).

So how can religion be a sin?  Consider a person who religiously attends church every Sunday morning for 50 years but at the end of his life displays no fruits of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22) in his life.  The relationship he started with God has been replaced by the ritual of a routine.  His comfort is in the ritual, not God.  Perhaps he was never taught or truly believed in the saving grace and Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ.  More likely, after 2600 Sunday sermons, the message was received but lost on the ritual.

As a teenager, a period of my spiritual development was spent looking for loopholes in the Bible.  When my parents forbid an activity I would frequently plead, “But the Bible doesn’t specifically say we can’t do that.”  There is real danger anytime we use those words because it reduces God to a checklist.  For parents facing this question I recommend teaching and modeling a relationship with God.  Children who understand the relationship will be more likely to know that EVERYTHING we do either builds it or breaks it down.

If you believe that everything we do builds or breaks our relationship with God then everything is under scrutiny.  Take a moment and consider if your job, hobbies, routines, family, faith tradition, or anything is causing you to drift away from God.  The beautiful thing is God will always welcome you back.  That’s why we love Him so much.

The Practical Christian by Greg Chaney is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.

Photo by Leslie James Chatfield (Brighton and Hove) http://www.flickr.com/photos/elsie/3585565075/

Miscellaneous information:

Definition:

at·tri·tion noun, Latin attrition-, attritio, from atterere to rub against, from ad- + terere to rub
1 [Middle English attricioun, from Medieval Latin attrition-, attritio, from Latin] : sorrow for one’s sins that arises from a motive other than that of the love of God
2 : the act of rubbing together  also : the act of wearing or grinding down by friction
3 : the act of weakening or exhausting by constant harassment, abuse, or attack
4 : a reduction in numbers usually as a result of resignation, retirement, or death

Other references to “Sins of Attrition”
Colossians 2:6-8 Stand strong, do not be taken captive
Ephesians 4:17-19 Darkened thinking will separate us from God
Ephesians 4:26 Do not give the devil a foothold (foothold in climbing = secure step for continued climbing).
Ephesians 5:15-17 Be careful how we live – make the most of every opportunity
James 3:3-12 The tongue set the course for the whole body
James 3:13-18 Envy and Selfish ambition = disorder and every evil practice
James 4:4-5 Friends with the world = Enemies of God

How Does the Bible Define Sin?  Scott Ashley
One of the insidious things about compromise is that it spreads. If we get away with something once, we find it much easier to try it again next time. Compromise grows like a cancer. It comes on slowly, then spreads. Before you know it you can be in a fight for your spiritual life. That is why God says that, if our actions aren’t done in faith or according to faith, if they violate our conscience, we are sinning.

Sin (Easton’s 1897 Bible Dictionary)
Sin is “any want of conformity unto or transgression of the law of God” (1 John 3:4; Rom. 4:15), in the inward state and habit of the soul, as well as in the outward conduct of the life, whether by omission or commission (Rom. 6:12-17; 7:5-24). It is “not a mere violation of the law of our constitution, nor of the system of things, but an offence against a personal lawgiver and moral governor who vindicates his law with penalties. The soul that sins is always conscious that his sin is (1) intrinsically vile and polluting, and (2) that it justly deserves punishment, and calls down the righteous wrath of God. Hence sin carries with it two inalienable characters, (1) ill-desert, guilt (reatus); and (2) pollution (macula).” Hodge’s Outlines.

Other Relationship Reference:
John 3:16 God loves us
Romans 5:1-11 We are reconciled [Reconcile:  to restore to friendship or harmony]
Colossians 1:21-22 We are holy [Holy:  exalted or worthy of complete devotion as one perfect in goodness and righteousness; having a divine quality; venerated as or as if sacred]
I Peter 2:9-12 We belong to God
Matthew 22:37 Love God with all our hearts (The greatest command)

Sin References
Romans 5:12-14 Adam brought sin into the world
Romans 3:9-20 We ALL are sinners
Acts 7:60 God holds sins against sinners
Matthew 6:14-15 Sins against each other
Mark 9:42-50 Sin can be caused in others
Luke 17:1-5  Woe to those that bring sin