Nena Arias | May 14, 2020
There is a deadly virus that has been around a lot longer than any other virus known to man. It is the worst virus of all in the history of mankind. It is worse than any plague ever known to the human race even those that have killed tens of millions of people and the equivalence of the entire population of a nation. For example, the Black plague, also known as the Black Death, which killed 50 million people in the 14th century, or 60 per cent of Europe’s entire population. The deadly Black Death disease spread across Europe in the years 1346-53. 7 years of deadly scourge.
When we talk about the original deadly virus, every human being that has ever lived, is living and will ever live is already infected with it by the time they are born. In other words, it infects 100% of all humans. There is no immunity or hope of not becoming infected by it, no one escapes. It is the original deadly virus that only has one solution.
As you have probably already guessed, the virus I am talking about is sin.
You can try to fight against it on your own strength and put forth your best effort to conquer it, but it keeps coming back. You will not succeed in your own strength and it doesn’t matter if you are strong-willed and a very disciplined person. It is a disease of the heart that requires the masterful hand of our heavenly heart doctor to heal us.
Sin is governed by the laws of the kingdom of darkness. The effects of this virus of sin don’t only affect us here on earth but throughout all eternity if we do not heal from it here on earth.
How does sin work?
First of all, we are told that all have sinned. There is not one righteous. Not even the moralists who say, “I don’t hurt anyone.” Romans 3:23 says, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Ecclesiastes 7:20 “Surely there is no righteous man on earth who does good and never sins.”
No one is exempt from the infection of sin. Sin is a spiritual virus. It is the deadliest disease of the heart and Christ is the cure.
In the natural, it’s hard to function when you’re hampered by a virus. Your strength is zapped right out of you, you experience pain and discomfort of many kinds. When the flu season comes around each year people live in dread of getting this terrible virus, because the flu invades the whole body. Weakness sets in making it difficult to function or even rest. I was astonished to learn of how many thousands of people die each year from the devastating effects of the flu and its side effects. I had never paid attention to those numbers.
Our spirit experiences the same weakness and breakdown with the presence of sin. But we have the power to resist it. God told Cain, who killed his brother Abel, in Genesis 4:7 “…sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.”
The process of sin
There is a process to the development of sin before it becomes an action. No sin suddenly appears from one day to the next. This is of extreme importance to note. Those who want to justify their sin make excuses like “I’m sorry, it just happened”. Uh no, it didn’t just happen it was cultivated inside for quite some time. James 1:13-15: “Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.”
The full-blown symptoms of the virus of sin were already manifest in us and growing by leaps and bounds. There is a limit to the sin God will allow to grow.
Before the COVID-19 virus came to our shores the virus of sin was already here creating havoc. This virus is just brining to the forefront the effects of the virus of sin that need to be dealt with and that is more deadly than the coronavirus.
All over the world, people are concerned about the coronavirus — and rightly so. I was looking at a report of a very important minister of health in Zambia that died of the coronavirus and he was given a hero’s welcome back in his hometown as he was flown there by an air force plane. The mourners in attendance were greatly manifesting outward crying and wailing and the entire crowd had face masks on. I thought to myself, what strange times we are living. The entire world is wearing face masks right now. We have all been touched and are threatened by this deadly disease. No one is exempt from the danger.
Any threat to the physical health of so many needs to be taken very seriously. And for the most part it has been. More people are taking the common-sense steps necessary to contain the virus and to keep it from spreading.
Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the virus of sin was attacked with the same diligence? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if more men and women took their spiritual health just as seriously? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if more people were as concerned to keep their souls free from the “virus” of sin as they are to keep their bodies free from COVID-19? And wouldn’t it be wonderful if more people were as concerned with avoiding sin as they are with avoiding situations where they would be exposed to this virus?
The wonderful news is that God has made a way for us to be set free from sin’s control and if we should sin, he has given us an advocate to plead our case before the Righteous Judge of heaven to grant us forgiveness and deliver us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 2:1-2 (ESV) says, “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.”
It is extremely important we understand how sin works and how we can arrest it before it enslaves us.
We all know that our physical bodies will eventually die, regardless of how well we take care of them. But our souls will live on forever either with God or away from him never to have access to him again. We need to care of our soul zealously, which is why reconciliation with God is so essential for such a long-range blessing. As hard as it might be to believe, a clean soul is even more important than clean hands. That is the main issue that God is getting across to the entire world right now through this scourge called coronavirus. God is saying, clean up your act or face even more severe consequences!
The symptom of the virus of sin has been all around us for a long time and increasing and not much was being done about it. Most people just thought these are signs of a modern world and its evolving culture. We had a self-made virus of entitlement and laziness that had already infected millions. There is the merciless killing of the unborn (1.6 billion worldwide since 1980), the rampant dangers of pornography and drug abuse, the devastation of the institution of marriage and the family, thuggery, violence and debauchery, corrupt politics and a culture of lies, apostasy in the church, the violation of God’s holy Word everywhere you look. All this could not and should continue going in that direction.
With Americans and the entire world hunkering down at home due to the coronavirus pandemic, it can sometimes feel like the end of days and if we don’t repent before the Lord, it may just be the end for us anyway and only a few survivors will have to begin again with life. Because for a countless number of our folks, today’s struggle is hardly different from a miserable day-to-day existence and it’s all due to sin.
If you work in the school system or as a teacher, then you know what I am talking about. The kid who comes to class with incomplete homework, a bad attitude, and no respect for authority all due to the lack of proper formation and diligence at home.
The parents are hardly ever in the picture—they are not engaged in their child’s life or schooling. In fact, if you were to go to their house to talk to them, you might find them there yet totally oblivious to their full responsibility as parents.
In these trying times, we must turn to God and the only life manual in the history of the world that promises freedom and opportunity for guidance on knowing how to properly live life according to God’s design.
When we see homeless people walking the streets we often think they clearly have nothing. But more ominous is the condition of men, women, and, sadly, children, who go through life like zombies, living on automatic and not paying attention or wanting to know what true life should be about. No goals, no discipline, no positive influences, no inspiration, no hope and no true faith or respect for God.
This is the reality in today’s America and the world. Sin is never the focus of mainstream media. It’s the dark and desperate side of America that we want to pretend does not exist, but it sure does.
In Third World countries, you will see people living in abject poverty. But the emotional and spiritual poverty you encounter in America is worse because we are all blessed to live in a land of possibility and promise that rewards hard work and offers more opportunities for advancement than any nation yet we are more impoverished spiritually because we don’t see our true fallen condition. We are blinded by our prosperity. We continue to lie to ourselves and believe those lies.
So many of our neighbors squander the rich gifts placed before them, from God and by virtue of living in this country, opting instead to live off of government subsidies and merely get by in life.
Young people have very little or no true work ethic. They bounce from dead-end job to dead-end job, too busy thinking about their pleasure the next hit of marijuana, meth, or other poisons that they use to destroy their bodies and numb their minds. This is the pathetic situation of far too many of our youth.
Those stimulus checks will have little or no impact to better the lives of these people because their mind and values are in the wrong place. They live only to please themselves. The credit card companies will gobble up the dollars, taking a small bite out of the debt that most Americans carry over from one month to the next because old habits die hard. We have become a nation of slaves to lenders, and our refusal to live within our means. All this is due to the virus of sin and ignorance of God’s ways for a better life.
It may sound strange, but the coronavirus may even be good news to get people to take a good inventory of their lives spiritually, emotionally, physically and financially. Most are certainly having to scale down their indulgences and unnecessary spending and squandering that leaves them living at the edge from paycheck to paycheck. All this behavior should change to enjoy stress-free lives.
For those whose poverty is not just financial but also mental and spiritual, the coronavirus makes no difference whatsoever. It’ll just be another hurdle to jump over in their life’s book of misery. When you think you have nothing to live for, then it is very probable that Satan will lie to you and tell you that dying is a good option and deceives you into thinking that death will provide a reprieve from the daily pain of life. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Your misery will only increase by a trillion times a trillion with no end in sight. Yes, during this coronavirus and the aftermath sadly there will be an increase in suicides.
But the symptoms of the virus of sin have been alerting us that we have been going down the wrong path for a very long time.
Before the COVID-19 virus came to our shores, we already had a self-made virus of sin.
Life has many turns and it will always be testing us. We are told that the previous generations of Americans—those who, if they are still alive, faced down hardships and emerged victorious are the most susceptible to the virus—. They confronted fascism in World War II and liberated concentration camps. They prevailed over communism and survived tumultuous cultural and geopolitical shifts but probably never faced this type of challenge.
What will future generations say about the present generation. Will they have the strength and will to survive and thrive by following our example or will we have failed them? The signs are not encouraging but WITH GOD we can still change that.
America may be the world’s only superpower but certainly seems to be unraveling. And how long can we be sustained when so many of our citizens drag themselves down and their neighbors with them because they are abusing the plan designed to provide short-term assistance as opposed to a lifetime handout?
Make no mistake about it, our country is very sick, and we should rush it to the ICU immediately by making drastic changes in our treatment of God and each other. Unless we are willing to change our lifestyle and mentality, then our collective destruction is unavoidable.
Needless to say, these are critical times in the history of our country. We are polarized and divided on the most important issues. Tragically, instead of more calling out to God in repentance and humiliation too many are demanding for increased government to be our savior and gain more control—over health care, socialism, increased regulations, and open borders—America has a founding for the answers on how best to proceed into the future especially by honoring God in our entire nation once again.
As you can see, sin is the most serious thing man will ever deal with. Sin is a spiritual virus that invades our whole being. It makes us morally and spiritually weak. It’s a deadly disease that infects every part of us: our body, our mind, our emotions, our relationships, our motives—absolutely everything. We don’t have the strength on our own to overcome its power. There is nothing we can do to rid ourselves of sin on our own.
But we have God’s Word, Christ, and the Holy Spirit to deliver and empower us if we but earnestly cry out for spiritual healing which will also bring everything else we need. We are clearly being strongly admonished that we are not right with God and we must get back to him.
All of our troubles lie in this one small word—sin. We all have this terminal disease and it’s far worse than the corona virus, the flu or even cancer. It has trapped and crippled us and has caused us to be caught in the devil’s trap and headed straight toward death!
People don’t willingly expose themselves to viruses—people generally run from them. This is what we should do with sin – flee as fast as we can.
By far the importance of a spiritual rebirth and renewal is what God is waiting for.
Sin is defeated through the blood of Christ which is the great medicine of the soul. We don’t need to be crippled any longer by the disease of sin because God has provided the cure. 1 John 1:7 says, “The blood of Jesus Christ … cleanses us from all sin.”
He will give us the power to turn from sin if we believe and act.