7 sins, 3 tempters, 2 commands

“LORD, we beseech thee, grant thy people grace to withstand the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil; and with pure hearts and minds to follow thee, the only God. ”

Do this. Don't do that. You're wrong. You're in trouble now. I try and I try but I just can't seem to do what I should. With admonitions, rules, doctrines and disciplines—so many things to remember and do—how can we ever be right with God and man? When will I ever stop feeling that I've sinned, failed, fallen, and disappointed the very ones I love and care about?

There are lists and lists of sins in the Bible, and some 500+ laws of Moses for the children of Israel. Boil the really important ones down and you still have seven major categories called the Deadly Sins. That's a foreboding title, and it's accurate. Get yourself lost in any of these, and they can cut you off from God, from grace, from this life and from the next. Pride, Envy, Anger, Covetousness, Gluttony, Lust and Sloth . I don't know whence the list arose: it's not in the Bible in this form. However, the seven are pretty good chapter headings of a very long list of our most common problems and pitfalls.

The most commonly understood meaning of Pride is having an exaggerated attitude about yourself, placing yourself above others. But Pride takes many forms and disguises, and can even be expressed as shame. Whatever it is, it distorts the truth about who you are and Who God is, and cuts you off from humbly facing the truth and being forgiven.

Envy, Pride's vicious sister, hates whatever rises up and shines, making one's own position seem lower by comparison. Anger—not righteous godly indignation at evil—also exaggerates ills done and others' inadequacies, slights and mistakes to create causes for outrage and bearing long grudges. Covetousness, last of the Ten Commandments, is an inordinate longing for things we don't have that others do. Gluttony is an inordinate attention to food, drink, and other intake of the body's natural cravings. Lust, Gluttony's bad brother, is alike, within a sexual context, and adds the heat, addiction and imagination of an obsession. And Sloth is laziness; setting aside all our important activities for sleep, watching TV, playing video games, or just doing nothing at all.

The Seven Deadlies have a cloud of allied sins and misdemeanors that can fill up a book. The study is a good one, for we can fool ourselves and have often redefined our sins as fine qualities. That's Pride again, the chameleon. Pride can dress up a prize pig to look like a Homecoming Queen. Pride is the very woof and weave of the Emperor's New Clothes. One word might describe all seven, though: Selfishness. They pretty much center around the god named Me. That's why idolatry begins with a capital letter I.

Now, are we innately sinful, already programmed with the whole list of these evils? Can we ever escape the siren call of the 7 deadly sins? At Baptism, we make a formal break, a renunciation and repudiation of three entities. We “ renounce the devil and all his works, the vain pomp and glory of the world, with all covetous desires of the same, and the sinful desires of the flesh, so that” we will not follow, nor be led by them. Today's collect echoes that: “LORD, we beseech thee, grant thy people grace to withstand the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil; and with pure hearts and minds to follow thee, the only God. ” The World, the Flesh and the Devil. In light of the 7 Deadly Sins, what are these?

These 3 are sources of Temptation, forces that act upon our hearts, minds and souls to move us into sin. The very idea of Gluttony may never occur to us until we feel an unfamiliar urge or see others gorging themselves. In a few weeks, a number of confirmands in our church will kneel before our Bishop to receive the special seal of the Holy Spirit, and will re-establish their baptismal vows, in essence again making a break with the World, the Flesh and the Devil. What are these and what can we do against them?

St. John wrote: “Do not love the world, nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world. And the world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God abides forever.” 1 John 2:15-17 Here the world is not this planet or God's created order, nor is it the world that Jesus came to save, meaning all mankind: the World we shun is mankind organized without and against God. It is Babel, Madison Avenue, Hollywood, Communism, Paganism, Hedonism, and Atheism . It pours out at us from a thousand bully pulpits the philosophy of going along with the crowd, being a part of humanity, having what the other guy has, doing what everyone else is doing. It's a hard thing to ignore, for we are created social, and it's a tall order to renounce the world, with all its vain pomp and glory with its covetous desires. But being your own man or woman is what God had in mind, so long as He remains the designer of you. “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness before God. For it is written, ‘He is the one who catches the wise in their craftiness.'” 1 Cor. 3:19

The Flesh is inside us, as descendants of Adam and Eve. Sin resides in our moral bodies, just as sin resides in the world. St. Paul wrote: “…we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.” Ephes. 2:3 “For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please.” Galatians 5:17 Flesh is the hardest thing to get away from until you die. It appears to be you, but St. Paul insists that you see it as sin that lives in you, like a parasite, a separate entity. Don't identify with it. Once you choose Christ, and are baptized, you have killed the old man and separated your life from that old Flesh. It hangs around, but it doesn't own you any more. Disregard it, says Paul. “You are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.” Romans 8:9 “Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.” Galatians 5:24

And the Devil. People laugh at us because we believe in devils. We believe because we have experiences with such invisible beings, fallen angels, wicked spirits that whisper and taunt and accuse us. Paul wrote: “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. ” Ephes. 6:12 And St. Peter wrote: “Your adversary, the devil, prowls about like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. But resist him, firm in your faith.” 1 Peter 5:8-9 I won't spend much time on him, but such a beguiler tripped up our first parents, who had perfect flesh and lived in a perfect world. He tried it with Christ on the desert. He's around. Resist him constantly, and he will run from you. By the way, he hates our hymns. Sing them joyfully to clear the air.

Add it up: 7 sins, or sin categories, 3 tempters, or sources of evil influence. 10 evils set against 10 commandments we find hard to keep. What are we to do? It would seem that we stand in a minefield, set with thousands of deadly traps to kill and maim us wherever we step. How can we escape this dark landscape of death?

The Jews were ever aware of sins, and laws that defined them. There were systems of laws, and endless interpretations, pitfalls and limits until it was impossible to live within that grid. The lawyers wanted to show Jesus as a fraud, and started a debate with the common question: Which of the commandments is the chiefest and most important . Jesus' answer was supposed to begin an argument that they knew how to win, no matter what He might say. It was like playing tic-tac-toe with a pro, whatever the space you put your O, he has the X in a place that drives you to lose.

Jesus, of course, knew the Law, for He was the source of God's wisdom expressed in all the Scriptures. He didn't use the Ten Commandments, but a less quoted passage of Moses' writing. “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.” To love God with all you have and all you are. It's both simple and impossibly hard, for it involves getting yourself out of that all-important seat of being the most important person in your life. It dissolves Pride, blunts Envy, cools Anger, and reverses Covetousness, Gluttony, Lust and Sloth. It silences the World, the Flesh and the Devil. Loving God, a God we don't see, but Whose creation we do experience, Whose loving acts we receive, Whose forgiveness is made ample for us, Whose grace is unending: loving such a One is different than all other loves. Such love doesn't come from us initially at all. We know we haven't the capacity for it. It comes from Him, if we let Him grow it in us. He gives us the ability to obey this first and most important commandment .

Then Jesus related a second commandment : the love of our neighbor in equal portion to the love we give ourselves. Now, just having said we love God most of all would seem to lessen the amount we love ourselves. In a worldly measure, that's true. We must “ love ” ourselves less in order to love God. And we must love others only as much as ourselves, also less than we love God. But what is the love of self without loving God? Is the love toward another human going to make life worth living if we fail to love God? Would you go to hell to be with your lover? Think of going to hell to be with anyone! That won't work! Going to hell is torment, and you have no love at all in hell. If loving yourself were the greatest love, you would not know it in perdition. You will hate yourself, and that began here. Godless self-love is a sickness, not a cure. It eventually gives nothing and ends nowhere.

But put in order, loving God first, ourselves and others next, our lives take on a beautiful new color, a great new shine, a wonderful character and graces we never knew before. Joy is born, and generosity, with consideration and a zeal to do for others. A new being is created in us as we love God first, and all things better than we ever did when we were alone.

But what has happened to the 7 and the 3? The 2 great Commandments, if pursued with real desire to live in Christ, in total sacrifice to God and fellow creatures, these 2 wipe out the 7 and the 3, defeat their traps, defuse their mines, silence their wicked whisperings, and take away their accusations. For it was never a matter of perfect performance, but of a loving nature and a faithful desire for God. The two cancel out these others and make our lives worthy of God.

PFH+