Yes to Hating Sin, No to Hating Self
00:00:00.000 | Pastor John, we have a follow-up question from a listener named Isaac.
00:00:04.280 | Pastor John, in episode number 924, you said Christians are known as sin haters.
00:00:09.760 | I agree wholly, but sometimes in living this out I become too self-focused.
00:00:16.060 | So what is the difference between hating sin, what you call for, and hating myself because
00:00:21.320 | I sin, which is so often what I feel?
00:00:24.680 | What's the difference between sin hate and self-hate?
00:00:28.480 | Let me first say something that will probably strike Isaac as depressing, and then I hope,
00:00:37.120 | because it's true and because it's real and because of the wider biblical context, be
00:00:44.480 | hope-giving and not just depressing.
00:00:48.880 | I think it is impossible to really hate our sin and know that this sin originates in my
00:00:56.880 | corrupt heart and not hate that heart.
00:01:01.720 | That is, hate my heart, my sinning self, insofar as I am corrupt, world-loving, God-hating,
00:01:13.560 | rebellious, and that is who we all are without the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit.
00:01:20.920 | Paul describes us in Ephesians 2, "Once we walked following the course of this world,
00:01:28.800 | following the prince of the power of the air and the spirit that is now at work in the
00:01:34.680 | sons of disobedience among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying
00:01:41.080 | out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature"—this is not alien to
00:01:46.120 | us—"by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind."
00:01:51.960 | You can't know yourself to be a child of wrath that is a person whom God is so angry
00:01:58.000 | with and not be angry with yourself if you're in sync with God.
00:02:04.000 | Now, of course, God enters into our lives with the power of the Spirit.
00:02:10.680 | The old man is crucified.
00:02:12.720 | Sins are forgiven.
00:02:13.720 | A new nature is given through rebirth.
00:02:16.600 | The Holy Spirit takes up residence in our hearts.
00:02:20.720 | He begins to lead us in paths of righteousness.
00:02:23.200 | We're not the same people anymore that we once were in such awful rebellion.
00:02:30.100 | So you might think, "Well, that's the end of that self-hate."
00:02:33.840 | There are two catches.
00:02:36.800 | One is that Paul tells us to remember what we came from in Ephesians 2.12.
00:02:45.600 | Remember that you were at that time—this is just ten verses later than what I just
00:02:51.400 | read from Ephesians 2—remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated
00:02:57.360 | from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope
00:03:01.680 | without God in the world.
00:03:04.320 | So remember that.
00:03:05.600 | Don't forget that.
00:03:07.080 | Bring that to your mind.
00:03:08.080 | Let it humble you.
00:03:10.000 | Hate that old self.
00:03:14.160 | The other catch is that in spite of our newness in Christ, the old nature must be seen, recognized
00:03:26.720 | now and put to death now, daily.
00:03:32.160 | Put to death.
00:03:33.560 | Paul said, "What is earthly in you?"
00:03:36.160 | Reckon to be dead that old nature.
00:03:40.480 | You can't put your old nature to death if you love it.
00:03:45.240 | In cases like this, you only kill what you hate.
00:03:49.320 | It's not just sin that you kill.
00:03:52.080 | It's the old you that keeps trying to raise its head, and you must hate that old you.
00:03:59.480 | And yes, it is a real you.
00:04:04.840 | I base that on Romans 7, 24, where Paul cries out, "Wretched man that I am!"
00:04:14.040 | Not just "Wretched sin that I do!"
00:04:18.200 | He's not calling the work of the Holy Spirit wretched.
00:04:21.360 | No, he's not.
00:04:22.960 | He says in verse 18, "I know that nothing good dwells in me that is in my flesh."
00:04:29.440 | Well, he knows something good does dwell in him.
00:04:33.840 | The Holy Spirit dwells in him.
00:04:35.120 | A new nature dwells in him.
00:04:37.480 | What he's calling wretched is his old, sinful nature.
00:04:44.160 | And the way he says it is, "Wretched man that I am!"
00:04:49.960 | And he knows he's still responsible for those acts that crop up from his old nature.
00:04:58.000 | So in that sense, I think there is a genuine and proper self-hatred that is essential to
00:05:05.960 | fighting the fight of faith.
00:05:09.200 | Now, here are two or three warnings how that—what I just said—can go haywire.
00:05:18.680 | Number one, I've already said it would be sin if you hated the new you that the Holy
00:05:26.920 | Spirit is shaping after the image of Christ.
00:05:30.080 | Every hint of godliness, every degree of love to Christ, every mustard seed of faith should
00:05:37.200 | cause you to feel thankful that God is at work in you, making you new.
00:05:43.040 | It's a sin to hate this new work of God.
00:05:47.520 | Don't ever hate what God has wrought in you by the power of the Holy Spirit, and he
00:05:53.840 | is at work in you if you are born again.
00:05:57.040 | And here are two more warnings how things can go haywire.
00:06:01.080 | Jesus bases his whole argument for self-denial on the preciousness of the human soul, the
00:06:11.960 | value of everlasting existence.
00:06:15.400 | Listen to how he says it.
00:06:17.800 | This is Mark 8:34.
00:06:18.800 | "If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow
00:06:25.640 | me."
00:06:26.640 | Here's his argument.
00:06:27.640 | "For whoever would save his life will lose it."
00:06:31.440 | Well, you don't want to lose it.
00:06:34.040 | But whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it.
00:06:39.760 | And you do want to save it.
00:06:42.440 | And then he adds, "For what does it profit a man if he gain the whole world and forfeit
00:06:49.320 | or lose his soul?"
00:06:52.640 | What can man give in return for his soul?
00:06:59.040 | The whole argument, the basis of Jesus' argument is you should love your soul.
00:07:08.360 | That is, love it in the sense of doing whatever it takes to save it.
00:07:15.060 | So in this sense, we should never, never, never hate our soul.
00:07:20.800 | That is, we should never act in a way that destroys the soul.
00:07:25.400 | The whole world is acting as though they hate their soul by living in sin.
00:07:29.240 | We should love our souls in the sense that we will do anything.
00:07:33.840 | We will deny ourselves anything.
00:07:36.440 | We will sell anything.
00:07:38.900 | We will go anywhere.
00:07:40.520 | We will believe Jesus to the max, including any self-denial in order to save our souls.
00:07:48.920 | That's the way Jesus is arguing.
00:07:50.840 | So don't ever become a self-hater in the sense that you don't care about saving your soul,
00:08:00.920 | but only destroying it.
00:08:02.560 | And the last warning about how things can go haywire in this recommendation that there's
00:08:09.760 | a genuine self-hatred that belongs to the Christian life is the third warning.
00:08:17.840 | Don't dwell on your past corruption or on your present remaining corruption to the degree
00:08:28.600 | that it keeps you from leaning into hope with such joy that you are set free to love.
00:08:37.880 | And here's the text, Philippians 3:13, "Brothers, one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind
00:08:46.120 | and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal of the prize of
00:08:54.400 | the upward call of God in Christ Jesus."
00:08:57.000 | So notice the key words, "forgetting what lies behind."
00:09:03.280 | So yes, remember your corruption, Ephesians 2:12, enough to humble yourself and keep yourself
00:09:10.320 | utterly dependent on grace, but forget your corruption if it ever keeps you back from
00:09:17.400 | pressing on toward the goal of the prize of the upward call of God in Christ with joy
00:09:22.480 | and hope and confidence and love.
00:09:26.440 | So Isaac, that's how you measure whether your self-hatred is pathological and self-defeating
00:09:35.600 | or whether it is Christ-exalting and hope-giving.
00:09:40.520 | Does it throw you onto grace in Christ?
00:09:44.760 | Does it intensify your love to Jesus and your confidence in his love for you and his readiness
00:09:51.840 | to use you for his glory?
00:09:54.000 | So say to yourself often, "I am the temple of the Holy Spirit.
00:10:00.240 | I am not my own.
00:10:02.440 | I was bought with a price.
00:10:05.120 | I will glorify God in my body."
00:10:09.560 | Yeah, amen.
00:10:10.800 | Thank you, Pastor John, and thank you for the question, Isaac.
00:10:14.600 | These are the wonderful questions that we really welcome, we love getting them, so thank
00:10:17.640 | you for sending us so many great questions over the years.
00:10:20.540 | Of course, we can't respond to questions in writing, and we can only get to a fraction
00:10:24.720 | of them on the air, but your questions really are important to us, and they make this podcast
00:10:29.520 | possible.
00:10:30.700 | So thank you for sending them in.
00:10:32.700 | And for more details about this podcast or to catch up on old episodes or to subscribe
00:10:36.640 | to the audio feed so you can keep up on new episodes as we release them, even to send
00:10:41.200 | us a question of your own, go to our online home at DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.
00:10:48.120 | Well tomorrow is Thanksgiving.
00:10:50.180 | Happy Thanksgiving.
00:10:51.180 | And we are going to return on Friday.
00:10:52.720 | We're going to talk about a theme related to Thanksgiving, but it's essentially the
00:10:56.080 | question of are we overdoing the anti-prosperity gospel theme?
00:11:01.120 | Can we be so anti-prosperity gospel that we become less thankful for the abundant gifts
00:11:06.360 | that God has showered into our lives?
00:11:08.400 | It's a timely question, and it comes into us from a listener, and we will address that
00:11:13.560 | on Friday.
00:11:14.560 | We'll see you then.
00:11:15.060 | [BLANK_AUDIO]