Breaking Up with Sin: Choosing the Right Relationship

From the sermon on December 28, 2025

Breaking Up with Sin: Choosing the Right Relationship
We live in a world obsessed with relationships. We analyze them, post about them, celebrate them, and sometimes mourn them. But there's one relationship we rarely discuss openly, yet it affects every aspect of our spiritual lives—our relationship with sin.

The concept might seem strange at first. After all, sin isn't a person. But here's the uncomfortable truth: even though sin is not a person, it is deeply personal. It involves personal choices, personal thoughts, and personal actions that go against God's divine standard. And when something becomes personal, we connect to it. We attach ourselves to it through our feelings and experiences, making it part of who we are.

The First Toxic Relationship
Before we examine our own relationships with sin, we need to understand where it all began. Most people point to the Garden of Eden, to Adam and Eve's fateful choice. But the first sin actually occurred before humanity even existed.

Lucifer, the anointed guardian cherub, beautiful and wise beyond measure, committed the original sin. Ezekiel 28:14-15 describes him as blameless from the day he was created "till unrighteousness was found in you." What was this unrighteousness? Pride.

Isaiah 14 records Lucifer's internal monologue: "I will ascend into heaven... I will set my throne on high... I will make myself like the most high." Five times he declared "I will," coveting God's position and authority. This creature no longer wanted to serve—he wanted to be served. He wanted worship that belonged only to the Creator.

How starkly different from Jesus Christ, who came not to be served, but to serve and give His life as a ransom for many.

The Ripple Effect of Sin
When we engage in sin, we often think of it as a private matter. But sin never stays private. It radiates outward, affecting communities, families, churches, friendships, and ultimately our citizenship in heaven.

Scripture provides sobering examples:

• Adam and Eve's disobedience led to immediate shame, blame-shifting, and expulsion from Eden, fracturing humanity's relationship with God forever.
• Cain's jealousy resulted in his brother's murder, bringing alienation and a curse upon himself.
• David's adultery and murder brought prophetic judgment, violence, and death within his household for generations.
• Samson's lust and betrayal of his vows led to capture, blindness, and the destruction of his God-given purpose.
• Sodom and Gomorrah's collective wickedness resulted in complete destruction, demonstrating societal collapse from pervasive sin.

Even in the early church, we see this pattern. Ananias and Sapphira's lie to the Holy Spirit caused immediate death. Paul warned the Corinthians that tolerating sexual immorality was like leaven corrupting the entire batch.

These aren't just ancient stories. They're warnings about what personal sin can do today—to you and everyone around you.

Dead to Sin, Alive to God
Romans 6 presents a revolutionary concept: dying to sin is not a process but a completed event. When Christ died, the old self of those united to Him also died. This means sin no longer has the authority to rule or govern our actions—unless we choose to give it that power.

Verse 11 instructs believers to "consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus." This isn't about feelings or current circumstances. It's about viewing yourself based on the fact of your new identity in Christ.

The wages of sin equals death. But the gift of God equals eternal life (Romans 6:23). This contrast should shake us to our core. Have we really let this truth sink in? Have we made the choice to change before it's everlastingly too late?

Being dead to sin naturally leads to being alive to God, where a person serves God and produces fruit of holiness, yielding righteous actions that lead to sanctification and ultimately eternal life.

Here's the key: you don't live right to become dead to sin. You live right because you are dead to sin. Sin no longer has a legal right to rule over you.

The Gospel Pattern: Death, Burial, Resurrection
Based on 1 Corinthians 15:3-4, we see a beautiful parallel between Christ's experience and the believer's transformation:

The Crucifixion and Death:

• Christ died on the cross, paying the penalty for the world's sin
• The believer's old sinful self—the hateful, law-breaking, prideful, lustful, lazy, backsliding, lying, immoral, idol-worshiping, troublemaking self—is crucified with Him, ending sin's power

The Burial:

• Jesus was placed in the tomb
• The believer is buried with Christ through baptism (immersion in water), symbolizing the burial of the dead, sinful self, leaving the old life behind

The Resurrection:

• Jesus rose from the dead, never to die again, conquering death
• The believer rises from the water, signifying being raised to new life, empowered by God to live righteously, no longer enslaved to sin

You cannot bury those who live in sin, only those who have died to sin. Those who have died to sin receive a proper holy burial that leads to a powerful resurrection—a transformation of the heart and soul that only God can give.

Breaking Up: Practical Steps
So how do you end a serious, toxic relationship with sin? Just like any destructive relationship, you end it by cutting it off completely.

You stop calling it. You stop texting it. You stop looking for it. You don't invite it into your home. You don't introduce it to your family or friends. You cease all contact. You block it.
This requires several deliberate steps:

Recognition: Acknowledge that sin is a destructive relationship, not just superficial transgressions. It goes deep into your heart and soul.

Radical Repentance: This involves a drastic change of mind in how you view sin. Stop seeing it from a worldly perspective and start viewing it from God's point of view.

Cut It Off: Block the triggers. Avoid temptations. Distance yourself from anything that fuels your desire to reconnect with sin.

Replace: Draw closer to God in your daily walk with Jesus Christ. Fill the void left by sin with the presence of God.

The Choice Before You
God initiated the restoration plan. He provided the cross as the conduit through which Jesus became the ultimate sacrifice to reconcile our relationship back to Him. But we must give up something—we must give up our relationship with sin.

Jesus absorbed our guilt and gave us His perfect record, making us holy and promising eternal life. By paying our debt, He removed the barrier of sin between humanity and God. But the choice remains ours.

Your spiritual health depends on breaking up with sin. Your heavenly walk with God requires it. Don't wait for sin to be done with you. Be done with it before it's everlastingly too late.

The Father wants a relationship with you, but He will not force you. You must choose Him over sin and the wages of sin. What relationship will you have? The path Satan chose, leading to death? Or God's path, leading to the gift of eternal life?
The call is clear. The invitation stands. The choice is yours.