“Sin will always take you farther than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay, and cost you more than you want to pay.” Some have attributed those words to Ravi Zacharias, the excellent apologist who died not long ago. We don’t know who wrote those words, but we do know they were correct in their assessment. Sin is exhausting, wasteful, and prohibitively expensive. As it was from the start, it will be to the end of time.
Eve saw three benefits in the fruit: it was good for food, pleasing to the eye, and desirable for gaining wisdom. She saw, took, ate, and shared with Adam. He was responsible for his own actions. Both of them sinned that day. In their analysis, Adam and Eve failed to calculate the awful cost of their choice, not only for them, but also for all their descendants, including us.
Now Adam and Eve saw their own nakedness for the first time. Sin changed things from “good” to “bad.” For the first time, they tried to cover themselves. Have you ever tried to cover over a sin? How did that work? Sin cannot be “swept under the rug.”
Satan always presents sin to us as good. He takes the good gifts of God and distorts them so that they cause harm. James explained it: “But each person is tempted when they are dragged away by their own evil desire and enticed. Then after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown gives birth to death” (James 1:14-15).
If Zacharias were the author of our first quote, he wrote his own epitaph. After his death, secret sins were revealed which tarnished his legacy. He should have known. So should we. The price for one sin is too high to pay. Today, if you are tempted, count the cost, and choose obedience over sin.
