Of Sin and Hamburger

With the recent fall of Ted Haggard, I believe the issue of sin has been brought the forefront of the Christian and moreover Evangelical mind like never before (or at least since the last scandal). A man at the front lines seemingly fighting against sin and its consequences gets caught up in the very sin that he preached so strongly against.

My heart breaks for a man like that. One who got swept away into the darkness of sin and became addicted to the secretive nature of living a life that was not consistent with what he was preaching. As I waded through the stories and news articles images of past leaders, friends, and mentors flashed across the movie reel in my mind. Each memory still painful and dreamlike, yet very real.

Sin affects everything. That is where any discussion on holiness or full salvation must start. Since the fall of man sin has infested every relationship, thought, concept of self, action, natural object, and concept of God. All of these have been marred by sin entering the world.

A few weeks ago I was given a task, an objective, a mission that was pressed upon whether I chose to accept it or not. The plan was to take six tubes of hamburger meet out of our freezer at home, maneuver them into a plastic bag and transport them from my house to my grandmother’s house five blocks away. Accordingly, I counted out six tubes of hamburger, placed them in a plastic bag and into the back of my mothers van, and transferred them to my grandmother freezer, once again counting out all six tubes. My task was completed … or so I thought.

Four days later my father asked me to take my mothers van to church and put gas in it on the way back home, so my mom would be able to drive it to work the next day. As I stepped into the van I noticed a certain … aroma, which was permeating the air. Perhaps “aroma” is not the proper word. I feel as if “nasty stench of rancid meat” would more aptly describe the odor.
I couldn’t figure out what could have made the smell, therefore I drove to church and led worship for the youth group not giving the smell another thought. After service my father was in the parking lot, and I explained to him that there was a certain aroma in the van and I felt as if, perhaps, we should check it out. My uncle asked what it smelled like and I replied something to the effect of “much like rancid meat.” As Uncle Jim opened the door he confirmed that “Yes,” the smell did smell “much like rancid meat.”

After a thorough search, we found the culprit. It was a seventh tube of hamburger meat that somehow snuck into the van (I am presently blaming it on Zoe … my year and a half old black lab). The package was swollen with hamburger juice ebbing from the top. The smell was awful and the look was almost as bad. I threw the package away and felt as if my job was done. However, I found 3 days later when I got in the van, that my job was not done. Although the meat was gone the stench still lingered. And what a stench it was. Seven bottles of Febreeze and two cans of air freshener later, I still had a problem. Finally, I had to shampoo the entire carpet. I had to unbolt the seat and remove all of the nasty juice that had soaked into the carpet. Just removing the meat was not enough; I had to get to the root of the problem.

I believe that sin is the same way. We should not and cannot be content with just forgiveness (getting the meat out of our lives). There must be a deeper cleaning that makes the smell go away. If all God was capable of doing was getting the meat out, but the stench of sin and decay was always there, we would not believe in a very powerful God. Sin must be dealt with on all levels because it infects all levels of life.


(next blog the four fold problem of sin)