Hating Sin Without Hating Yourself

by Debra Baty

There was a time when I thought the attraction I had for women was the most pure type of love possible. It seemed to be a selfless, whole-hearted devotion, willing to sacrifice all for the sake of putting this other woman first. Another word for that is idolatry. It took quite a while for me to see this was putting a person above God, and reading the booklet Emotional Dependency[1] was one of the things the Lord used to clear the fog that had clouded my mind.

Once you’ve realized that this is a sin – that same sex sexual behavior, and dwelling on these desires/attractions is sinful – then what? Often there is a person you love in the mix, and deep-seated feelings that once seemed wonderful are now to be set aside, and even mortified, or put to death. How can one do this? It is typically a painful process, and having Christian friends to walk alongside you, listen, and pray with you as you wrestle through these things can be very helpful.

Many times I called a dear friend in tears over the latest painful layer of attachment and/or attraction that had to be let go. Yet looking back over my journals, I don’t see signs of self-hatred. Frustration, pain, calls to the Lord for help are there, but not self-loathing that others report. Here are a few things that kept me from that trap of hating myself along the way:

Knowing God’s Love

Knowing the agape love of God – the perfect, unencumbered, fathomless love of the God who knows me in complete, microscopic detail, was a truth that guarded my heart against any lie that I was unlovable. He knows us and loves us before we’re born, fully knowing we are going to sin, with the price for that sin fully paid. How can I hate myself when God loves me?

“For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:38-39 ESV

Taking the Right Degree of Responsibility

Understanding that I am responsible for how I respond to temptation, not for the capacity to be tempted.

In Romans 7, we read about the battle of the will in temptation, and the impact of original sin:

14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am of the flesh, sold under sin. 15 For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. 16 Now if I do what I do not want, I agree with the law, that it is good. 17 So now it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. 19 For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. 20 Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me.

There is a distinction in this passage between me - “it is no longer I who do it”, and the sinful nature inherited from the Fall - “but sin that dwells within me.” That sinful, fallen nature is not who God created me to be. A profile of God’s compassion for us as we fight this battle against temptation is found in The Screwtape Letters:

“Now, it may surprise you to learn that in His efforts to get permanent possession of a soul, [God] relies on the troughs even more than on the peaks; some of His special favorites have gone through longer and deeper troughs than anyone else... It is during such trough periods, much more than during the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He wants it to be... He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles.”

― C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

As the culture increasingly tries to convince us that our sexual temptations define the core of our being, here we see, “if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with [our] stumbles.” It is our will to walk with God that defines the core of our personhood – even if we falter along the way. He sees us at this deeper level as clear as day. And even if we don’t have the will to follow in His steps, we can ask for His help – giving us the will to want to:

“I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put My Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey My rules.” Ezekiel 36:25-27 ESV

Responding to temptation by asking the Lord for help is always the best foundation to build on. We can hate sin without hating ourselves because who we truly are is no longer bound in sin through Christ. He has created us to be the sinless version of ourselves, and the part of us that longs for this, that asks for the empowerment of the Holy Spirit, and the ability to walk alongside Him in obedience, is who we are now as we live in the “not yet” before Heaven.

Knowing the Lord’s Compassion

First, His compassion for me is beyond any human compassion. He alone knows the depths of our temptations and our weaknesses. And He is always, always faithful to meet us where we are and cleanse us:

I know all about the despair of overcoming chronic temptations. It is not serious providing self-offended petulance, annoyance at breaking records, impatience etc. doesn’t get the upper hand. No amount of falls will really undo us if we keep on picking ourselves up each time. We shall of course be very muddy and tattered children by the time we each reach home. But the bathrooms are all ready, the towels put out, and the clean clothes are in the airing cupboard. The only fatal thing is to lose one’s temper and give it up.
It is when we notice the dirt that God is most present to us: it is the very sign of His presence.

~ C.S. Lewis; from a letter to Mary Neylan, Jan. 20, 1942

Second, His compassion for those I love is beyond any level I could ever achieve. As noted earlier, there is often a person you love in the mix of repenting from these sexual attractions. It is hard to walk away from love – the hopes and dreams of what could be in a relationship with someone you’ve come to know and feel connected to. It can feel wrong to abandon them by walking away. Eventually I learned to hand that person over to Jesus – in prayer, putting them into His arms instead of wishing they were in my own. Remembering that He loves them perfectly, without selfishness or neediness getting in the way, helped a great deal. At times this prayer had to be repeated on a regular basis until my feelings caught up with what I knew and know to be true.

But that mental picture of handing them over to Someone far better was a huge help in wrapping my mind around His greater love for each one of us.

In a sense, when you turn away from sinful erotic temptations you’re turning towards the greater, eternal agape love.

All of these things – lessons of love, if you will, kept me from beating myself up over my temptations and stumbles. We mortify - or put to death - in us what Jesus has put to death on the cross. All our sin and shame. And we walk out of the grave with Him into newness of life. Each day we can do this, and get a new start on living in love.

[1] Available here: https://midvalley-fellowship.helcim.app/quick-order#category-container-7929

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