I recently finished up Pastor Tim Keller's book "The Reason for God". This is a great book that I began reading a year ago, never finished, and re-read this past month. Keller is the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NYC. In his book, he outlines several of the objections to Christianity and Christ that he has heard in his years of ministry. In the book he presents his apologetic arguments against many of these beliefs that are held by skeptics in society. I found his book to be an excellent book on apologetics, and quite frankly, one of the best books I've read on addressing the main tenets of the Christian faith.

Among the tidbits I read from the book was Keller's definition of the problem of sin. I, like most, often am guilty of filing the "problem of sin" into a series of wrongs or "don't do's". And sin certainly applies to those "don't do's" in our life. However, Keller correctly argues that the "problem" of sin goes much deeper than this. Sin is foundational in man's quest for his own identity apart from God. The first of God's Ten Commandments is to "have no other God's before me". Therefore, the problem of sin is often a problem of idolatry - or worshipping things other than God. I think that this is a signficant problem - even in many Christian's lives. Sadly, we are all at times guilty of putting things above God - even good things. According to Keller, "...the primary way to define sin is not just the doing of bad things, but the making of good things into ultimate things. It is seeking to establish a sense of self by making something else more central to your significance, purpose, and happiness than your relationship with God." (p. 162) Therefore, as Christians who understand the need for repentence, we must recognize our need to repent not only of the things we do that are apart from God's will, BUT also to repent of our own selfishness, our desires for other things above God, and for striving to build up our own identies instead of God's.

"Lord, please forgive us"