Imagine you’re walking through a dense forest, the canopy above barely letting the sunlight peek through. Suddenly, you feel a sharp sting on your ankle. Looking down, you see a snake slithering away. It’s not just any snake, though — it’s venomous. Your heart races, not just from the bite but from the knowledge of what comes next. The poison has entered your system. It’s not the snakebite that’s the deadliest part; it’s the venom that courses through your veins, threatening to corrupt every part of you from the inside out.
This, my friends, is a picture of sin.
Sin isn’t merely the bad things we do — the lies we tell, the envy in our hearts, or the wrongs we commit. No, sin is the venom. It’s a dark, corrupting poison that has infiltrated the human condition since the dawn of time. When we talk about sin, we’re not just talking about actions that tick off a celestial checklist of do’s and don’ts. We’re talking about a pervasive corruption that affects every part of us — our hearts, our minds, our very souls.
Think of it this way: just as venom can change the body’s operations, causing it to shut down and malfunction, sin alters the way we operate on a spiritual level. It distorts our desires, warps our perceptions of right and wrong, and separates us from the source of all life and goodness — God Himself.
But here’s where the hope comes in. Just as there is antivenom for a snakebite, there is a cure for the poison of sin. This antidote isn’t found in doing more good deeds or trying harder to be a better person. No, the cure is much more potent and comes from outside ourselves. It comes from Jesus Christ — God’s own Son, who took the full force of sin’s deadly poison upon Himself on the cross, defeating its power once and for all.
This understanding of sin — as a corrupting poison rather than just a list of bad behaviors — transforms how we approach our spiritual lives. It moves us from a place of trying to manage our symptoms to seeking a complete cure. It’s not about trying to avoid the snakebites of life; it’s about acknowledging that we’ve already been bitten and that our only hope lies in the antidote provided by Christ.
So, as we journey through this forest of life, let’s not be naive to the presence of the venom within us. But more importantly, let’s be ever mindful of the antidote we have in Jesus. It’s by His grace and power that we can be healed, made whole, and restored to the life we were meant to live — a life in vibrant, unbroken relationship with God.
This deeper understanding of sin doesn’t lead us to despair but to a profound hope and a deeper reliance on the grace that is ours in Christ Jesus. It’s a reminder that no matter how venomous the bite, the cure is always available, always sufficient, and always ours for the taking.
For more on this, be sure to check out this episode of our podcast, the GoodLion podcast, where we take a deep dive into the concept of sin.
Theology: What is the Nature of Sin? | Brian Higgins & Aaron Salvato | The GoodLion Podcast Network
Scripture to Consider
1. **Romans 5:12** — “Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned — “
2. **Jeremiah 17:9** — “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?”
3. **Psalm 51:5** — “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.”
4. **Romans 7:18–19** — “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. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.”
5. **Ephesians 2:1–3** — “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience — among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind.”
6. **1 John 1:8–9** — “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
7. **Romans 6:23** — “For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
8. **2 Corinthians 5:21** — “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
The Poison Within: Understanding Sin Beyond Actions was originally published in GoodLion Theology on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
