Living With The Consequences of Mistakes and Sin

This article was requested by a dear reader following the article ‘How to Recover from Mistakes’. How can we as believers live with the consequences of our sins and mistakes? Recovering from them is one thing but living with the consequences is a different ball game. The best way to really understand how to live with the consequences of your sins and mistakes without being overwhelmed is to evaluate how God’s people in the scriptures were able to do this. I can think of no better example than Apostle Paul.

In Acts chapters 7-8, we see how Paul (then named Saul) persecuted the church of God. He stoned, imprisoned, broke into the homes of God’s people and dragged them into prison. He did this fervently. He was so zealous that he ‘went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus so that if he found any belonging to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem’(Acts 9:2). But on his way to Damascus Paul met the Lord Jesus. Instead of persecuting God’s people, he became one of them. Not only did he become a child of God, he became an apostle, one who served the people of God and led many to Christ.

Nevertheless, he killed and harmed God’s people prior to his conversion. This could not be undone. How did Apostle Paul live with the consequences of his past sins and mistakes? In Acts 9:20-22 Paul preached in the synagogues and people pointed fingers at him as the one who persecuted Christians. But in verse 22 we see that ‘Saul increased all the more in strength and confounded the Jews who lived in Damascus by proving that Jesus was the Christ’. There are two key things that we can learn from Apostle Paul’s response to when people reminded him of his wrongdoings and whenever guilt weighed down his heart.

1. Don’t allow those who remind you of your past sins and mistakes to discourage you from fulfilling what God is calling you to do now.

Despite the constant reminders and finger-pointing of Paul’s experiences, he kept moving forward in serving the Lord. Despite the shame and pain he may have felt inside, he did not let that rule over what God called him to do. Why? Because he knew that God had forgiven him. God forgave and provided Paul an opportunity to serve Him in truth, and Paul embraced the opportunity and made the most of it. People in your life can sometimes remind you of the wrong decisions you made in the past. Your environment and challenges today could remind you of your past.  Instead of becoming angry and discouraged, push on and focus on what God has called you to do now. Meditate on scriptures that speak of God’s mercy and how through Christ you have been forgiven. For instance, Psalm 103:12 states that “as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us”

It can be challenging to live with the consequences of your sins and mistakes when they are in one sense ever before you, i.e. an incurable disease due to sexual sin, a stained reputation, health challenges due to drug usage and alcohol consumption, etc. but don’t be discouraged. If God has helped you recover from your sins and mistakes, press on and live in the freedom from guilt that He offers His children. Although you can’t erase the past, you can live above the consequences of your past by keeping your eyes on He who enables you to recover and has called you to continue to walk with Him in spite of the unpleasant consequences of your past. God certainly doesn’t sit down and constantly remind Himself of your wrongdoing! He forgives you for His own glory! How merciful is our God?

Isaiah 43:25 “I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.

2. You don’t have to pretend like a sin wasn’t commited or a mistake wasn’t made. There are times when you may feel the need to talk to God and others about it, but always return the glory to God— understanding that God can use all of it for good.

1 Corinthians 15:9-10 For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.

These verses really do give us an insight into how apostle Paul felt at times because of harming Christians prior to his conversion. He acknowledges that he did not feel worthy to serve the Lord in this manner. He acknowledges his pain. But note, he doesn’t stop there— he goes on to say that ‘by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain…’ He puts his focus back on God and what God is making him to be. He also reminds himself that as a result of what he did in the past he worked harder than other apostles! Lest you think he was doing this out of guilt or pride, he again puts the spotlight on God and says, ‘though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me’.

So, how do you live with the consequences of your mistakes and sins? By continually putting your focus back on God. You don’t have to pretend like it never happened or ignore the consequences, but you do have to be determined to keep your eyes on Jesus, not on the past. You are not defined by your past sins and mistakes. God has called you out of them, live as one who has been called out even if the consequences lurk around.