Pancakes without baking soda are flat; little taste. But soda has a way of working its way throughout the batter, totally permeating the whole batch.
Water – given enough time and pressure – can soak through just about anything, reducing it to pulp, rust (like the old VW to the left), debris or waste. Total permeation.
Sin has soaked through the entire human race, every physical thing, all thought life, all self-talk, all imagination, all, all, all. Total permeation (See Genesis 6:5).
We can be happy in the grace of God and then suddenly have the most vile thoughts – revenge fantasies, power scenarios, lustful inventions, self-pitying dreams. Total permeation.
Sin can high-jack the mind. Thorough take over. Instant change of mental scenery. The time factor of going from righteously worshipping the Living God to base, sinister imagination is the blink of an eye; much less time than it took to read this sentence. From singing to the Savior to wicked thoughts in an instant. Indeed, sin has soaked through to every part of our lives. Total permeation.
A well-dressed, polite person can be standing in front of you smiling at you and in a mental leap can be fighting a cesspool of revenge, fending off the most hideous interior landscape.
That’s the nature of sin. It does not surrender, it does not get better, it does not play nice, it does not take a vacation, it does not become polite or pleasant. It will always be in rebellion against the holiness of God. It will always be wicked. It will always reject God’s authority. It will always resist the right. It will be present with you until you take your last breath. It totally permeates.
But where sin totally permeates, grace permeates more. Where sin abounded, grace much more abounded – Romans 5:20 says so. Oh, how glorious that we who are sinful by nature can be made right. Clean. Pure. Righteous. Relish these phrases from Romans 5:
“Therefore, since we have been justified through faith we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
. . . when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.
. . . we have now been justified by His blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through Him.
For if, by the trespass of one man [Adam] death reigned [sin permeated and dominated] through that one man, how much more will those who receive God abundant provision of grace and the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one Man, Jesus Christ
But where sin increased, grace increased all the more”
Romans 5:1, 6, 9, 17, 19 and 20, respectively
Total permeation. Total righteousness.
Hallelujah
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