“My God, my God why have you forsaken me?” – Matthew 27:46

Have you ever wondered if sin effects God? At the darkest moment in earth’s history, because of our sin, God had to turn away from His Son. Earlier He had said about this same Son, “This is my beloved Son in Whom I a well pleased.”

What changed from the time of Jesus’ baptism until His crucifixion? Consider these Scriptures:

“For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Christ.” – 2 Corinthians 5:21

Then even more graphically:

“All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned, every one, to his own way; and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.” – Isaiah 53:6

Jesus’ shoulders – that is what changed. At His baptism, those shoulders, dripping with water from the Jordan River, bore holy glory of Almighty God. John remembered, “We beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten of God full of grace and truth.”

However, on the cross, those same shoulders now carried the stench and stain of every sin. They bore the guilt of every human being who had lived, was living, or ever would live.

Sin Affects God

What effect did that sin have on God? He had to look away. The ugliness of sin was so repulsive that God could not even look at His own Son. That is the sickening effect of sin on God. God loved His Son. But because of His essential holiness, He could not even look at His Son at this most agonizing time.

So the next time you face temptation to excuse sin, think about the reaction of God to sin.

When you want to rationalize or even turn a blind eye to sin, picture the darkest day in human history.

The next time someone calls it a “lifestyle choice,” remember what that choice did to God that day at Calvary.

“Don’t ask – don’t tell” did not cover the atrocity of sin that day at Calvary.

The next time the entertainment industry uses sin to amuse us, remember Sin neither amuses nor entertains God. It repulses Him.

Let’s take sin more seriously, shall we? God does.