Don't blame me! It's not my fault! ...

Don't blame me! It's not my fault! 

These words take us back a long way - back to the Garden of Eden, back to the beginning of sin (Genesis 3). It's not just a story from a long, long time ago. It's our story. It's the story of every one of us. We don't confess our sin. We make excuses for ourselves. What does God say about this? He says, 'Really? - Do you really think it's not your fault? Do you really think you're not to blame?' Let's go back to Genesis 3. What do we find there? We find sin - and, before that, we find temptation. What's the connection between temptation and sin? Temptation gives us a choice to make. Temptation came from "the serpent" (in Revelation 12:9, we learn that "the ancient serpent" is, also, known by the names, "the devil" and "Satan.) When did temptation become sin? It became sin when Adam and Eve chose to do what the serpent suggested they should do. The temptation came from the serpent. The sin came from Adam and Eve. It's still the same today. We are tempted. We sin. When do we sin? - when we give in to temptation: "Yield not to temptation, for yielding is sin." Why does God's Word speak to us so forthrightly about our sin? - It's because he wants us to confess our sin and receive his salvation. God never speaks to us about our sin so that we'll be depressed about how sinful we are. He speaks to us about our sin  so that we will see our need of his salvation. God doesn't leave us in the place of our sin - the Garden of Eden. He takes us to a better place. He takes us to the place of Christ's crucifixion. He shows us his Son - Jesus, our Saviour: "In Christ, we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God's grace that he lavished on us" (Ephesians 1:7).