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I was teaching Sunday school several years ago, and I compared sin to a disease. One zealous attendee spoke up and told me that sin isn’t just a disease; rather, we are “dead in [our] trespasses and sins” (Eph. 2:1). To that, I heartily agreed. Too often, the modern church underestimates the effects of sin. The Bible describes man’s problem in stark terms, reminding us that there’s nothing we can do to obtain our own salvation—God must give us new birth (John 3:6–8). A diseased man can choose God, after all, but a dead man can’t—and we are spiritually dead apart from Christ.
Yet the Bible doesn’t describe sin merely as death. It also describes it as a disease. Isaiah laments how “the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint” because of sin (Isa. 1:4–6). Jeremiah declares that the heart is “deceitful above all things, and desperately sick” (Jer. 17:9). The psalmist mourns that there is “no health in my bones” and that his wounds “stink and fester” because of his sin (Ps. 38:3–8). While sin ultimately leads to death, it also manifests in a diseased existence, corrupting every aspect of life.
I am writing this article while recovering from the flu, and my illness is a palpable reminder that sin operates much like disease. I feel lethargic, unable to carry out my daily responsibilities. My wife has taken on more of the household duties, and I’ve been unable to work. Likewise, sin makes us spiritually lethargic, dulling our pursuit of righteousness (Rom. 12:11). I also don’t enjoy things that usually bring me delight. That slow-cooked pork shoulder I prepared earlier this week? I have no appetite for it. Instead, I subsist on saltines and bananas. In a similar manner, sin distorts our desires, making us crave what is harmful rather than what is good (James 1:14–15). Most of all, I am reminded that sickness diminishes life. There’s nothing like illness to make one long for health. Sin, too, twists God’s good purposes and hollows out what it means to truly live (Isa. 5:20).
We must understand that sin is not just something we try to avoid or mortify—it is fundamentally destructive. God created the universe with a moral order, and sin violates that order, leading to a diseased existence. No wonder Paul longed for creation to be set free from its bondage and to enjoy “the freedom of the glory of the children of God” (Rom. 8:21). But there is hope. Just as my body fights against this flu to regain strength, so, too, does Christ’s redemptive work restore what sin has broken. Isaiah prophesied of the Messiah: “With his wounds we are healed” (Isa. 53:5). The healing we experience in Christ is not just a metaphor—it is the reality of our salvation, the renewal of our hearts, and ultimately, the resurrection of our bodies.
As I recover from this flu, and as you perhaps recover from illness yourself, remember: every healing is a foretaste of the final restoration that God is bringing through Christ. One day, the sickness of sin will be eradicated forever, and we will stand whole, fully alive in His presence.