Part Three, Stuck in sin

Ernest couldn't control his behavior. He became angry with his family, especially his 2-year-old son, and suffered regular bouts of regret and shame.

At church he came forward at almost every altar call I witnessed, wanting prayer for his most recent lapses. It was clearly an unbreakable cycle and, many years later I saw the tragedy of one of the basic doctrines of almost all churches, whether Catholic, Protestant, Fundamentalist, or Liberal. We are (supposedly) imprisoned by sin for term of life.

Ernest needed rescue from his self-and-family-destructive cycle, but as long as he held to his church’s tenets about sin, he was stuck. Only God’s direct guidance could have liberated him but, as we have seen, he rejected it.