“Who can understand his errors? cleanse thou me from secret faults.
Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me: then shall I be upright, and I shall be innocent from the great transgression.
Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.” Psalm 19:11-14
Have you ever committed a premeditated sin? Okay that sounds pretty bad. We’ll define the word “premeditated”. So, if we were to picture this sin, we need to describe it in a way that justifies it right? Have you ever had a thought to do something, thought about it for awhile, knew it was wrong, rolled over the consequences in your head, but after a minute, you just decide to do it anyway.
That didn’t sound so bad now did it? It was just something small after all, right? Actually, It is presumptuous.
You might ask, “What in the world is a presumptuous sin?” In our English language today, we link presumption and assumption together; but in the Bible, it had a different meaning. Presumption is a very weighty matter. It is a very dangerous sin, and what makes it a little more scary is that the Bible does not spell it out for us word by word. God does, however, give us many examples of people that committed presumptuous sins. He outlines the topic in the Bible and leaves our conscience (with the help of the Holy Spirit) to guide us.
As Christians, we look at some sins differently than others. Sins like adultery, murder, and homosexuality would make that list. But, you know what’s crazy? Any sin can fall into the sin of presumption. ANY SIN, Even “small” sins. Numbers 15:27-36 describes the Old Testament requirements for a sacrifice for “ignorant” sins, but notice that there is no sacrifice offered for the sin of presumption!
Charles Spurgeon sheds a little more light on some different ways that we practice presumption. (Charles Spurgeon Sermons, Volume 3) These are a more simplified version with scriptural support.
1. WILLFULL Sinning
Presumptuous sin is a sin, any sin that you know to be sin, and doing it anyway, regardless of the warning of God’s Word, counsel from others, and pricking of your conscience.
James 4:17
“Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.”
2. DELIBERATE Sinning
Presumptuous sin starts as a habitual sin because if you continually commit the sin, you will eventually start planning to do it again. It leads to premeditating your sin.
A man with a temper, might lose his temper at someone in the heat of the moment. It is not deliberate because it came on suddenly, fleshly, and in the moment. But even in his haste of losing his temper, we can find presumption in his sin. He can be guilty of this because he knows he is prone to losing his temper, but never strives to fix the problem. He blows up a story in his head towards someone else and then loses it again. Therefore, he is making way to do it again.
We view our continual mistakes as “no big deal” and we never face them to confess them.
Romans 6:1-2
“What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?”
3. REBELLIOUS Sinning
Presumptuous sin is a sin that we do in pride against God. Literally an act of rebellion.
I Samuel 15:23
“For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry. Because thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being king.”
In this passage, rebellion is the sin of presumption.
4. SPITEFUL Sinning
This is as if we were standing face to face with God and spitting in his face. Presumptuous sin is a sin that we do just to show others a disregard for God. Proving our hate for God and his laws.
Romans 1:28-32
“And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:
Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.”
These are the people that hate God so much, that they will do anything they can to defy him. God’s grace is always extended, but usually this person is too far gone at this point.
5. CONTROLLED Sinning
Presumptuous sin is a sin where we lie to ourselves about the consequences or the end results of sin. It is where we believe we can stop ourselves at one point and go no further in that sin. In other words, we can control our level of sinning. We believe we have the power to stop.
I Peter 5:8
“Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:”
Don’t you think that satan would like you to think that you have control over your sin?
“Sin will take you farther than you want to go, keep you longer than you want to stay, and cost you more than you want to pay.”
- Unknown
6. SPECULATIVE Sinning
You are presumptuous when you believe that you will live in sin today with the idea that you will start living for God tomorrow.
Many lost people will use the excuse that they want to live in sin with the idea that some day, they will find Jesus. They are presuming that they will live to see that day. In the same way, Christians can make the excuse that they can always “get right with God” tomorrow, but what if tomorrow never comes?
James 4:14
“Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.”
This is perhaps the biggest reason not to compare yourself to others. We have enough to worry about in ourselves! Too many Christians are so preoccupied at what others are doing that they forget to look into the deepest chasms of their heart to find what is really lurking there. Satan knows he can distract you from your own heart. What sin can we overlook while looking over our shoulder at someone else?
How many of us still think these sins are “small”? It’s humbling isn’t it? We could look at the many avenues of presumptuous sinning and pick out the ones that don’t apply to us, but it is all presumption. Those sins we thought were small, turned out to be bigger than we thought!
“Sit down at the foot of his cross, and watch him till your heart is moved, till the tears begin to flow again, until your heart breaks within you; and then you will rise and say –Dissolved by his mercy, I fall to the ground, And weep to the praise of the mercy I have found.“
I’m so thankful for grace! God sent His Son to die for us! Yes, our sin is great, and we should never forget that, but we can also stand amazed at His amazing grace! We can stand in awe of His love for sinners like us. We are great sinners, but our Father is always willing and ready to forgive.
