Sin? Who, me?

For those of you who don't know, I work in a church. Every Wednesday we have staff chapel where we all come together for a mini sermonette by one of the pastors and a time of prayer and sometimes a song or two. A couple of weeks ago, Suzanne challenged us to start journaling during our prayer time using a guide that she provided. One of the areas is, "Father, forgive me for . . ." Well, the first morning as I prayed I actually had a hard time coming up with sins I had committed the day before and the directions are pretty specific. You are to write down the actual sins and ask for forgiveness. I guess I actually was thinking, "hmmmm . . . what did I do yesterday?" I think we are all a little bit like that. Wait - don't jump on me yet. We are all so quick to judge the sins of others (and I'm at the front of that line!) but when it comes to our own sins, we think, "Sin? Who, me?" I did come up with some rather generic things but continued to think on this throughout the day. Of course, as the day went along I actually noticed when I was sinning. Sometimes that realization made me stop and other times I just barrelled on through whether it was the sin of gossip or gluttony or negative thoughts. BUT I was aware. I was actually thinking about it. On morning two, I sat down and started with the first step - "Father, I praise you for . . . " By the time I reached the section on forgiveness, I had no trouble listing my sins. So why is that? Because we are humans. Because we are sinners saved by grace. Because it is so easy to judge others but even easier to whitewash our own sins as "not so bad." Once again, I thank God for his love and forgiveness.