Conceived in iniquity

You're the One I've violated, and you've seen it all, seen the full extent of my evil. You have all the facts before you; whatever you decide about me is fair. I've been out of step with you for a long time, in the wrong since before I was born. What you're after is truth from the inside out. Enter me, then; conceive a new, true life. (Psalm 51:4-6 MSG)

This past weekend I was able to travel back to my hometown for a few days. A little over a year ago, my paternal grandmother passed away. She was quite an interesting character, and led a pretty interesting life. She was always a writer of sorts, and wrote a lot of short stories, histories, etc., on her old Remington typewriter.

One morning my dad handed me four sheets of paper and said, "Read this." So, I sat down and ready through it. It was my grandmother Frankie's biography in four pages. (All other things aside, it takes a great writer to squeeze 70 years and a lot of information into 4 pages.) I have noted previously that my grandmother was quite the character, and have heard a lot of stories by and about her. I had these as my background as I read about her life.

I learned quite a few things I didn't know: she was a seamstress, had worked as a reporter, and had a dream of building a high fashion dress shop and passing it down to her daughter. I also saw that she glossed over quite a bit, such as her divorces and affairs. But you know what surprised me the most? The fact that my great grandparents had divorced and had the first custody battle in Coke county, Texas over her in 1928.

It impressed upon me that God's mercies are way greater than I've ever imagined. As an independent minded free thinking "Texan American", I've always known about personal responsibility. And I always thought that your personal sins are what you deal with when you ask God for forgiveness and believe in Jesus. But that's just not how God's economy works. Because of Adam everyone is condemned to death. Scripture even tells us that God blesses those who love him and keep his commandments to the 1,000th generation, but he remembers the sins of a father to the 3rd and 4th generation.

But there's much more to it than that: we are the products of our ancestry, and bear the sins of our predecessors. Oh, I've heard the tales about my grandmother (and the rest of my family), but for some reason I've always felt like I came from a "good family." In four pages of glossed-over autobiography, I realized that not only am I guilty of sin, but I come from a long line of sinners.
How can I escape the wrath of a Holy God? Only through the one man who sacrificed to take away our sins. The only one who was perfect, and gave a greater gift than the sin: Jesus Christ.