The weight of Sin

    With Thanksgiving just past and the Lord's Day tomorrow when we participate in the Lord's Supper, remembering the sacrifice of Jesus on our behalf, I thought this would be a great time to consider the weight of sin.

     How does one calculate the weight of sin? Hebrews 12:1 compares sin with weight. In Isaiah 43:24, God says that Israel had burdened him with the weight of their sins. So what does sin weigh?

     Spiritually, each sin is the weight of the executioner's axe, poised above our necks. Emotionally, it can vary from a nearly unnoticeable burden, the feather's weight in our hair, to the weight of the world on our shoulders, leaving us like Atlas, struggling under it's weight, unable to accomplish anything else.

     Physically though, how do we weigh sin? I am not aware of any recorded answer to this question. Consider this. If we were to assign sins a very minute weight, say the equivalent of one drop of water, what would the weight of the sins that Christ bore on the cross be equal to?

     There are 15 drops in 1 milliliter of water. 1000 milliliters is equal to 1 liter. There are about 3.79 liters in a gallon of water. A gallon of water weighs 8.333 pounds. Using these facts, we can extrapolate the theoretical physical weight of sin that Christ bore on the cross.

    There are currently nearly 7 Billion people living on earth. Since the dawn of man, estimates range from 10 Billion and up for the total number of people who have populated the earth. Not knowing when Christ will return, we can take this number as a starting point, and know that the burden will only increase for each additional person. For this calculation, let us use an extremely conservative number of 1000 sins per person. 1000 sins per person times 10 Billion equals 10 Trillion sins. If we divide that by 3.79 we come up with a volume of sins equal to 264 Billion, then we multiply that by our 8.33 pounds per gallon, we come up with 2.2 Trillion pounds!

    That weight is physically impossible for any man to bear. The world record weight lifted by an individual in the clean and jerk is a measly 263 kilograms or 578.6 pounds. Men and women have snapped there tibias, broken their backs and died trying to lift such heavy weights. If sin had any physical weight, the burden on Christ was so overwhelming we cannot comprehend it.

    If we have anything at all to be thankful for, it was that Christ was willing to take on the weight of the sins of you, I, and every person who has ever or will ever live. When you participate in the Lord's supper Sunday, remember this post, please.

    Thank God our Father for his plan, and Jesus Christ for being willing to bear that burden and be our sacrifice. God is so good. Were He only just, we would all die for our sins. He is just, but He is also gracious, because he is willing to accept the blood of Jesus for our sins. Praise Jehovah! Praise Christ!

Discount Workout!

    It always amazes me that no matter how convenient it is to work out (example: complete 24 hour gym less than 5 minutes from my house), I want it more convenient. Hence, my slow accumulation of various workout equipment over the years. We have exercise balls, weights (ankle and dumbell) in various sizes, a small collection of workout dvds and at one time, a large treadmill that took up a huge amount of room.
    The treadmill has been consigned to dumpster land after I tried to put it in the storage position, forgetting that I had left the incline up. OOPS! No matter how hard I tried, or how many people I got involved, it just never worked right after that.
    My workout video collection was expanded during my deployment by the addition of the P90X videos on my laptop. It was great when I was right there and could set my laptop on the counter in the little tent gym right outside the hospital in Bagram, but I just couldn't picture it working at the big gym here on base, or any other gym I might have access to.
    My solution was to get all the weights I would ever need, and a weight bench, and I could do the workout at home. Sounds great, right? Have you ever priced dumbells? Not the type you might find sitting on a couch in front of the T.V., but those weights designed to be lifted one handed? If you can find them for a dollar a pound, you are doing pretty good. Considering that in just one P90X workout I might use the 10s, 15s, 20s, 30s, 45s, and 50s, I was going to need a lot of weights. I only had the 15s, so how was I going to afford all those weights? I wasn't. 
    Someone very smart had a solution, a weight set that was completely adjustable from 5 to 90 pounds, and much more affordable than 1 dollar per pound. They are called PowerBlocks. But, they still ain't cheap. According to the website www.powerblock.com, "The Elite 5-90 set comes with plates 1-8, and has a weight range of 5-90 lbs per hand. The Elite 5-90 lb equals/replaces 28 pairs of dumbbells, or 2565 lbs of free weights while taking up the space of just 1 pair (90 lb dumbbell is just 16" in length) This set is expandable to 130 lbs per hand using the 8-11 Elite Big Block Kit. The dimensions of the Elite 90 are; 16"L x 6" W x 6" H. Ships in 4 boxes. Made in USA." Price: a measly $588.00 per pair, plus $89.00 shipping and handling.
     Hard on the bank account, but I was willing to do it, especially since we are moving to the land of snow and ice and other cold weather phenomenon. I was still going to have to find a weight bench as well.
    And then Mrs. Penguin happened to check the Travis yardsales e-mail one evening a week or so ago. Lo and behold, a weight bench and the PowerBlock Elite set for the low, low, low price of $350.00! Immediately Mrs. P sent an e-mail saying we were interested, and I went and picked them up the next day, plus the safety mat the seller had the weight bench on. Half price! 
    I rushed them home, set them up in the garage, and . . . there they sat until the movers packed them up on Tuesday. We will be reunited in Anchorage, where I intend to get my money's worth out of my discount workout equipment!