One of the great joys of working in a Lutheran school is the exceptional perspective that the children often bring to matters of theology. Recently a student asked me, “Why does sin feel so good?”

The child was young enough that, unlike most adults who seem to think about sin mostly in terms of sex and sexuality, he was not referring to something like sex or even money which are inherently good but become sin when used outside of the purpose for which God created them. He was referring instead to that “tingly sense” that one feels when they know that they are doing something wrong, a feeling that only seems to grow into a smug self-satisfaction as you realize that you may in fact get away with it.

I had always tried to simplify the theological definition of “sin” for my students by describing it as the “disordering of God’s ordered creation.”  However, that definition doesn’t seem to hold sway when it comes to matters of irrational selfishness or greed, such as cheating on an exam or the thrill of stealing. How else can you explain why even some wealthy people (including celebrities like Winona Ryder) who have no financial need to shoplift, nevertheless commit the crime. Temptation itself is sinfully problematic, not just the giving into that temptation. The totality of sin’s pervasiveness can be seen in that it even (or perhaps most especially!) effects non-material things like emotions and feelings.

No wonder our Lord prayed: “Lead us not into temptation,” for even young children need to “ask in this prayer that God would watch over us and keep us so that the devil, the world, and our sinful self may not deceive us and draw us into false belief, despair, and other great and shameful sins.”