If God is all powerful, why didn’t he stop you from committing those sexual sins in your past that you now deeply regret? Here are 4 biblical answers to that question.
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1. God Let You Commit Those Sexual Sins You Now Regret Because You Were Not Born Again
As Christians, we understand that we are born with a sinful nature (Romans 5:12). This is why we must be born again through putting our faith in Jesus (Romans 5:15). When we confess our sins and ask God to save us through the gospel, we are not only forgiven of past wrongs, but we are given a new nature so we can live differently (Romans 6:1-4).
So, if you committed sexual sins before you were a Christian, the reason God allowed that was because you did not have the new nature that will cause you to live differently. God will not override our choice to sin. He wants to empower us to reject sin, but we still must make our choices.
But what if you were a Christian and you still committed sexual sins you now regret? Why didn’t God stop you?
2. God Let You Commit Those Sexual Sins You Now Regret Because Sanctification Is a Process
In Scripture, we learn that while we are given a new nature at the moment of our conversions, this does not mean our old nature is eradicate out of our bodies (Romans 7:20). The new you and the old you will now fight for control of your body. This fight will cease once we die and we are completely glorified (1 Corinthians 15:42-49), meaning that the old nature will be completely removed from us and only our true selves in Christ will remain.
In the meantime, Scripture states we are in the process called sanctification. When we become a Christian, we are justified in Christ and made perfect in God’s sight because the righteousness of Jesus is fully transferred to us. The Holy Spirit enters into us and we become a new person. But through the process of sanctification, we are now learning to live from the perfections given to us as we still fight our old natures.
In the ESV, Hebrews 10:14 states, “For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.” In the NIV it reads, “For by one sacrifice he has made perfect forever those who are being made holy.” You can see here that while we are perfected by the blood of Christ, we are also still being sanctified, which means we are learning to live holy lives from the new nature.
Thus, if you committed sexual sins as a Christian that you now deeply regret, this happened because you are still in the process of sanctification. You are totally pure through Christ (1 Corinthians 1:30-31), but you are still learning to live within that purity (2 Corinthians 3:18, Colossians 3:10).
3. God Let You Commit Those Sexual Sins You Now Regret to Let the Pain of Your Own Disobedience Turn You Back to Him
When you read the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15:11-32, it’s easy to gloss over the fact the father gave the son his inheritance early even though he didn’t have to do that. The son was supposed to wait until the father died to receive the inheritance. Thus, the father could have prevented the son from going off into his wild living by not giving him the resources to do so. Why didn’t the father stop the son from running away?
I believe the father didn’t stop the son because he knew the son was already gone. In other words, the father new the son had a heart issue. Keeping the son at home wasn’t going to help the son. The son wanted to rebel, and the father couldn’t change that. The only thing he could do was let him go, hoping that his son would ruin his life so badly that he would come home with a different heart.
I think this is why God often doesn’t stop us from committing the sins we come to regret the most in life. Before those sins occurred, we had a heart issue already. Those sexual sins you now deeply regret, those are not what separated you from the love of God. You committed those sexual sins because you were already running from the love of God in your heart. To help you come back, God did the only thing left for him to do. He let you run, hoping you would be humbled by the pain of your choices so you could come back to him with a different heart (1 Corinthians 5:5).
Perhaps if God didn’t let you commit those sexual sins, you would have stayed away from him forever, which would have been far worse than running for a season but then coming to your senses and repenting (Psalm 119:67).
4. God Let You Commit Those Sexual Sins You Now Regret Because the Gospel Is Enough
The final answer to questions about why God did not stop us from sinning is this: Because he didn’t half to.
In other words, when we ask why God did not stop us from a certain sin we now deeply regret, in a way, we are saying, “I don’t feel the gospel is enough to take away the guilt of what I’ve done.” When we are upset at God for not stopping us from our past sins, we are saying that the key to feeling right with God is rooted in our own obedience, not in the grace of our Lord Jesus (Ephesians 2:8-10).
God didn’t stop you from the past sexual sins you committed that you now deeply regret because stopping you from your sins is not the solution he has chosen to best restore our relationship with him. Instead of micromanaging our behavior, he sent Jesus to pay the penalty for sins and be raised from the dead that we might be raised to new life with him (2 Corinthians 5:17-21).
God couldn’t have stopped Paul from persecuting the church. But he didn’t. Instead, he used his grace on Paul. In 1 Corinthians 15:9-10 Paul states, “For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain.”
God doesn’t stop our sins because the gospel is enough! Jesus enough! If you still have regrets about past sins, go to the cross, onload your burdens there. His grace is sufficient. 2 Corinthians 12:8-10 states:
Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
No matter what you’ve done, he can cleanse you and give you complete purity through Christ.
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