When I was a teenager a firecracker exploded in my hand. It wasn't big enough to do permanent damage, but I'll always remember the experience. For about 3 minutes the entire world turned into a searing pain in my hand and a loud ringing in my ears. There was nothing I could do but wait for the water to cool the burn and for my hearing to slowly return.
Sin is like that.
It's more like that the more you're trying to hear from the Lord. It doesn't separate you from God's grace as much as it deafens you to his voice. The world just turns to pain and ringing, and there is no cure for the effects of sin.
The reality is Christ has already forgiven you for it, if you'll accept. But the effect, the hurt, the shutting up of the soul into a castle of selfishness, that doesn't always just go away. Ask a minister who's been caught in a public embarrassment. God forgives him, but the look in his wifes eyes, the way the church shuns him, that's still there.
Jimmy Swaggart has his own radio show again, not as big, but it's there.
Time was created for healing. There are certain wounds that only time can heal. And there is no wound that won't eventually be healed, either here or in the world to come. It's just a matter of time. Time for the ringing to die down, for the wound to cool. There are no shortcuts or magic elixirs for wounds of the heart, there is only time. No one can wound you forever (except, ironically, God) and sometimes nothing will make you feel any better.
Except Time.
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