You have heard it said don't commit adultery, but I say to you don't lust. The heavy sin was lust; the light sin was [not 00.17.56] committing adultery. You have heard it said this, but I say to you this. This is light and heavy statements. Another way you lose light and heavy is you would use light and heavy in order to decide what to do when the Bible contradicts itself, because light and heavy was so important. You want to handle something at the light so it never gets to the heavy. To understand this we have to understand a Hebrew definition of sin. There are three levels of sin in the Hebrew culture; first level is iniquity, second level is sin, third level is transgression. Now to understand this even further we have to understand the pictures on the Hebrew word iniquity. The Hebrew word iniquity is the word - let me write it out. Okay, [avon. 00.18.51] Avon, like the make up company right, okay. The old Pentecostals love that right. You see, I told you, even the word for make up is sin! [Laughter]
Okay, so avon - three letters, three pictures. The picture of the 'a' is an eye, the picture of a vav is a hook or a nail, and the picture of the nun is fish multiplying. So when a Hebrew person read the word iniquity this is what they read: whatever your eye hooks to multiplies. Whatever dominates your focus becomes very large. Listen to me, when problems are in clear view those problems are actually bigger than they actually are. In a mirror it says objects appear closer - objects in a mirror are closer than they appear okay? It's the opposite here. When something is a problem and that problem is in focus, the problem becomes bigger than it actually is because whatever your eye hooks to multiplies. Whatever your eye hooks to multiplies. I have seen a lot of people in good situations leave those situations because the problem appears big. I'm a counsellor by trade. I can't tell you the number of husbands who have left good women and four months later regret it, and all it was was the problem got bigger than it actually was. The wife leaves a good man and four months later she regrets it. Why? Because in actuality it's just the problem became the focus and whatever your eye hooks to multiplies. It got bigger than it actually was.
This is the concept of iniquity. Iniquity is whatever your eye hooks to multiplies. There are three levels to it. Let me see if I can explain this. Let's say I wanted that phone and so iniquity is my eye hooks to the phone and my need for it multiplies, okay? That's iniquity. Now in the Old Testament could you prosecute me for iniquity? No. Why? Because you don't know that I'm thinking it. Now here's sin. Sin is this. It says that a person sins when he's drawn away by his own lust and enticed, so as I look at the phone my need for the phone becomes bigger. At some point it creates a lust. Once it creates a lust and entices me, now I'm in sin - and let me just - if I could blow away some theology here and I haven't done anything yet. I've simply thought it, it's multiplied, my eye hooked to it, it became a lust and I'm enticed by it. That's sin. Transgression is when I actually take it, so I actually transgress the law. Now in the Old Testament could you prosecute someone for iniquity? No. Could you prosecute them for sin? No. Could you prosecute them for transgression? Yes, as long as you had two or three witnesses. So you had to have two or three witness of somebody transgressing the law. That's transgression.