Sin & Split Personality

Excerpt from A Praying Life by Paul E. Miller, P. 92

All sin involves a splitting of the personality--what James calls being "double minded" (4:8). If we become proud, we have an inflated sense of self that has lost touch with who we really are. If a husband watches porn online and then warmly greets his wife, he has created two people--one public and one hidden. If you talk about friends disparagingly behind their backs, you've created two personalities--the loving friend and the gossiping friend. You try to keep the personalities separate by telling those to whom you gossip, "Please keep this in confidence."

We first see this split immediately after Adam and Eve sin. Their friendly, walking-with-God selves are replaced by hiding, naked selves. God's searching question, "Where are you?" (Genesis 3:9), attempts to expose this fracture of the two selves.

Repentance brings the split personality together and thus restores integrity to the life. The real self is made public. When the proud person is humbled, the elevated self is united with the true self.