Let us speak of a matter that carries weight—of a word that loses its shape when we try to define it not by what it is, but by what it leaves behind. When meaning is measured by outcome alone, truth is quietly bent. What remains is not definition, but interpretation—formed by our own hands.
We gather our understanding from lived experience, and experience rarely stands untouched. It is filtered through what we have named right and wrong, judged by consequence, softened or sharpened by how the result makes us feel. When the result wounds us, the meaning is often altered to lessen the blow. Thus, good and evil are handled as lightly as daily choices, decided with confidence and little fear. Yet what seems harmless when first tasted may, over time, draw a person down a slope whose end they did not intend to reach.
The word is sin.
Many who hear it speak of visible acts—violence, deceit, hatred, unrestrained anger. These are not false, but they are incomplete. They are the echo, not the source. The word itself reaches deeper than behavior. At its root, sin means only this: to fall short.
The image is old. An archer raises the bow and fixes his sight on the mark. The target is clear. The standard does not move. Yet any deviation—no matter how slight—sends the arrow elsewhere. Distance is irrelevant. Nearness does not matter. To miss the center by a hair is still to miss it entirely.
Once this meaning is understood, a quiet conclusion follows. The measure admits no margin. The standard allows no adjustment. Precision is not partial. From this, the language of lists and categories begins to fade. The question is no longer which acts qualify or disqualify, but whether perfect alignment is possible at all.
Only one answer remains.
Truth does not change to accommodate the one who aims. The mark does not lower itself. And so the ancient record speaks plainly:
“For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”
Here, sin is not weighed by consequence or explained by intention. It is named by distance—by the space between what is and what ought to be.
What follows is not resignation, nor denial. Skill may still be honed. The bow may still be drawn with care. But reliance shifts. Confidence is no longer placed in the steadiness of the hand, but in the one whose aim does not fail.
When sin is reduced to outcome alone, its deeper nature is obscured. It is not first about what is seen, but about alignment—about where the heart is turned, and the One who, in the end, carries both archer and arrow to their rest.