Conviction

John 16:8 And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment:

God uses many ways to bring about conviction in the lives of people. We need people today in the Lord's service who are sensitive to the conviction of the Holy Spirit. If we are to grow, if we are to flee from sin we must be convicted of it.
Sometimes we grow accustomed to sins. At first we fear them and shun them. If we do not flee them and turn them over to God we may just try to ignore them. The next step is to tolerate them. (It is frightening to hear so many people speak of tolerance today) Tolerance is followed by acceptance and before long a person will be embracing them.
We must be sensitive to conviction of sin and turn to righteousness. Ignoring, tolerating, accepting, and embracing sin does not make us a nicer or kinder person. Actually it is just the opposite because sin is destructive. God would never deny us anything that was for our own good.