I didn't grow up in a family that talked much about "sin" per se. My parents taught me important values and ways to relate with other people, but I don't know that they really couched it in the language of "sin." At least not until my mom underwent a conversion experience of her own. Then the word started to crop up a lot more, and if you cared about sin at all, you better figure out what was and what wasn't sin.
I think most Christians probably live their lives in between two extremes when it comes to this issue. One the one side, you have those who find the idea of sin to be pretty antiquated. It might come up in liturgy, and it's sure out there in some big, awful ways like I mentioned previously, but it doesn't really relate much to the every day lives of people unless you are a racist or murderer.
On the other side you have the legalists and perfectionists, who are probably related to one another but not necessarily the same person. The legalists try their best to figure out - down to the minutest details - which types of behavior are considered "sin" and which are not. They then consider any kind of behavior that is even comes close to whatever is considered "sin" to be wrong as well and they do their best not to engage in that either. Perfectionists are part of that same system, but they believe as well that a person can actually be considered perfect by God while still living on Earth. In other words, they can achieve a state of sinless perfection (however temporary) through their own efforts and the help of the Holy Spirit.
The worst sermon I ever heard involves legalism like what I have just described. When I was away at seminary, our family attended a fairly conservative, evangelical Baptist church that was focused on college students and young adults. One of the pastors was a fairly young guy who had just recently graduated from seminary, and he loved to get up in front of the congregation every Sunday and tell them how his job was pretty much having coffee with people, and how people should come seek him out so he could have coffee with them. It was enough to make a person nauseous hearing that week after week. Anyway, this particular Sunday, he was doing his best to relate to the congregation and show us how he was a fallible human being just like us. And his illustration of choice was that he struggled with drinking too much Mountain Dew. Apparently, he was exercising regularly, and he had his masturbation, cussing, speeding, and drinking under control, and he was showing up at church every Sunday and tithing his 10%, so pretty much all that was left to fix in his life was drinking too much Mountain Dew.
It's a story that makes me want to do some cussing myself, but only because I can remember being in a very similar position in my early 20s. I remember thinking, "let's see... I don't do this, or this, or this, or this... What left to I have to change?" And I remember (to my shame) that I couldn't come up with anything. If you are pretty sure that sin is all about making personal, moral choices (as defined by your ethnicity, nationality, age, socioeconomic position, and Christian subculture), then its a pretty easy trap to fall into. But, I had to learn that sin was about more than me and my personal moral choices.
Behind all this lies some important groundwork on what sin is or is not. Legalists like to focus on behavior, and even a cursory reading of scripture will confirm that there are some actions that are considered to be sin. But, an even more careful reading of scripture will yield the more important point: that sin involves much more than what a person does or does not do, but that it involves the orientation of his or her heart. It has to do with broken relationship between God and the whole creation, and the work of Jesus to set that right again. There are also important social and structural aspects to sin, like some of the "ism's": racism, sexism, etc. And, I'm pretty sure, sin so permeates everything that it's practically impossible to get away from. I don't think any one of us could live a moment without sin, because it's a part of us in so many ways. We could spend the rest of our lives excavating deep down inside our soul and the further we would dig, the more ugly, sinfulness we would encounter.
So, in some ways, sin is a much smaller deal than conservative evangelicals make it out to be, and in some ways it is much more serious than they seem to give it credit for. It's a smaller deal in that I'm not really sure how much time God wastes on the errant curse word that escapes from my mouth, or the fleeting lustful thought I just had a few seconds ago. And that really seems to be where most evangelicals spend their time when it comes to sin: worrying about what people say, or their sexual thoughts or fantasies, or whether or not they are drinking, or if they are watching some kind of inappropriate movie or television show, or whatever. And, I'm pretty sure that God would prefer me to love my wife better, be less angry with my children, care more for the people around me, and maybe even use my time, talents, and energy in ways that benefit those who have been excluded and trampled on in this world. In that sense, I think it's a much bigger deal than most evangelicals give it credit for. If you spend your whole life worrying about the minituae of what is sin and what isn't, then I think you miss the chance to engage with it in a deeper way and come to know yourself differently.
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