In the last year I've watched as my faith has taken a large decline. It initially began over the idea of not being able to stop living a lust filled life (but that isn't what this question is about), and after talking to my girlfriend I realized there seems to be this huge hole in my knowledge about living as a sinner.
You see my girlfriend is a social worker, and constantly has to deal with patients who do not have the ability to properly reason. The idea that they need God is almost impossible for some of them to grasp. And the idea that they could stop the sinful ways they live? It's basically impossible. Like asking a potato to run.
Or I have a friend who was sexually abused growing up. He is a smart person, but his whole view on sexuality has completely been distorted. And we basically ask him to just "stop sinning"?
I don't understand it. I can understand a life living in pain, or without something. At least that has taught me something in my journey. But living a life of sin, where hope to remove it is essentially non existent? I don't understand how God can put us in that place. We didn't ask for these things to be part of our lives, they're just there. And we're told we need to remove them from our lives.
What creates sin in our would is the amazing gift of God's Free Will given to us. We create sin by rebelling against God and doing what we want, and God is not going to intervene in anything we do not want him to which is an amazing gift. If you read the New Testament, Christ states that God does not look at the outside of a person but at their heart. Our innermost thoughts. If you are trying hard to fight against certain sins, but you do them, you can take solace in st paul's words:
"So this is the principle I have discovered: When I want to do good, evil is right there with me. For in my inner being I delight in God’s Law.But I see another law at work in my body, warring against the law of my mind and holding me captive to the law of sin that dwells within me. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord!'
Attaining virtues to replace our sins, especially one's that are engrained, takes time. One most continually battle against them, and this is what a Christian is called to do.
"Finally, be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can make your stand against the devil’s schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this world’s darkness, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms."
When we struggle against our sins, when we pray for God to help us, when we ascetically stay away from them as best we can little by little we will make progress, for Christ commands us to be perfect as our Father is perfect, so we are able to attain perfection if we work hard on Earth, for the 'Kingdom of Heaven is within you'. It is not a place in the sky.
and as you are fighting your sins with God's help, st. James says:
Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
If you need inspiration along the way, read the lives of the saint. They attained the Holy Spirit in full, so they are in full union with God and have become perfected within God's Divine Love which dwells in their heart. Seek Union with God, for without God, we can do nothing.