Deal with Sin Quickly

It is best to prevent, as much as in us is possible, the very first risings of sinful passions, before the soul be overcast. Passions are but little motions at first, but grow as rivers do, greater and greater, the farther they are carried from their spring. The first risings must be looked to, because there is most danger in them, and we have least care over them. Sin, like rust, or a canker, will little by little eat out all the graces of the soul. All sin is easier kept out than driven out. If we cannot prevent wicked thoughts, yet we may deny them lodging in our hearts. What we are afraid to do before men, we should be afraid to think before God. It would much further our peace to keep our judgments clear, as being the eye of the soul, whereby we may discern in every action and passion what is good and what is evil. When the heart begins once to be kindled, it is easy to smother the smoke of passion, which otherwise will fume up into the head, and gather into so thick a cloud as we will lose the sight of ourselves and what is best to be done. Little risings neglected cover the soul before we are aware. If we would check these risings, and stifle them in their birth, they would not break out afterwards to the reproach of religion, to the grief of God's Spirit in us, to the disturbance of our own spirits in doing good, to the disheartening of us in the troubling of our inward peace, and the weakening of our assurance. Let us stop sin's beginnings as much as may be possible. So soon as they begin to rise, let us begin to examine what raised them, and where they are about to carry us (Psa. 4:4). The way to be still is to examine ourselves first, and then censure what stands not with reason. As David does, when he had given way to unbefitting thoughts of God's providence, 'So foolish was I,’ he said, 'as a beast before you' (Psa. 73:22).

Devotional Readings taken from Puritan Richard Sibbes 'Refreshment for the Soul.'
The Soul's Conflict with Itself, Works, vol. 1, p. 166
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