Music Piracy And The Gospel

As I read this story about the Recording Industry Association of America cracking down on illegal downloads by college students, the correlations between the article and the gospel were flowing. Everyone has heard of this happening, but it probably won't affect them.

The students who were interviewed admitted that they knew it was illegal to download and share the music, but rationalization was everywhere:

"Obviously I knew it was illegal, but no one got in trouble for it."

"Johnson compares what he did to people driving 5 miles per hour over the speed limit. 'It's not like I downloaded millions of songs and sold them to people'."

"But the students coughing up the cash question why they're the ones getting in trouble."

Maybe it's because they're guilty, and they're getting what they deserve under the law. (Really, getting off easy by settling out of court, but I'm still working on a scriptural parallel to that.) As I read, the arguments sounded so much like our own reasoning when faced with God's law. "I'm not so bad. Lookit that guy over there! I've only killed one person and he deserved it. But that guy's a serial killer! Besides, everybody's doing it."

Sounds like a lot of law, and that was the point of the article (or at least how I took it.)
The grace came in the form of the girl's parents paying her fine: "Without their help, I don't know what I would have done."

Indeed. Without Jesus to pay our fine, what would any of us do?