Sin, What is it?

SIN - WHAT IS IT?

There are various definitions in the Bible for sin.

Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law (1 John 3:4).

All unrighteousness is sin (1 John 5:17).

Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin (James 4:17).

Whatsoever is not of faith is sin (Romans 14:23).

But if ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin (James 2:9).

We think of sin as what we do or what we don't do. We identify them as sins of commission and sins of omission. But sin is more than what we do and what we don't do.

Jesus is our substitute. We are guilty and He is innocent. Yet He takes our guilt upon Himself that we might be considered innocent. He took our place. He became guilty (what we are) that we might become innocent (what He is).

He became what we are.

"For he (God the Father) hath made Him (Jesus) to be sin for us …" (2 Corinthians 5:21).

Jesus became what we are. We are sin. Jesus was made to be sin … for us.

Sin is what we are!

It comes out of us. It is what defiles us.

"For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lasciviousness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness: all these evil things COME FROM WITHIN, and defile the man" (Mark 7:21-23).

Jeremiah tells us that the human heart is deceitful. How deceitful? ABOVE ALL THINGS! (Jeremiah 17:9)

Job asks, "What is man that he should be clean? And he that is born of a woman, that he should be righteous?" …

"How much more abominable and filthy is man, which drinketh iniquity like water?" (Job 15:14, 16)

Sin is more than what we do and don't do. Sin is what we are. It is our nature, our fallen nature.

But don't we get a new nature? Are not believers born again?

Yes. But the new nature does not obliterate the old sinful nature. They war against one another as in Romans 7. The flesh, the old sinful nature, fights against the Spirit, the new born again nature. The battle goes on until this corruption puts on incorruption at the last trumpet (1 Corinthians 15:52-54).

True believers will lead righteous lives. If and when they fall, they will hang their heads in shame and ask God for forgiveness. But they will lead righteous lives.

However, their lives are never righteous enough to open Heaven's gate. That would be salvation by works.

It has been said that John Wesley, founder of Methodism, believed in a second blessing, one to come after the new birth, in which the believer reaches full sanctification, a state in which he doesn't commit sin.

Wesley was probably the greatest itinerate preacher since the Apostle Paul. Some believe that his preaching to the lower class, along with his brother Charles and George Whitfield, enabled England to avoid the horror of a revolution similar to the one that convulsed France beginning in 1789.

John Wesley was clear on justification by faith and although he believed in a second blessing, he was honest enough to confess that he never received it. Some of his followers felt that they had.

As the teaching of the second blessing lost favor in the Methodist Church, Nazarenes split with Methodism in the late 1800's in order to support the doctrine. Various Holiness Churches followed.

It is sin which separates us from God. A sinless being would be acceptable to God. If God could have sent the Holy Spirit to dwell in man's heart and work a work that would produce a sinless being, acceptable to God, then Jesus need not come to this earth and die for our sins. He could have stayed in Heaven and let the Holy Spirit do its work.

Adherents to the second blessing see that the "… power to become sons of God …" in John 1:12, is a power to work internally on the human heart and make it righteous. The margin in the KJV says "power" can mean the "right" or "privilege".

It is the right, the privilege to become a son of God because of God's work of grace on Calvary's cross in the Person of His Son, Jesus Christ, not because of some change in the human heart.

In fact, the scripture tells us that God justifies the ungodly. That is, before there is a change of heart, because his faith, his belief, is counted for righteousness (Romans 4:5). It is AFTER his belief that a change of heart occurs.

Again, in Romans 1:16 where Paul says that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation, power is seen as the transforming power of the Holy Spirit to transform the human heart.

However, verse 17 plainly states, "For therein (that is, in the gospel) is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, the just shall live by faith". What faith does the just (one who is justified) live by? It is faith, trust, acceptance that Jesus died for our sins. That our salvation is in Him.

The Apostle Paul plainly tells us in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4, that the gospel is about Christ who died for our sins. It is about his death, burial, and resurrection. The gospel is about Christ and His experience. It is not about man, what takes place in man, nor about man's experience.

Unfortunately, American Protestantism places such a great emphasis on man's experience because we have lost sight of the great Pauline doctrine of justification by faith, which the Reformers pulled out of the Dark Ages in the 1500's. It brought about the greatest revival since apostolic times. Yet noted theologian Paul Tillich said that when he came to America in the 1930's, Reformation theology was almost unknown at Union Theological Seminary in New York.

Sin is what we are. Sin is what we humans have been since the fall in Eden. Sin is what we will be until the Second Coming of Christ. Sin is SELF-righteousness. Sin is looking down on others who are not as righteous as we are.
"If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us" (1 John 1:8).

Although Wesley is recorded as understanding and believing the doctrine of justification by faith, his long suit was sanctification. It well must be that most all of his reported 42,000 sermons were on this subject so dear to his heart.

Man is not saved by a new birth but, of course, he is not saved without one.

Somehow Wesley's concentration on God's work on the human heart allowed the great truth of justification to recede in his mind to the extent that he could believe in a second blessing. The doctrines of justification by faith and the second blessing are not compatible.

Methodism was a major part of American Revivalism, which swept the frontier in the early 1800's. Feeling and emotion were big in the camp meetings of the day. It laid the foundation for Protestant religion in this country today where the theology of the Reformation is not well known, and where the person in the pew is led to believe that he is saved by being born again.

Sin is what we are. Never is there enough transformation of the human heart that will allow us to stand before God. It is only God's work of grace in the Person of His Dear Son that makes us acceptable in His sight.

Sin is what we are.

God created man in His own image. Man rebelled against his Creator. God came to this earth, took on human flesh in order to save man. What did man do? Man killed God.

Sin is animosity toward God. Wanting to kill God. Sin is the rejection of LIFE itself. No wonder that sin, when it is finished, brings forth death.

Why did man sin. The serpent said it would open man's eyes. And man would be as gods, knowing good and evil. Why would man want to know evil. He already knew the creation, which God said was good. Why would man disobey his Maker and eat of the forbidden fruit?

Why, why, why?

There is no reason why. If a reason could be given, sin could be justified. There is no reason for sin.

From the history of six thousand years of sin it will be seen by the redeemed, the great multitude that will inhabit eternity, that there is no reason for sin and that glory and honor and blessing belong to the Lamb who saved them from it.

"He will make an utter end: affliction shall not rise up the second time" (Nahum 1:9).