Sin

WHAT IS SIN?

Here is a brief background that would help you when you read this write-up. God created Adam and Eve (see Creation) and placed them in the Garden of Eden. Satan, also called "the Devil", through the serpent, seduces Eve to eat the fruit of the tree that God had specifically told them not to do. Eve persuades Adam to also eat of the fruit. This is the record of the first sin in the Holy Bible - the sin of disobedience. God puts them out of the Garden of Eden.

They gave birth to Cain, their first son, and then to Abel. Both brothers made offerings to God. God was pleased with Abel's offering but rejected Cain's offering. Cain was dejected and angry with Abel. Cain murdered Abel - this is the record of the second sin in the Holy Bible. Now on to the write-up taken from the Baker’s Evangelical Dictionary:

“Perhaps we most often think of sin as wrongdoing or transgression of God's law. Sin includes a failure to do what is right. But sin also offends people; it is violence and “lovelessness” toward other people, and ultimately, rebellion against God. Further, the Bible teaches that sin involves a condition in which the heart is corrupted and inclined toward evil.

In the biblical world sin is, from its first appearance, tragic and mysterious. It is tragic because it represents a fall from the high original status of humankind. Created in God's image, Adam and Eve are perfect but immature, fine but breakable, like glass dishes. They are without flaw, yet capable of marring themselves. Satan uses a serpent to tempt Eve and Adam, first to question God, then to rebel against him.

First, Satan introduces doubts about God's authority and goodness. "Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?" (Genesis 3:1). He (Satan) invites Eve to consider how the fruit of the tree of knowledge is good for food and for knowledge. We see the tendency of sin to begin with a subtle appeal to something attractive and (seemingly) good in itself, to an act that is somehow plausible and directed toward some (seemingly) good end.

Throughout the Bible almost every sin reaches for things with some intrinsic value, such as security, knowledge, peace, pleasure, or a good name. But behind the appeal to something (seemingly) good, sin ultimately involves a raw confrontation between obedience and rebellion. Will Adam and Eve heed their impressions or God's instructions? Will they listen to a creature or the Creator? Will they serve God or themselves? Who will judge what is right, God or humans? Who will see to the results? Ultimately, by taking the position of arbiter between the conflicting counsel of God and the serpent, Eve and Adam have already elevated themselves over God and rebelled against him.

Here too the first sins disclose the essence of later sins. Sin involves the refusal of humankind to accept its God-given position between the Creator and lower creation. It flows from decisions to reject God's way, and to steal, curse, and lie simply because that seems more attractive or reasonable. Here we approach the mystery of sin. Why would the first couple, sinless and without inclination toward sin, choose to rebel? Why would any creature presume to know more or know better than its creator?

Adam and Eve become sinners by a historical act. The principal effects of sin are alienation from God, from others, from oneself, and from creation. They emerge almost at once. Alienation from God lead Adam and Eve to fear and flee from him. Alienation from each other and themselves shows in their shame (awareness of nakedness) and blame shifting. Adam acts out all three alienations at once when, in response to God's questions, he excuses himself by blaming both Eve and God for his sin: "The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit" (Genesis 3:12).The sentence God pronounces upon sin includes grace (Genesis 3:15) and indicates that He retains sovereign control over His creation even in its rebellion, but it also establishes our alienation from nature in the curse upon childbearing, work, and creation itself (Genesis 3: 14-19).

After the curse, God graciously clothes the first couple, but He also expels them from the garden (Genesis 3:21-24). He graciously permits them to reproduce, but death enters human experience a short time later (Genesis 4:1,8; 5:5-31). These events prove the vanity and futility of sin. Adam and Eve seek new freedoms and dignity, but sin robs them of what they have; seeking advantage, they experience great losses.

The biblical books of Genesis and Romans teach that Adam and Eve did not sin for themselves alone, but, from their privileged position as the first, originally sinless couple, act as representatives for the human race. Since then sin, sinfulness, and the consequences of sin have marred all. Every child of Adam enters a race marked by sin, condemnation, and death (Romans 5:12-21). These traits become theirs both by heritage and, as they grow into accountability, by personal choice, as Cain's slaughter of Abel quickly shows.

In Cain's sin we have an early hint of the virulence and intractability of sin. Whereas Satan prompted Adam and Eve to sin, God himself cannot talk Cain out of it (Genesis 3:1-5; 4:6). While sin was external to Adam and Eve, it appears to spring up spontaneously from within Cain (their first-born son); it is a wild force in him, which he ought to master lest it devour him (Genesis 4:7). Sin is also becoming more aggravated: it is premeditated, it begins in the setting of worship, and it directly harms a brother, who deserves love. After his sin, far from manifesting guilt or remorse, Cain confesses nothing, refuses to repent, and chides God for the harshness of his punishments (Genesis 4:5-14). Cain's sin and impenitence foreshadow much of the future course of sin both within and without the Bible.

The fourth chapter of the first book of the Bible, Genesis, traces the development of sin. It becomes proud and deliberate (Genesis 4:23-24). Eventually, sin so pervades the world that every inclination of the thoughts of the human heart is only evil all the time (Genesis 6:5; 8:21). Consequently, the Lord purges the Earth of evil through the flood. When sin threatens to reassert itself in both direct disobedience and idolatry, God reveals his new intention to restrain sin by confusing human

language at Babel: (for it is) better that humanity be divided than that it stand together in rebellion against God.

The Bible illustrates that sin plagues all - even the people who believe in God and it also shows that punishment naturally follows, or is built into iniquity. The second book of the Bible, Exodus, reveals that sin not only brings suffering and punishment, but also violates God's laws. At Mount Sinai where the Ten Commandments were given to the nation of Israel, we learn that sin is transgression of God's law; it is behavior that trespasses onto forbidden territory (Romans 4:15). The Ten Commandments also label sin and unmask it. One can sin without knowing it, but the Ten Commandments make such ignorance less common. The Ten Commandments emphasize the external character of sin, but the laws that command Israel to love God and forbid it to worship idols or covet show that sin is internal too.

Transgressions are more than mistakes. The Bible never dismisses a sin simply because it was done by someone young or ignorant, or because it was done sometime ago. Sin pollutes the sinner, and the law requires that the pollution be removed. Sin offends God, and the law requires atonement through sacrifices, in many of which a victim gives its life blood for an atonement. Jesus Christ explained that sin arises from the heart. Bad trees bear bad fruit, blasphemous words spring from hearts filled with evil, and wicked men demand signs when they have already seen enough to warrant faith (Matthew 7:17-20; 12:33-39). Therefore, evildoing is not simply a matter of choice, rather, "Everyone who sins is a slave to sin" (John 8:34).

Sin begins with evil desires (James 1:14; 4:1-4) and leads to death when fully grown (James 1:15). The Bible indicates that wickedness gains some of its power through repetition. When an individual commits a sin, it can become, through repetition, a habit, a vice, and a character trait. When one person imitates the sins of another, wickedness can be institutionalized. Whole governments can become corrupt; whole industries can be based on deception or abuse of others. Societies can wrap themselves in a fabric of deceit. Thus one sinner encourages another and the wrong kind of friendship with the world makes one an enemy of God (James 4:4-6).

The last book of the Bible, The Revelation, also reminds us that sin involves more than individual people and acts. In some places Satan reigns (The Revelation 2:13). The dragon (Satan), in his futile desire to devour the church (believers of God and followers of Jesus Christ), prompts the wicked to persecute it (The Revelation 12:1-17). Both government and religious leaders serve Satan in his wars against the church (The Revelation 12:17-13:17).

What, then, is the essence of sin? Sin has three chief aspects: breach of law, violation of relationships with people and things protected by the law (of God), and rebellion against God. The essence of sin, therefore, is not a substance but a relationship of opposition. Sin opposes God's law and His created beings. Sin hates rather than loves, it doubts or contradicts rather than trusts and affirms, it harms and abuses rather than helps and respects.

But sin is also a condition. The Bible teaches that there are lies and liars, sins and sinners. People can be "filled" (meaning "controlled") by hypocrisy and lawlessness (Matthew 23:28). God "gives some over to sin, " allowing them to wallow in every kind of wickedness (Romans 1:18-32). The apostle Paul, speaking of the time before their conversion, told the Ephesians, "You were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live" (Romans 2:1-2).

This said, we have hardly defined sin, and with good reason. Sin is elusive. Sin has no substance, no independent existence. It does not even exist in the sense that love or justice does. It exists only as a parasite of the good or good things. Sin creates nothing; it abuses, perverts, spoils, and destroys the good things God has made. It has no program, no thesis; it only has an antithesis, an opposition.

Sometimes wickedness is as senseless as a child who pulls the hair or punches the stomach of another, then honestly confesses, "I don't know why I did that." In some ways sin is an absence rather than a presence: it fails to listen, walks past the needy, and subsists in alienation rather than relation.

Negative as sin is, it hides itself under the appearance of what is good. At the first temptation, sin operated under the guise of claiming (seemingly) good things such as food and knowledge. Even the goal of being like God is good in some ways; after all, God made the first couple in his image. Similarly, when Satan tempted Jesus, the second Adam, he offered things (seemingly) good in themselves: food, knowledge, and rule over the kingdoms of the Earth. Sin and temptation continue to appeal to things (seemingly) good and desirable in themselves. Fornication (sexual immorality) promises bodily pleasure, boasting seeks honor, by breaking promises or vows people hope for release from hardship. Someone can make a persuasive defense for almost every offense.

Although negative and irrational, sin is also a power. It crouches at Cain's door, ready to devour him (Genesis 4:7). It compels the apostle Paul to do the evil he does not wish (Romans 7:14-20). It moves and is moved by demonic and societal forces. It enters the heart, so that wickedness wells up spontaneously from within (Matthew 15:17-19). Its stronghold is the all but instinctive tendency to put one's own interests and desires first. From the selfish heart come rebellion, godlessness, cursing, lies, slander, envy, greed, sensuality, and pride (Matthew 12:34-37; Romans 1:18-32).

Three factors compound the tragedy of sin. First, it pervades the whole person; no sphere escapes, for the very heart of the sinner is corrupt (Psalms 51:5; Jeremiah 17:9; Romans 8:7). Second, evil resides in the heart of the crown of God's creation, the bearer of God's image, the one appointed to rule the Earth for God. The remarkable capacities of humans to think, plan, persuade, and train others enables wickedness to become clever and strong. Third, sin is proud; hence it resists God and His salvation and offers a counterfeit salvation instead (2 Thessalonians 2:2-4)."