SIN
How does the Bible define sin? Where does sin come from and what are its effects? How is sin dealt with, both in the Bible and in the lives of Christians today?
There are few issues more important to the Christian than the issue of sin. We often come to Christ to be set free from our sinfulness, and our most intense struggles are frequently a response to Paul's command, "so do not let sin control your life here on earth" (Romans 6:12). Yet because our society avoids the term sin, we are confused about it’s meaning, in the Bible and in our lives.
The Bible uses a variety of terms to talk about sin. Some, like "breaking a command" (Romans 5:14), emphasize sin's failure to conform to God's desires. Still others, like "turning away" (Hosea 11:7), emphasize the inner attitude which sin expresses. Sin is a breach of relationship. At times this can refer to a broken relationship between individuals ("If your fellow believer sins against you." Matthew 18:15), but most often the Bible speaks of sin against God.
Sin begins at the beginning of the human story. We were not created sinful; we were created good, but with the capacity for choice. God placed Adam and Eve in the garden with only one prohibition: not to eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The account of the sin of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden in Genesis 3 shows the combination of temptation and decision in the first sin. Paul views the sin of Adam and Eve, when they ate the forbidden fruit, as the start of an age of sinfulness (Romans 5:12-21). Adam represented all of us in the garden. We are sinners when we are born, and so we cry out with David, I was brought into this world in sin" (Psalm 51:5).
The Old Testament talks about sin in the context of the history of the nation of Israel. Israel sinned by failing to regard the holiness of God's presence in their midst (Leviticus 20:1-9). They sinned by yielding to the temptations of security and luxury found in the surrounding nations (Isaiah 30; Hosea 7:8-16) and by unjustly treating the weak (Amos 5:10-12). Sin in the Old Testament is not living, as God would want. Inwardly, it is the heart turned against God; outwardly it is the breaking of commands.
The New Testament speaks more to the sins of individuals than nations. Jesus emphasized that obedience to God's commands must go beyond mere performance of rules to changing our attitudes. Sin lies in a failure to respond positively to the revelation of God. Paul says that "they knew God, but they did not give glory to God or thank him" (Romans 1:21). New Testament sin is the human tendency against God, which says yes to evil inner impulses and says no to God.
The consequences of sin are separation and death. Because of our tendency to choose our way rather than Gods way, the commands of God are not able to bring us into good relationship with God. Rather, "the law came to make sin worse" (Romans 5:20). We lack peace-with God, with ourselves, with others, and with nature. The ultimate consequence of sin is the anger of God expressed in judgment and punishment.
But the Bible teaches that God has made a way to restore relationship with him and to grow in likeness to his own ways. In the Old Testament, God provided a system of "sin offerings," annual sacrifices which would "remove the people's sins" (Leviticus 4) and bring God's favor. But sacrifices were merely the outward expression of a heart turned toward God. Hosea writes, "I want faithful love more than I want animal sacrifices" (Hosea 6:6). In the person of Jesus Christ, God himself offered for us the acceptable sacrifice for all sins. "But Christ came only once and for all time at just the right time to take away all sin by sacrificing himself" (Hebrews 9:26). Paul writes, "While we were God's enemies, he made friends with us through the death of his Son" (Romans 5:10). By trusting in the sacrifice of Christ, we are freed from the separation and penalty of sin. On earth, Jesus was found welcoming the "sinner" and forgiving sins. The risen Christ does the same for us today.
The Bible not only tells us of our rescue from the penalty of sin. It also tells of the removal of the power of sin. Paul writes, "We know that our old life died with Christ on the cross so that our sinful selves would have no power over us and we would not be slaves to sin" (Romans 6:6). "If we confess our sins, he will forgive. He will cleanse us from all the wrongs we have done" (1 John 1:9). By offering the parts of our "body to God to be used in doing good" (Romans 6:13), by using "the Spirit's help to stop doing the wrong things" (Romans 8:13), looking "only to Jesus" (Hebrews 12:2), we are given a means of obtaining not only a new relationship with God, but through that, a new life in God.