Major Bible Themes

Okay, this is page two, or day two, of talking about sins. And a lot of this is stuff that you're pretty much aware of and have gone through. But I thought, anybody read the chapter on sin? I thought this was kind of interesting. Under B, the biblical doctrine of sin, He says that the teaching of scripture is that sin is any want of conformity to the character of God, whether it be an act, a disposition, or a state.

Sin is sin because it is different from what God is, and God is eternally holy. Sin is always against God. my thought was when I read that was that's a pretty good definition because we remember last week we talked a lot about the two trees the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil sets the premise for all human beings that the basis of our existence is good versus evil and until you study the word of God you don't really get a good handle on a definition for sin, and I like this one, it's a want of conformity to the character of God or anything that's different from God. Anything that's different from God would be sin. And as we talked about, the Greek word for sin is hamartia, which means to miss the mark, and the mark is obviously God.

Now if sin is looked at from that frame of reference, it changes your association with sin in terms of whether you think you can schmooze your way by it or not. Because if I'm on the good and evil train, then I can be subjective and relative and say, well, this is evil, this is good, and I'm doing good. How many non-believers have you talked to in your life who say, well, you know, I've done some bad things, but I'm doing some good things, and by the time I die, God is going to grade me on the curve, and I'll have done enough good things, and he'll probably accept me in his presence. But if you come back to him and say, well, let's talk about good and bad, If you catalog bad as sin, then if sin is a lack of any conformity to God, you're in big trouble. Now, one of the things that we want to talk about today is define the difference between sins and sin.

You will find in Paul's epistles, and it's in Romans, Romans chapter 1.1 through chapter 5.11, the word sins, S-I-N-S is used constantly. When you get to 5.12 and going forward, it changes to singular, the word sin. What's the difference? You can't read this, but I'll read it for you.

Sins are acts of sin. and bitterness, anger, etc. Sins are the product of the sin nature, so that's fairly easily defined. How would you define sin, S-I-N, singular? It's a sin nature. And it most often refers to the sin nature, and mostly if you were reading a Greek Bible, you would see a definite article in front of it. It would say THE SIN. THE SIN. Which means he's talking about a specific thing. OK?

Now, remember last week we talked about God's provision for sins? And notice it says here, God has forgiven every single sin. Is that a true statement? Did you listen to the tape from last week? God has forgiven every single sin, past, present, and future of every person in the world through the substitutionary death of Christ on the cross. True statement? No, it's not. My buddy across the street who's not a believer, are his sins forgiven? Paid for. Big difference. So cross that out and put paid for in there. Christ took the penalty for all the sins of all mankind forever. He paid the penalty.

But why isn't my buddy across the street forgiven? Because he has no faith. Well, yeah, that's the obvious reason. If he has no faith, then why without faith? What's the mechanics of why he wouldn't be forgiven? Because he has a sin nature. Did God forgive the sin nature? When Jesus died on the cross, he forgave you your sins. He paid the penalty for the sins of the world. Did he forgive the sin nature? No, he didn't. What did he do with it? He condemned it.

Look at Romans 8.3. I can recite it.

What the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh. God sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin he condemned the sin in the flesh. So that sin nature that you and I have is condemned. You still have it, it's under the penalty of condemnation, but you don't want to be around that sin nature when you leave the planet. Because if you are, you're going where it goes and that's condemnation. So my buddy across the street, even though his sins are paid for, he's attached to the sin nature. And when he leaves good old Mother Earth, he and the sin nature go together. The sin nature is condemned. What does that make him? Condemned.

You and I as believers have been identified with Christ and His death, burial and resurrection. died unto the sin nature, so did you. It's still there, but you're not attached to it anymore. Maybe another way to look at it is, here's you and your soul, the guy crossed the street, sin nature's got him. Right? When you become a believer, when you die with Christ, this happens. And the Holy Spirit now becomes your life.

This sin nature still functions within you and tries to convince you that this transaction didn't happen and it still wants to manifest, but you're separated. So when you leave the planet, what happens? We're stuck to the... Sin natures. Doesn't go with you. Right. Okay. That's basically how that works. Okay, so is that why God couldn't look at Christ as he was crucified? Because he had the sins of the world on him? Yeah. And he had your sin nature on him too. Yeah, that's right. He was the thing sin. So, what causes...

Trick question based on what you just answered. What's the one unforgivable sin? Unbelief. Unbelief in what? It's got to be specific. I can believe in the Republicans. Big mistake. Look right here. There is only one sin that a person will go to hell for and that is the sin of not believing in Christ. Do you buy into that? That the only reason someone does not get saved is unbelief in the person and work of Christ. Sure. Well, how about that poor slob in Bali, Uganda that never heard of Christ? Oh, they know about Christ there. Pick a place. How about Five Points? How about Cherry Hills? Never heard of Christ?

Somebody wrote, man is without excuse. Man is without excuse. And John, if you look at John, and we don't need to go there. In John 16 it says that the Spirit of God has come to convict the world of sin, of righteousness and of judgment, of sin because they don't believe in Me. Now, don't ask me how the Spirit of God gets everybody, but He does at some point. At some point even people who you may think have never heard of Christ at all now.

So let's say he doesn't get to, you know, my Uncle Louie. Is that unfair? He got to him. Uncle Louie didn't believe. Well let's say Uncle Louie never did get the gospel. Is that fair? God doesn't need to be fair. He doesn't have to be fair and he's under no obligation to give you Okay, but then there's an excuse because God isn't fair and so therefore you never heard of anything. But you do know this, that every single human being that comes on the planet, God says, you know who I am from my creation and from your conscience. And because you know who I am, I require two things from you.

What are they? That you honor me as God and that you're thankful. Every human being. Honor me as God and you're thankful. Okay, but they don't know about Christ. If my Uncle Louie, who lives in a place where Christ has never been mentioned, looks at his creation and says, wow, there must be a God. And whoever you are, I believe you. And I'm really thankful. Guess what God will do for my Uncle Louie? That's right. You'll get the message to them. Yes you will.

There's all kinds of missionary stories like that where this one woman woke up one day and said, God, I don't know who you are, but you aren't the tree in the middle of the village that we all worship. So whoever you are, reveal yourself to me. And within a week, this guy shows up with a little black book. And she said, well, you have the name of God in there. And he said, yeah, I do right here.

Every believer has a sin nature. Every believer has two natures. Do you agree with that? You have a sin nature and you have the nature of the resurrected Christ. No problem there. A new nature or the old nature, 2 Corinthians 5.17. Sin must have a source. If you only had one nature and you were a Christian, you would have no source for your sins. You'd have to come up with something like memories or ultimately Satan made me do it.

Okay? Okay, what was that resurrected what? You have the sin nature and you have the resurrected what? We have the nature of the resurrected Christ. Okay, thank you. Okay? Convincing about sin is the work of the Holy Spirit. Let me go back, I want to ask you one more question here. You see right here where it says, number 7, the sin nature is imparted at conception and is active from birth to death? I disagree with that statement too.

When did you become a sinner? Before we were born. How much before you were born? In Adam. When Adam sinned, you sinned didn't you? So it's not a matter of imputing or imparting the sin nature to you. Because you're an offspring of Adam, that's part of what the deal is. When you buy a car, it's got a motor in it. You don't impart the motor, it comes with it. is to be, when you are co-crucified with Christ, what that process is designed to do is to render your sin nature inactive so it will not produce its sins.

How many of you have read Watchman Nee's Normal Christian Life? If you haven't, I recommend you find it and read it. He has the best analogy there, a real simple one. He relates sins has whiskey bottles. And he said what most Christians do is they search out as many whiskey bottles as they can find and they break them. But you know down the road there's this thing called a whiskey factory that produces those bottles. What did God do with that factory? The goal of identification is to put the factory out of business so it won't produce any more bottles. That's what co-crucifixion does. Normal Christian Life by Watchman Ney. To understand identification truths, it's a priority.

So, you're citing Psalm 51 there? Say that again? You were citing Psalm 51 there? I was? Yeah. And number 7? Let me go back. Where you were just saying, well, by sin nature, Psalm 51, 1 through 5. So that's in support that it was from conception. Let's go to it. Let's look at it and read it. You got it? Go.

Have mercy upon me, O God, according to your loving kindness, according to the multitude of your tender mercies. Blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from sight that you may be found just when you speak, and blamelessly when you judge. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me." Oh, nasty. My mother was better than yours. In sin did my mother conceive me.

That doesn't mean she was committing a sin when she conceived you. because she was a sinner from Adam and your father was a sinner from Adam when they conceived you, guess what? You're just like them. You're exactly like them. Okay? Did you have a question there?

So David was wrong in writing that. What's that? David was wrong in writing that. No, he wasn't, because I think he's saying that, I think the verse is saying that in sin my mother conceived me, and it isn't that imparted. Well, I guess you could use the word imparted because, you know, do the physiological characteristics of our parents get imparted to us? You know, yeah, my dad had red hair, maybe I'm going to have red hair. you know, if my family characteristics, Courtney's family characteristics are imparted to his children and so you can look at a family and say, oh yeah, you must be a whatever, you know, because you kind of look alike and you kind of have the same characteristics. Well that's also true in the spiritual realm. Imparted soul characteristics with a sin nature come along with the program. So imparted, I guess so. Okay, Steve?

Sin versus sin and unbelievers. God has infinite love, grace and mercy and constantly working that life of unbeliever via the Holy Spirit to convict him of sin, righteousness and judgment. What the Spirit of God is doing, really, is to convince them that they're sinners. If I were the Holy Spirit and I can't convince you you're a sinner, what do you need a Savior for?

I need a psychiatrist. I don't need a Savior. Or another beer. Who knows? So, an unbeliever has reached a wrong conclusion concerning sin in his mind because how is he looking at it? He's looking at it from the glasses of the sin nature. He cannot see what he is because Satan has blinded him. He's operating on the good and evil principle out of the tree. That's all he knows.

Okay, but what about your conscience? Wouldn't your conscience tell you, wait a minute, that's just not a thing? Okay, your conscience is important because it is utilized by God to persuade you that there is a God. Right. Internally. But your conscience can be faulty in that it can, because of the society you live in, it can tell you that what is really sinful is okay. Good example.

I'm born in the United States. My parents are godless people. Abortion is okay with them. And I grow up thinking there's nothing wrong with abortion. Right? Yeah. I have it right in our country. Why would you argue with an abortionist? He said, well, you know, that's my conscience. He didn't care about your conscience. His conscience is fine. The Constitution and our country says abortion is okay, so we're going for it. What you say, but it's taken a life. He said, well, no, it's not a life. You see that?

The reason that they don't understand is for that their minds have been blinded. by Satan, and you know, trust me, he doesn't have a tough job, because the only thing you can rely on is your sin nature, Satan doesn't have to pick on you, he can leave you alone, because you can't see anything anyway.

So the convincing is the work of the Holy Spirit to penetrate the darkness and show you that you're a sinner. God loves the unbeliever and his ultimate will and responsibility is to save each unbeliever. The Holy Spirit overcomes the blindness by enlightening them with the truth. Now, look at this part. The convicting of sin, the Spirit of God is continuously convincing the unbeliever of one's sin or missing the mark that will keep him separated from God.

You think that's right? Do you think that, again my buddy across the street, he's not interested, is the Spirit of God constantly working on him? I think he is. Yeah, maybe. And you know why I think he is? Because God, salvation is an issue of grace. It's not an issue of obligation, it's an issue of grace. And God never stops working. And there's lots of examples of that.

I have a friend who's a His father, he's Jewish and he's one of these traveling itinerant brethren preachers, teachers. He travels around to the brethren churches, not only here but Canada and other places. And he gives week-long teachings. And his name is Benjamin. He's a Jew.

His father forbid him to ever mention the name of Jesus in his presence ever. So his father was about 90 years old in Phoenix and he was dying. Jerry went down to see him and he thought, you know, I'm going to have to break my father's rule. So he goes in and his dad's got only a day or two left. So he goes in there and he says to his dad, Dad, I know you told me I can never mention the name of Jesus, but you've got to listen to me.

Jesus is the Messiah. He's the Savior. And he goes through it and his dad didn't say a word. Jerry thought, he left the room. Next day, his dad is deteriorating and he goes in to see him again and his dad just says to him, Jerry, you and I believe in the same Savior. He got the message.

He died that night. So this man met Christ within 12 hours that he left the planet. That meant that the Spirit of God was working on that man his whole life. His whole life. So, of course, imagine how joyful Jeremy is. Wow, he was really fired up. So when you lay Christ on somebody, you tell them about Christ. Who is he? He's God. He's human. He's sinless. He's the creator. He sustains life and the universe. He's the truth and he's life. Do you think you can get anybody to buy into that? Jumping back there for a minute. When you stop and think about it, any sin is a moment of non-belief, or it's the lack of action of that. Oh, that's a good point.

So, I guess the question behind that is, where is the moment of being separated from God in all eternity? and go, you know, just start normal. You mean the second death? Well, no, we're saying that the one sin, missing the mark, keeps them separated from God for all eternity. Right. And the one sin is the sin of unbelief in who Christ is. But is it anytime there's sin that comes into our life, is that an action of unbelief?

Yes. Sure. So is that a separating? By our life you mean a believer? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. The Bible says whatever is not in faith is sin. So is that, my question is, is that a moment of potentially being separated from God in all eternity? No. Oh, I see what you're saying. Okay. I think the answer to your question is an issue of position and condition.

We all have a position in Adam when we come on the planet. We are positioned in Adam. That's our sole identity is Adam. So if we never ever are able to disassociate ourselves from that position, then we are going to go for all eternity associated with Adam. That's our position.

Now at the point in which someone presents a gospel to me and I believe in the person and work of Christ, my position changes. I'm now positioned in Christ for all eternity. A big part of salvation is intimacy and fellowship with Christ himself. So when I sin, what happens is that I lose the fellowship. I'm separated conditionally from Christ. It's not a permanent issue because my position is Never changes. Never changes. Let's look at it conversely.

I'm born, I have a sin nature and I become, my family are Catholic, which was true of me. And I become a good Catholic. And I buy everything they're selling. I go to church on Sunday and all the holy days I do a lot of good stuff. Somebody comes to me and gives me the gospel and I reject it because it doesn't fit with my doctrine. and my whole life I'm working really diligently to rack up enough points so that God, and I recognize that I'm sinning and I'm probably going to have to go to purgatory and all of this other nonsense and get my sins burned off. And when I die, I'm done.

I'm toast. I'm not saved. Why not? Did I not hear the gospel? Listen, You didn't hear it the way that an evangelical would present it, but if you had a Bible and you read it, you got it. You saw it. It was there. Maybe you didn't understand it, or maybe you were more infatuated with the religious environment that you were in. So let's say one day you have this urge to do a really good thing.

Even give your life for somebody else, because you're a good Catholic. didn't change your position at all. I'm still dead and trespassing sin, you see that? It's just like if I'm positioned in Christ as perfect and I do a terrible, awful sin, it does not affect my position one iota. Just like doing something really good, living in Adam doesn't change my position in Adam one iota. Would that be the ultimate insult? your sins would make you acceptable. Well, I was hoping you were going to send some money to the Pope. Well, I did. That didn't work for you. Yeah, I mean, it's the height of arrogance to think...

See, salvation is by faith, by grace through faith. Salvation is a gift. If it's a gift, you can't earn it. You have to receive it. If you're stuck in a religious mode, of earning, and I pick on the Catholics because that's where I came from, but Baptists usually get it right, Methodists, I'm going to go right down the line. It's a works-oriented program in which you have to do things to get God to look at you more favorably. When real salvation and rescue from your sins, it's a gift.

And all God requires of you is to believe in the person and work of His Son. Okay, but let's just say that you believe you need to work for whatever. And so you know about Christ and you believe in him. Does that mean you automatically go to hell because you've done too many dishes? Alright, now think about this. When you said I believe in Christ, what specifically do I believe? Do I believe these two things right here? Do I believe who he is and his work? What's his work? He died for us. No, he died for what? For sin. He died to pay the penalty for my sins. Right.

You believe that? You're in. I don't care what you do after that. Okay, so if a Catholic does believe that, then they will not go to hell. No, he's saved. Exactly. The Catholic Church is full of saved people. Yeah. You know? And the Bible Church down the street is full of lost people. Okay.

The Baptist church is full of lost people, too. When we go to be with the Lord, I'm going to be really surprised at some people who aren't there. Boy, they were really cool down here. And I'm going to be real surprised at some people who are there, who were dogs here.

This is Romans 5.12. Notice the contrasting of two men. The two most important men are Adam and Christ. The one on the left is Adam.

He committed one offense, right? And that one offense caused death to be the reigning principle of the earth. You believe that? You think death, if death means separation, the entire earth functions in an environment of spiritual and physical death, separated from God. There's judgment on all men because they have all sinned.

And there's condemnation. Oh, by the way, the trial was already over. You didn't get a chance to show up, but you were condemned because the trial happened in the Garden of Eden and you were in Adam. And so we had a little trial there and your defense attorney, I hope you didn't pay him because he didn't do you very good. All men are sinners by nature because of that?

Okay, one man Christ. One righteous act. What was the righteous act? The cross. He becomes sin and he dies. Once it's done, God is satisfied. Now he's got a gift to give away. And what's the gift? Righteousness. Salvation. Instead of death being the reigning principle, those who receive Christ, it says in Romans 5.14 that they reign in righteousness through Christ. Isn't that cool? You're justified rather than judged. You're declared righteous by God.

He does the declaring because of your faith in what Christ has already done. He decides. If you can get away from the fact that you decide anything, it helps. God is the one who decides. He's the one that offered you the gift. He's the one that said, here's the criteria I have to demand of you, and that is you believe me. And when you believe me, you don't get any credit for that, but I'm going to give you the whole thing. I'm justified. I'm declared righteous. There's no condemnation for me. where all in Adam are condemned and die.

Many are made righteous by nature. Do you understand that you are righteous by nature? Not by activity, but by nature? What does that mean? If I say you're righteous by nature, what am I saying? I don't think so. Because you have to believe first. Okay, now you believe you're righteous by nature. What does that mean? You have a new nature in Christ. And you now have become the righteousness of God in Christ. That's better than your own.

The process by which the Holy Spirit saves unbelievers. I like this. Salvation is by calling on the name of Jesus Christ. Calling on the name of Jesus Christ requires on the called one what? That they believe. Belief requires that you hear. How do you get to hear? Through the word. All mankind hears via revelation.

So part of the convicting work of the Holy Spirit is to reveal some things to you that you didn't know before about Christ. So does God give you a special revelation to the responders? And because my buddy across the street isn't special, he doesn't get it? Anecdotally. Raised a Catholic. I was 35 years old. Took a pass on the Catholic Church because they weren't doing a whole lot for me.

And when a man started to tell me about Jesus Christ, my response was, I was in Religion 101 with you, I know what you're talking about. He said to me, no you don't. And I couldn't understand him. You know what the big issue was with me? I didn't understand that Jesus died just for me. I always knew he died for the sins of the world, but I didn't know he died just for me. And the other part I didn't know was that if I believed that fact, he would save me for all eternity. I couldn't get my arms around that.

I used to say to this guy, you mean to tell me that once I believe my history is over? I don't have to do anything else?" He said, nope, you don't have to do a thing. I said, oh, nonsense. I said, if I sin and then I can... He said, no, no. That was hard. So I had lots of information. I didn't have the very right stuff.

Hearing requires a preacher, that's you. You get to tell them. a proclaimer requires being sent and man's response. How beautiful are the feet who come and preach the gospel. Not all believe the gospel. Have you ever told anybody the gospel and they told you to get lost? Yeah, that's true. I don't need to go through that. So what do you do? What do you do if you tell somebody the gospel and they don't buy it? Move on? That's cold.

It's not your responsibility. Yeah, you have to know that. You are the one called to maybe bring the message. You are the one that should live the life of Christ, but you're not the one responsible for saving anybody. God isn't going to call you up when you go and say, Courtney, I sent you to talk to Joe over here, and you didn't do a good job, and Joe didn't come. rewards cut you off. Now, who saves people? It's the Spirit of God who saves people. He may use you, but the responsibility is His. And that's a really important part.

The classes must be over, right? What time is it? I didn't hear the first bell when it started. Did you? No. Okay. But you know, you think that You maybe didn't say something the right way. So? And so maybe you didn't reach that person that didn't... Okay, I'm God and I'm going to hold you responsible for not saying it the right way. No, but sometimes you just... People sometimes... There's no question about that, yes. And so then you try again. Yes. And I've done that and it... So have I. On flat ears or whatever you call it. So have I. Again, an anecdotal story.

When the Spirit of God was calling me and I didn't know what was happening, a college buddy of mine said to me, you need to call up this other college buddy who was a believer and he's got the answer for what you're looking for. So I called this guy up and he's the one that started telling me about Christ. You know the guy that told me to call him? Not a believer and never has been one.

And every time I see that guy, I say, you know, you're responsible. God used you to save me. And he looks at me like, you're nuts. But he did. He said to me, call him. He's got the answer for you. And this guy never got saved. So far. Isn't that something? That's like how a Greek teacher who taught him every job in the middle of Greece. Yeah, sure.

Yeah, I mean it's so important to understand that this information that you get is spiritual information. If you grew up in any kind of a religious home or denominational environment, you got the message, but it didn't register on you spiritually. And that's why I'm one of those people that are convinced that it's how you live your life that's way more important than what you say. Because we are these epistles of Christ for all men to read. And you don't have to say it. It's who you are. We better close. Father, how we thank you for your word. the rescue you provided for us in the salvation of your son how thankful we are we pray in his precious name amen