Is Our Sin Nature dead or NOT?

Following you will find 3 articles written by Dr. Bill Gillham about the sin nature. I strongly believe what he teaches lines up with the Word of God.

What Kind of Nature Do Christians Have?
by Dr. Bill Gillham

God is Spirit, angels are spirit, the devil is spirit, demons are spirit and man is spirit temporarily housed in “throwaway containers” we call bodies or earthsuits. We are known as “humans.” Jesus was a human without a sin nature in that He was never descended from Adam. The Holy Spirit furnished the 23 male chromosomes which united with Mary’s 23 to enable Jesus Christ to leave heaven and take on the form of human male. It is not evil to be a human or our Lord would have been evil, but it is evil to possess a sin nature. It is the sin nature that condemns a man to hell, not his sinful performance. A man could perform perfectly but still go to hell because of his sin nature. A lost man’s performance will apparently determine the degree of his punishment in hell because Jesus taught that it would be better for a man to be drowned now than to lead a little child into sin, implying a greater punishment.

The body is designed by God as a temporary dwelling place for a human while on Planet Earth. When the earthsuit is cast off at physical death, every man will eject from it and then the nature of his spirit will be revealed. The whole ballgame for all of eternity is spiritual, not physical… the bottom line is spirit! Friend, what is the “nature” of your spirit? Is it godly and good or satanic and evil? Who is your spirit-father? Whose offspring are you?

The Bible speaks of only two types of spirit-natures referring to them as “men.” They are the “old man” and the “new man.” The old man has no part with God. He cannot commune or fellowship with God. Indeed he has no desire to do so. The new man can commune with God and has a very special desire to do so. He loves God (Rom. 8:7-9).

The scriptures teach that old men and new men are classified as spirit-sons of one or the other of two spirit fathers, God or Satan. Jesus states in Jn. 8:44 that the most religious, law-conscious men in His culture were “sons of their father, the devil.” Every person born is a slave of his father, the devil, as a descendant of the first man, Adam (Rom. 5:12). They have the same spirit-nature as their father, Satan, and their behavior is correlated with his (Jn. 8:44).

However, the Bible speaks of the old man being able, by grace, through faith in Jesus Christ, to be born in a new way in order to change his identity (Jn. 3). Through turning from his self-centered rebellion, submitting himself to Christ’s authority as the God He is, appropriating His provision for getting shed of his dead spirit and beginning all over again with a new, good, alive, godly spirit, man can become something he has never been…alive to God through Christ (Rom.6:13). This new man is now a son of God via faith in Christ (Jn. 1:12).

Now, allow me to pose a question. Is this new man still a son of the devil? You say, “No, that can’t be.” OK, let me ask you another. If this new man is no longer a son of the devil, how did he cease to be such a son? Did God add something to his original identity? If you say “yes”, then you are saying that the new man is a combination spirit-person…part son of Satan and part son of God. He would have two spirit-fathers. He would be of the spirit-lineage of both! But, man can’t be spiritually half and half! He either has to be in one category or another, remember? In God’s ecology, in order for a man to cease to be the son of Satan and become a son of God, the man must first die (spiritually) and then be reborn (spiritually), this time to a NEW FATHER! This is portrayed clearly in Romans 7:1-4.

A great problem exists today in that many well-meaning Christians teach that the death of the old man is simply a “positional truth”; it’s the “position in which God sees us.” They speak of it as if it were something we have to “reckon on” (count it as true) to keep it true. Admittedly, we do not have to reckon on it to derive any benefit from it, but it is true whether we reckon on it or not. God says it is true! (Rom. 6:6, etc.) If it’s “the way God sees us,” then how are we? What is reality? Are we to believe the deceiver’s definition or God’s definition of reality?

The only kind of sons either God or Satan have are spirit-sons, because both God and His enemy are spirit, not physical. Therefore, man can either be human spirit-son of Satan through Adam or a human spirit-son of God through the Second Adam, Christ. At the death of the earthsuit, we will be revealed to have been all along spirit-sons of Satan or to have been since salvation spirit-sons of God. 1 John 4:17b says, “…as He is, so are we in this world.” 1 John 3:2b says, “…when He appears, we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him just as He is.” How will “seeing Him as He is” relate to our “being like Him?” Because then we shall see ourselves just as “we are in this world.” We are cut from the same spirit-genetic cloth as our Lovely Lord Jesus! God reveals no provision in His word for adding His Spirit to a spirit-son of the devil You cannot mix Light with darkness. How could God welcome a man as a son into His eternal forever family by adding His Holy Spirit to spirit-person of His enemy? Such a blemished spiritual mutation would have a basic nature of dual allegiance. Romans 7:15, instead of reading “…for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate,” would read, “ I find myself doing both good and evil which is only normal since I am part good and part evil. There is no conflict here. I enjoy both roles very much. It’s my nature to enjoy them.” Romans 7:21, instead of reading “I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wishes to do good,” would read “I find then, the principle that I am half evil and half good.” Note that the verse says that I am good, but that there is some sort of evil power indwelling a part of me and that this power is contrary to my true nature, which is good. Dear friend, read verses 22-23, “I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man.” Now, there is your nature! You really love God’s ways! It’s your nature to do so because you are spiritually of His Nature! Verse 23, “but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind” (I have the mind of Christ… a sound mind, 1 Cor. 2:16). You see, my battle is not against my old man, but against the power of sin working through the flesh (body, brain, memory traces (flesh) in the brain). This power is not your nature! It is an agent of the devil which seeks to deceive your mind by using first person singular pronouns and traveling your old memory traces (flesh) in your brain hoping to lead you into sinning to get your human needs met.

God made Provision for the old man to be executed (Gal. 2:20, Rom. 6:6, etc.) before He could cause the new man to be born into His family (2 Cor. 5:16-17). His Provision is Christ. God spells relief J-E-S-U-S!

The word “nature” in the dictionary means “to be born,” “the essence.” A baby pig has the nature of a hog because of its birth. Farmers don’t wait to see if it “oinks” (performs) before they call it a pig. It isn’t performance that determines nature, it’s the parents! It is by nature a pig by its birth. Now, once a pig, always a pig. Pigs can’t apply for trans-nature surgery! But lost people can, by faith, appropriate the death of their evil nature as sons of Satan via their co-crucifixion with Christ and, through claiming their co-resurrection with Him, the birth of a totally new identity in Him as sons of God. “Therefore, if any man is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold new things have come” (2 Cor. 5:17). They can’t have two natures after the process because the nature is the product of the parent! The reason ducklings aren’t ducklings aren’t alligators is because their parents are ducks! The reason a Christian doesn’t have a sin nature is because he is no longer the spirit-genes of God, his (New) Father! Hallelujah! Shout for joy! Whoooooeeeee! It’s not my old self that I am fighting against inside! It’s the power of sin working on my (new) mind (Rom. 7:23) through the flesh (the old memory traces) that I battle, and we are dead to having to submit, brother! (Rom. 6:11) So, let’s act like it, by faith, and act like Christ is expressing His life through our personalities and bodies to do His will.’

Make no mistake, a man will “life out” what he believes to be his true identity (to avoid feeling like a hypocrite). Swallow the devil’s lie that you are a half and half and you’ll act like you are! You will accept sin’s rationale which he will serve up through your brain to your mind, and convert his suggestions into behavior. This will lead to the further deception of accepting the “two natures” teaching as being valid because your experience will bear it out.

But, accept God’s Word at face value that you are NOW a holy (Eph. 1:4), righteous (2 Cor. 5:21), saint of God (Rom. 1:7), blameless (Eph. 1:4), with Christ as your very Life (Col. 3:4), a son of God (Jn. 1:12), housed in an earthsuit (2 Cor. 5:1-8), a citizen of heaven (Eph. 2:19), on foreign assignment as an ambassador representing the “Fatherland” (2 Cor. 5:20), a righteous son of the King (2 Cor. 5:21), a spirit-son of the Second Adam (1 Cor. 11:45), spawned from His Spirit gene pool (Rom. 8:9), filled up with Christ Himself (Eph. 3:19), will all your needs (not greeds) supplied (Phil. 4:19), blessed with every spiritual blessing in heaven (Eph. 1:3), impervious to the obstacles of this planet (Phil.4:13), taking all things in stride as a part of the Loving Father’s “obstacle course” designed to prepare us for eternal rulership (Rom. 8:28-29)! Accept this by faith as your true identity! Set your mind on it! Dwell on it! Meditate on the truth of it! Then, moment by moment act like it is true! Praise Him in and for all things, whatever circumstances you may encounter, acting as if Christ is expressing His victorious Live through you and He will be! You will be walking in His victory!

Oh, the liberty and the victory that is ours through our precious Jesus. Test the words of this article, dear relative in Christ. Seek truth from His word via His Spirit’s teaching. Can a man possibly possess dual spiritual sonship? No? Then act like the Christ-indwelt son of God that you are regardless of how you feel. Act according to your faith. Stop acting like who you are not! That’s hypocritical! Act like the new man you are by faith! That’s obedience!

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© Lifetime Guarantee Ministries [published: 1983-04-01]
These articles are written for the edification of God's people. Copying, printing, and distribution are encouraged. Thank you for crediting Lifetime Guarantee Ministries and our website (www.lifetime.org) as the source.
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Do Christians Still Have a Sin Nature?
by Dr. Bill Gillham

“The King is Dead! Long Live the King!” When I was a kid, I heard a Shakespearean actor in a film make such a statement and was thoroughly confused. How could the king be dead but alive at the same time? Little did I know that he was talking about two different people! Indeed, the former king had died and was no longer king…he had ceased to exist! But the new king, who could never have emerged as king had the old king not died, lives indeed! So long as the old king remained alive, the new king could not be “born.” But after the one’s “birth” as the new king, the old king could never again resurrect himself because he had no capability for self-resurrection! The very existence of the one precludes the existence of the other and vice versa! They cannot jump in and out of the grace, womb, grave, womb, etc.

The analogy is obvious to those who understand the believer’s identification with Christ in His death and resurrection. The old man has indeed died (Romans 6:6, etc.) and the new man has indeed been generated by the Holy Spirit (Colossians 3:10, etc.). But, unfortunately, the pervasive position taken by most Christian leader is that the old man is till “alive and well’ within the believer…that sinful performance gives daily testimony to this as “fact.” The old man is seen to leap in and out of the tomb many times during the typical day. However, one seldom hears a teacher claim that the new man leaps in and out of the womb, but most never see that the very existence of either precludes the existence of its opposite! The two can’t coexist any more that the two kings can! It was the death of the old man, which enabled the new man to be born! It is impossible for the new man to exist until the old man has died and the old man cannot resurrect himself. There is but One Life Who has such resurrection power…the Life of Christ!

Galatians 5:17 says that the “flesh lusts against the spirit” and vice versa and there is obviously a war going on inside of every Christian, but it’s not the old man versus the new man doing battle. Those cannot exist simultaneously. The Greek word interpreted “flesh” in all pertinent New Testament verses refers to the body…the physical body with its frailties and vulnerability (to sin). Romans 7:20 speaks of the POWER OF INDWELLING IN (not the sin nature) working in man to produce undesirable (sinful) behavior. The power of sin simply deceives the Christian by masquerading as the old man, suggesting (deceiving) to the will that a choice be made to perform according to the old self-serving patterns programmed in previously. This is referred to as “walking after the flesh.” Satan could never deceive a Christian with a direct approach as a “little man in red underwear.” He must disguise himself if he is to have any hope of victory. There is one way and one way only to accomplish this deception and that is to masquerade in the thought life of the Christian posing as his unique version of the old man! The naïve Christian will believe he, himself, is generating the unchristian suggestion and thus direct his defensive efforts against the wrong foe…what he perceives to be a darker side of himself! He fires all his bullets at a shadow! This is the explanation for the frustration depicted in Romans 7:15 “…why do I do the very thing I hate? Why can I get no victory?”

For many years it appears to me that to adopt the posture that the sin nature was crucified in Christ (2 Cor. 5:210 would be rationalizing and excusing the Christian’s sinful performance. It seemed more logical to believe that Christian all have a sin nature against which the new man constantly must do battle. It would also appear that this is the noble, the more conservative, the more Spartan posture, and that to believe otherwise would be to fly in the fact of personal experience as well as God’s Word. While subscribing to this view I was blocked from recognizing the truth of Rom. 7:20 cited previously. Though it would appear that the “two-natures” view places the greater responsibility for poor performance squarely on the Christian and that the “one-nature” view is a cop out, the opposite is actually true! So long as one embraces the former he is constantly deceived into believe his failure is just standard Christian experience. As Scofield said (paraphrased), “This is not standard Christian experience, it’s the standard experience of most Christians,” the tragic result of faulty discipling. Once the Christian enters into identification with Christ’s death, resurrection and ascension, claiming he no longer has two natures, but is now “the righteousness of God in Christ” and “holy and blameless in His sight” he is without excuse when he sins, because he knows what it is to possess the Life (“Christ in me”) which overcomes on a moment-by-moment basis. He is discerning of how sin is able to deceive him by masquerading a the extinct “old man,” hoping the Christian will take the bait, believe that the old man has generated this impulse or thought and end up “doing the very thing he hates.” (Rom. 7:15-20)

In reality, it is accepted as fact that Christians no longer have a sin nature that places one squarely on the hook and totally responsible to choose, moment-by-moment, against the wooings, deceptions and accusations of indwelling sin working through the flesh. “Always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus (moment-by-moment) in our body.” (2 Cor. 4:10—NAS)

“We know that our old (unrenewed) self was nailed to the cross (Note: this isn’t just our sins that Christ paid for on the cross, although PTL for that blessed truth, but that the old “you” died there, too). With Him in order that (our) body, (which is the instrument of) sin, might be made ineffective and inactive for evil, that we might no longer be slaves of sin.”
(Romans 6:6 Amplified)

Indwelling sin deceives the “two-natures” believer into rationalizing, “I’m just human. I just fail a lot and God understands it’s just my old sin nature that got the better of me.” This is the true cop out position! Such believers often have Romans 7:15 underlined as “evidence” that their experience is “the normal Christian life,” when it is, in fact, wandering in the aimless circles of the wilderness with Canaan just a promise away. Awake sleeper! The king is dead! Long live the King!

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© Lifetime Guarantee Ministries [published: 1980-01-01]
These articles are written for the edification of God's people. Copying, printing, and distribution are encouraged. Thank you for crediting Lifetime Guarantee Ministries and our website (www.lifetime.org) as the source.
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The “Power of Sin” is not the Sin Nature
by Dr. Bill Gillham

I wrote an article entitled The Power of Sin in our May, 1988 Ministry Letter. In it I pointed out that the word “sin” appears forty-one times in Romans 5:8, forty times as a noun, once as a verb. That is one of the most astounding revelations I have ever received from the Holy Spirit. I believe that most people who read this section of Romans interpret the word sin as a verb, or if they do see it as a noun, they either interpret it as a single sin, which was committed, or as their sin nature.

As most of you know by now, Lifetime Guarantee teaches that Christians do not battle against themselves, but against the power of sin, an agent of the devil which work through the flesh (old ways) to try to control the soul (personality). When we lose this battle, we “do the thing which we do not wish” and fail to “do the thing we wish.” We do not “wish” to sin, and yet we sin.

The power of sin is what its name implies, a power to entice you into sin. It dwells in you (Rom.7:21) yet it is not you any more than a gold tooth that dwells in your mouth is you. Sin’s goal is to deceive the saints into living to get their needs (though good and godly) met by sinning rather than by using the Matt. 6:33 method; that is, “seeking Christ first.”

The power of sin is not your sin nature. Your sin nature is a synonym for old man or old self. That “old you” was crucified in Christ (Rom. 6:6). Before you were saved, it was as normal for you old nature to rebel against God’s authority as it is for a fish to swim. However, with salvation the new you hates to sin (Rom. 7:15a, 19,22). That’s why the Bible addresses Christians 56 times as “saints” (holy one) rather than sinners saved by grace like we’ve erroneously believed. Even the Corinthians, the most carnal church in the epistles, are called “sanctified” and “saints” (1 Cor. 1:2).

Yet the power of sin is alive and well in you, saint. It indwells your body (Rom. 7:23). On page 1055 of W.E. Vine’s Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words, Vine states that sin is, “a governing principle or power” that is “personified” in the following passages. He then lists sixteen verses in which this holds true. The term personified means “represented as a person.” The power of sin can represent itself as a personage.

You have heard us teach that the power of sin’s key tactic is to personify itself as your sin nature, the old man or the old you who was crucified with Christ. It accomplishes this by sending thoughts into your sound mind, the “mind of Christ” (1 Cor. 2:16) with singular pronouns in order to deceive you into believing that the old you has somehow jumped off the cross to “do the very thing you do not with.” Hey, nobody but Jesus can come down from a cross.

Let’s examine a few of the sixteen verses where Vine says the word hamartia, the Greek noun translated “sin,” is personified.

“Therefore, do not let sin reign in your mortal body that you should obey its lusts” (Rom. 6:14). Mr. Sin(the personification) cannot master you. Since sin is personified, let’s call it “Mr. Sin” so we won’t confuse it with the verb. Mr. Sin tries to control you, to make you live to satisfy your bodily needs.

“For sin shall not be master over you…(Rom. 6:14). Mr. Sin (the personification) cannot master you. Remember how sin is “represented as a person?” It tries to master you through presenting thoughts to your mind by masquerading as the old man who has risen from the tomb. But no one except Jesus can do that, right? That’s not the old man; it’s the power of sin personified.

“But thanks be to God that though you were slaves to Mr. Sin you became obedient from the (new) heart…and having been freed form Mr. Sin, you became slaves of righteousness” (Rom. 6:17-18). In both instances above, sin is a noun. It doesn’t say, “you were freed from sinning (verb)”; rather, it teaches that you have been freed from being controlled by the power of sin, which results in sinning. There’s a tremendous difference. The first would be robotical sinless perfection; the second would require a moment-by-moment appropriation of your freedom from being controlled by Mr. Sin.

“But, if I am doing the very thing I do not wish, I am no longer the one doing it, but Mr. Sin which indwells me (is somehow doing it)” (Rom. 7:20). This verse can really be a puzzler if you interpret the word “sin” as a verb. But it’s a noun, and Vine says it is personified (represented as a person). How is the power of sin involved in your sinning? The same way wind is involved in a windmill, electricity in a light bulb, water in a hydroelectric generator, or gasoline in an engine. It’s a power. If you let it, it will control you and you will sin (verb).

In the same way, Christ is your wind, electricity, water or gasoline for righteous behavior if you will believe He is and act like He is by faith. He, Himself, is the power in the Christian life.

“But, I see a different law in the members of the Christian lie war against the law of my mind, and making me prisoner of the law of Mr. Sin…” (Rom. 7:23). Mr. Sin the “personage,” wars, fights and seeks to control your mind. But your mind does not want to be controlled by this power, so it fights back. In a war there must be at least two sides represented and they must oppose one another. Otherwise the war would cease. Mr. Sin is on Satan’s side, so whose side is your mind on? God’s (1 Cor. 2:16). Otherwise the war would cease! You hate to sin, right? You like to get your human needs met (and that’s not evil), but you hate to sin in order to accomplish it.

The new man is a good person (saint) in Christ. Read the first eight verses of 1 Corinthians to discern what Paul has to say about the Corinthians’ true identity in Christ. He calls them “saints (holy),” “confirmed to the end,” “blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus,” etc. After reminding them of who they are, he kicks the daylights out of them because they are not acting like who they really are.

Can you see what a difference this makes in motivating a Christian as opposed to berating him by constantly telling him what a sorry, no-good sinner he is and how he is going to face an angry God some day? Folk, it’s our works which will be judged in the future, not our personhood (2 Cor. 5:10) and God is not mad at the saved. He took our all the anger He had against us on Jesus (Isa. 53). We’ll either be rewarded or we’ll lose what we potentially could have won, but “there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ” (Rom. 8:1).

“The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law” (1 Cor. 15:56). The Law is the source of Mr. Sin’s strength. To couple law with Mr. Sin is like pouring gas on a fire. This personage called sin needs a law to aid it if it is to optimally control you. It “eats, breathes and sleeps” via the Law.

“The Law is not made for a righteous man” (1 Tim. 1:9). Why? Because you, the righteous man (2 Cor. 5:21), don’t need it. The lost man does (in order to show him his condition), but you don’t. You now “have the laws of God written on (your) heart and mind” (Heb. 10:16). God’s ethical, moral law of agape is built into the new creation. You desire to obey God. Choose to let that law control you and you will keep the Commandments. Jesus summed them up in loving God and others (Mk. 12:30-31).

“But encourage one another…lest any one of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of Mr. Sin” (Heb. 3:13b). In this verse, sin is represented as a personage which can harden you through deception. It’s not talking about the deceitfulness of a single sinful act, but o a power called sin which “wars against your mind” (Rom. 7:23).

“You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against Mr. Sin” (Heb. 12:4). This is speaking of Jesus in the garden, not on the cross. He “sweat great drops of blood” as He struggled against this power called “sin” which was trying to coerce Him into rebelling against the Father God. But He won! And He continues to win in and through us if we, too, will learn that we are “dead to Mr. Sin” (Rom. 6:11).

These are some of the verses in which Vine says the word sin is personified. As I have studied the Word, I believer there are additional ones which he does not mention. In any case, it was exciting to discover that a man of Vine’s stature as a scholar testifies that the power of sin is often personified in the Word. What liberty there is in knowing that the rebellious, evil, hateful thoughts I experience are being presented to my mind, not generated by it. By simply standing on God’s Word and thinking, “Nope. I’m dead to you Mr. Sin. That’s not my idea,” and then acting “alive to God through Christ”, I have victory over the power of sin. Truly, “Mr. Sin shall not be master over you…” (Rom. 6:14a) when you act and therefore live like you are dead to its thought and alive to Christ.

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© Lifetime Guarantee Ministries [published: 1988-11-01]
These articles are written for the edification of God's people. Copying, printing, and distribution are encouraged. Thank you for crediting Lifetime Guarantee Ministries and our website (www.lifetime.org) as the source.
 
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IB

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"Paul describes this war within that the believer goes thru in Romans 7:15-24. "

Actually Paul is describing his struggle with sin.

This passage is a christian in the current time looking back on his life before he became a christian.

No, Paul is talking about his current state. In v24 he states "What a wretched man I am!", he does NOT say what a wretched man I was.

NIce "articles" Kim, but I dont agree

I also disagree with those articles. There are so many things wrong with those articles I don't even know where to begin. How about here:

"Jesus was a human without a sin nature in that He was never descended from Adam"

So how is it that Jesus descended from David, but not Adam??

Does not the Scripture say that the Christ will come from David's family[Greek seed] and from Bethlehem, the town where David lived?" John 7:42

Or how about this:

"It is the sin nature that condemns a man to hell, not his sinful performance"

WRONG! It is YOUR sin that condemns you and YOUR sin that seperated you from God and YOUR sin that put Jesus on the cross. We need to quit blaming Adam and start taking responsibility for our own actions. Why did God destroy Sodom and Gomorrah? Was it for their actions or their 'sin nature'? If it was for sin nature then why did he let some escape? There is no original sin, there is no 'sin nature'.

We are not responsible for the sins of our fathers.

Yet he did not put the sons of the assassins to death, in accordance with what is written in the Book of the Law of Moses where the LORD commanded: "Fathers shall not be put to death for their children, nor children put to death for their fathers; each is to die for his own sins." 2Kings 14:6

The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the son. The righteousness of the righteous man will be credited to him, and the wickedness of the wicked will be charged against him. Ezekiel 18:20

The scriptures are clear on this point.

Thats all the time I have for now, see ya, IdahoBassman
 
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suzie

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Our "bent" is to sin. We cannot help but sin--we live for ourselves and "protect" our own self interest. That is, until we are saved. Then we are "new creations" we die to self and take on Christ. It is no longer we who live but Christ lives in us. Our slavery to sin is gone. If we didnt have a sin nature, then we could be sinless and wouldnt be in need of a savior, such as Adam and Eve prior to the fall.
 
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kingcaboose

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We can choose to do sin or not. Satan is given too much credit when these thing are brought about. How many times in the bible is satan himself mentioned to have tempted people? We use satan as a cause for our sin but really what was the Sin of Adam and Eve, was it in disobeying God? or was it in Not owning up to their disobedience? God knew they had disobeyed him but he still acted as if he was ignorant of their actions.

Genesis 3:11 who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?

Why would he do this? Maybe he was waiting for them to own up to their actions and ask for forgiveness. Also Adam and Eve were not expelled from the Garden of Eden because of their sin but to stop them from eating from the tree of life.

Genesis 3:22 The man has now become like on of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat and live forever. 23 So the Lord God banished him from the Garden ...


Also this could mean that God was not wanting Adam or Eve to simply get eternal life by taking it but by asking God for it. We choose to do sin

Genesis 4:7 sin is crouching at your door; it desire to have you, but you must master it.

But if we do commit sin we generally try to excuse it or hide it from God

Genesis 4:9 then the Lord said to Cain, "where is your brother Abel?" " I don't know," he replied. " Am I my brother's keeper?"

God wants us to come to him admit our wrong doing and ask for forgiveness.

Luke 11:9 So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you;seek and you wil find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.
11 which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, you give him a scorpion? 13 If you then, though you are evil, know to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!"
 
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This issue over sin and whether we have a sinful nature is about the most absurd thing I have ever read!

I can't believe that there are those who claim Christianity believe that they do not sin!!! I don't believe my eyes!!! Have you left the faith? I just don't understand you people!!

I suggest you go back and start reading the bible or maybe you read a different bible than myself. Do you read a JW Bible or something? If so, get rid of it, it is heresey!!!
 
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LouisBooth

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"No, Paul is talking about his current state. In v24 he states "What a wretched man I am!", he does NOT say what a wretched man I was"

Because he is looking at it from current perspective, ie reliving his experience in the flow of the letter. Paul isn't a slave to sin either. Its all in the past.



"I can't believe that there are those who claim Christianity believe that they do not sin!!! I don't believe my eyes!!! Have you left the faith? I just don't understand you people!! "

Lady love, just a quick hint. Don't assume things. YOu can sin and not have a sinful nature, they are 2 very different things. A dog's nature is to bark, but I can bark, though I don't have a dog nature.
 
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SavedByGrace3

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Originally posted by LouisBooth
[B"No, Paul is talking about his current state. In v24 he states "What a wretched man I am!"
[/B]


This is not a picture of a redeemed soul, but of a captive of sin. Every statement in this chapter proves that this was Paul's experience while bound by sin under the law and before he was freed from the law of sin and death, as in Romans 8:1-4.

Rom 8:1-4
(1) There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
(2) For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
(3) For 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, condemned sin in the flesh:
(4) That the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.



His testimony indicates deliverance was after the three days of blindness at Damascus (Acts 9:17-18). The experience must have been during these three days for he had lived in all good conscience before this (Acts 23:1; Galatians 1:13-14; Phil. 3:6). In the new enlightened state of these three days he saw that he had not really kept the law, saw that he was a helpless slave to sin and could not obey it as it should be kept. Hence, his conclusion of wretchedness.
 
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judge

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Thanks Louise. I agree the flesh is not evil, and matter is not evil. I suppose i think it is pssible for sin to dwell in our mortal bodies and our earthly bodies to be corrupted without flesh or matter being evil in itself.

Our bodeis have appetites and make demands on us that constantly drag us to do wrong, as paul said, "we groan inwardly awaiting the redemptiuon of our mortal bodies"

The new birth has begun but we carry this treasure in jars of clay, that is our frail and weak flesh.

I think our flesh ahs been corrupted or diseased in a way that will never be regenerated. instaed we will be clothed with another uncorruptible body.

As paul said a seed must die before the new plant comes.

 

what do you think?
 
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LouisBooth

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"this chapter proves that this was Paul's experience while bound by sin under the law and before he was freed from the law of sin and death, as in Romans 8:1-4."

Yup, its Paul looking back on his life from his current perspective. Most people would say its "sharing a testimony". Paul is using his current mindset and saying, ohh..that's why that happened.

"I think our flesh ahs been corrupted or diseased in a way that will never be regenerated. instaed we will be clothed with another uncorruptible body."

I'd agree, our flesh is fallen, but not evil.
 
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