Original Sin

[MadHermit]

Adam and Eve weren't created sinners, they became sinners once they sinned; as it is with all of us.

Adam and Eve were created, we today are not.

We aren't born sinners - seperated from God. He still carries us in His bosom until sin separates that relationship. It is inevitable that we all sin at some point and become dependent upon the grace which God has granted us to put our sin behind us.

-A

How can it be inevitable that we sin? If we are only sinners by choice and not by nature, then how can it be inevitable? If Christ was a man and was sinless by choice and not by nature, then cannot someone today duplicate this?

Mark 7:20 And He said, "What comes out of a man, that defiles a man. 21 For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, 22 thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. 23 All these evil things come from within and defile a man."

We are sinners by nature, not by choice.

 

[armothe]

Adam and Eve were created, we today are not.

We are all created in God's image.

How can it be inevitable that we sin? If we are only sinners by choice and not by nature, then how can it be inevitable? If Christ was a man and was sinless by choice and not by nature, then cannot someone today duplicate this?

In a word, yes. I would contend that in a closed environment it would be possible to not commit sin. The likely scenerio would have to be a young child being left on a deserted island by himself for the rest of his days. Possible, yes, probable - no.

As a matter of fact, aren't we commanded to model Christ and remove sin from our lives?

However, most of us interact with other humans on a daily basis. We observe and experience the effects of both love and sin. Once sin is introduced to us it becomes next to imposible to resist 100% during our entire lives. Jesus the Christ, being the son of God and having the Holy Spirit at the time of His temptation was definitely at an advantage.

When Jesus snuck away from His parents - an act of either deception or defiance - was it considered a sin?

-A

 

[MadHermit]

We are all created in God's image.

Genesis 5:3 And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and begot a son in his own likeness, after his image, and named him Seth.

In a word, yes. I would contend that in a closed environment it would be possible to not commit sin. The likely scenerio would have to be a young child being left on a deserted island by himself for the rest of his days. Possible, yes, probable - no.

Romans 11:32 For God has committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all.

Galatians 3:22 But the Scripture has confined all under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.

Ephesians 2:3 among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.

When Jesus snuck away from His parents - an act of either deception or defiance - was it considered a sin?

-A

In the account given in Luke Chapter 2, there is no indication that Jesus "snuck away". The account simply states that He lingered behind and that His parents assumed He was travelling within the large company of people they were with.

 

[sawdust]

I fellow forumer brought up the idea that the doctrine on original sin or the belief that we are all stained with original sin was "a falacy, a perpetration based on assumption and opinions." I thought this would make for a good and interesting discussion/debate because I don't understand it totally. If you must know what I think I would say I heavily lean towards the belief that we are stained at birth, or conception, with original sin.

The term "original sin", as we are going to discuss in this thread, is not written in scripture. That odviously means that the belief that we are all stained with original sin comes from someones interpretation of scripture. These scriptures in which this interpretation was derived from is what I want to look at and discuss.

I know the doctrine on original sin is what most churches and denominations believe to be absolutely true and that it was discussed and debated and set in stone in the early church, exactly when I don't know. Yet, apparently, there are some who don't agree. I'd love to see what they have to say and how they would show through scripture how they believe the interpretation of scripture that is used to show the truth in original sin is flawed.

I know this will lead to the discuss of the nature of Jesus Christ. I ask that for the time being that we first tackle the job of our original sin first. Thank you

Hey Neph, how ya doin'?

I have been trying to understand pretty much what you are asking for as long as I can remember and for the most part was never able to get a satisfactory answer until recently. This is what I have been taught of late that makes more sense to me than all the rest of what I have learned in (and out of) Church.

1. God declared from the beginning that disobedience would bring death.
Gen.2:17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die.

2. Adam and Eve sinned. Eve was deceived, therefore was not held accountable to the same degree as Adam hence, sin came into the world through him.
Gen.3:13Then the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?" The woman said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate."
and
Rom.12:5a Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin..

3. When Adam sinned he died. His spirit left his body and returned to God because that's what the human spirit does at death.
Ecc.12:7 and the dust returns to the ground it came from, and the spirit returns to God who gave it.

4. This "split" is what genetically mutated Adam's body and caused his eventual physical death and also made him susceptible to disease and sickness. This genetic mutation is the sin nature we inherit through the male line.
Rom.7:18 I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. (also rendered "the flesh") (Also Rom.12:5 again)

5. We are conceived in it (at conception) and born into it when God imputes our human soul at birth. (the soul is not sinful, it is pure as it comes from the hand of God directly. God does not create sin)
Psalm 51:5 Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.

6. It is this mutation and the lack of a human spirit that locks our soul down into the inevitability of committing our own personal sins. (ie. we are born into the kingdom of darkness, we have no light) It is why we must be "born again".
Jn.3:6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit.

7. It is also why Christ came in the flesh (partly). Christ was sinless because a) He had no human father and b) because He never committed a personal act of disobedience.
Heb.10:5 Therefore, when Christ came into the world, he said: "Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me;
and
Heb.5:8 Although he was a son, he learned obedience from what he suffered

We don't inherit Adam's original sin, we inherit the sinful nature (genetic mutation) that resulted from Adam's original sin.

peace

 

[armothe]

Genesis 5:3 And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and begot a son in his own likeness, after his image, and named him Seth..

Again, mankind (not just Adam) was and is created in God's image:

Genesis 9:6, "whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man is his blood shed: for in the image of God hath He made man."

Romans 11:32 For God has committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all.
Galatians 3:22 But the Scripture has confined all under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.
Ephesians 2:3 among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, just as the others.

Can you tell us who the all and the we are in these passages?

In the account given in Luke Chapter 2, there is no indication that Jesus "snuck away". The account simply states that He lingered behind and that His parents assumed He was travelling within the large company of people they were with.

Alright, how about when Christ went on the rampage through the temple area throwing tables around?

-A

 

[nephilimiyr]

Hey Neph, how ya doin'?

I have been trying to understand pretty much what you are asking for as long as I can remember and for the most part was never able to get a satisfactory answer until recently. This is what I have been taught of late that makes more sense to me than all the rest of what I have learned in (and out of) Church.

Well what a pleasant surprise! Hi sawdust, I'm doing great thank you and I hope your doing just as well.

This subject hasn't been something that I have often thought about but recently and more and more I have seen people rejecting the traditional or Catholic teaching on this. I never quite understood what the traditional belief was but neither did I question it much either. Up to this point I see my belief in the traditional teaching on this fading away.

As always you put together a great post with plenty of provoking thought and scripture. I'm following right along with you but I have just one more question and or comment to make on our sin nature.

We don't inherit Adam's original sin, we inherit the sinful nature (genetic mutation) that resulted from Adam's original sin.

True, we don't inherit Adam's sin but do we really inherit the sin nature? I'm still a little confused about just what is the sin nature. I've always thought of the sin nature as a state of being. I've always believed that what happend when Adam and Eve ate of the forbidden fruit they died spiritually. God said on the day they ate of the fruit they will surely die. Well they odviously didn't die physically but their spirits died. The result of this effects all human beings from generation to generation. Maybe I'm splitting hairs here or makeing this too difficult but I see a difference between inheriting a sin nature and simply not having a live spirit in us.

To me, having a sin nature means that you have sinned and have the potential to sin again. So to say we have inherited a sin nature means that we have sinned. So if at conception we inherit this sin nature from Adam to me is therefore saying we are in fact inheriting his sins. Yet I don't believe that. Again, I simply believe that we are born without a spirit and we don't recieve a spirit until we convert and accept Jesus Christ as Lord and saviour of our lives. This is being born again, our spirit person is born in us.

LOL, basically I believe we physically inherit the genes of our parents, even going way back to Adam and Eve but spiritually or anything other than physically we inherit nothing from our parents, even going as far back to both Adam and Eve. The problem I see is essentially that we lack inheritance altogether. We should've perhaps inherited spirits from them but because both Adam and Eve's spirits died on the day they ate of the forbidden fruit, there therefore was nothing to inherit. It's this lack of having a spirit in us that eventually causes us to sin. When we are conceived, when we are then born we have not committed one act of disobediance to God.

Yes we were conceived in sin because both our parents were living inside a sin nature, i.e. they had already sinned and have the potential to sin again but it's not their sin nature that causes us to sin but the fact that we have no spirit and without spirits we can't connect with God. And when we can't connect with God we fall into sin. It's simple, you can't have your connection with God severed and expect to live a holy, sin free life.


But that's where I think I'm at in my understaning of this right now.

 

[nephilimiyr]

I'm just curious, which Christian Denominations believe that we all inherit original sin and which do not?

I don't know of any list but I do know that the RCC believes this and if they believe and teach this I would also guess that the Eastern Orthodox do as well but maybe in a slightly different way.

 

[Joykins]

I don't know of any list but I do know that the RCC believes this and if they believe and teach this I would also guess that the Eastern Orthodox do as well but maybe in a slightly different way.

I think the Eastern Orthodox believe in ancestral sin, not original sin. No doubt one of them can explain it better

 

[OrthodoxyUSA]

From www.oca.org

The word sin means literally "missing the mark." It means the failure to be what one should be and to do what one should do.

Originally man was made to be the created image of God, to live in union with God's divine life, and to rule over all creation. Man's failure in this task is his sin which has also been called his fall.

The "fall" of man means that man failed in his God-given vocation. This is the meaning of Gen 3. Man was seduced by evil (the serpent) into believing that he could be "like God" by his own will and effort.

In the Orthodox tradition the eating of the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil" is generally interpreted as man's actual taste of evil, his literal experience of evil as such. Sometimes, this eating is also interpreted (as by St. Gregory the Theologian) as man's attempt to go beyond what was possible for him; his attempt to do that which was not yet within his power to realize.

Whatever the details of the various interpretations of the Genesis story, it is the clear doctrine of Orthodoxy that man has failed in his original vocation. He disobeyed God's command through pride, jealousy and the lack of humble gratitude to God by yielding to the temptation of Satan. Thus man sinned. He "missed the mark" of his calling. He transgressed the Law of God (see 1 Jn 3:4). And so he ruined both himself and the creation which he was given to care for and to cultivate. By his sin-and his sins -- man brings himself and all creation under the rule of evil and death.

In the Bible and in Orthodox theology these elements always go together: sin, evil, the devil, suffering and death. There is never one without the other, and all are the common result of man's rebellion against God and his loss of communion with Him. This is the primary meaning of Gen 3 and the chapters which follow until the calling of Abraham. Sin begets still more sin and even greater evil. It brings cosmic disharmony, the ultimate corruption and death of everyone and everything. Man still remains the created image of God -- this cannot be changed -- but he fails to keep his image pure and to retain the divine likeness. He defiles his humanity with evil, perverts it and deforms it so that it cannot be the pure reflection of God that it was meant to be. The world also remains good, indeed "very good," but it shares the sorry consequences of its created master's sin and suffers with him in mortal agony and corruption. Thus, through man's sin the whole world falls under the rule of Satan and "lies in wickedness" (1 Jn 5:19; see also Rom 5:12).

The Genesis story is the divinely-inspired description in symbolic terms of man's primordial and original possibilities and failures. It reveals that man's potency for eternal growth and development in God was turned instead into man's multiplication and cultivation of wickedness and his transformation of creation into the devil's princedom, a cosmic cemetery "groaning in travail" until saved once more by God (Rom 8:19-23). All the children of Adam, i.e. all who belong to the human race, share in this tragic fate. Even those born this very minute as images of God into a world essentially good are thrown immediately into a deathbound universe, ruled by the devil and filled with the wicked fruit of generations of his evil servants.

This is the fundamental message: man and the world need to be saved. God gives the promise of salvation from the very beginning, the promise which begins to be fulfilled in history in the person of Abraham, the father of Israel, the forefather of Christ.

And the Lord said ... to Abram [later named Abraham] "I will make you a great nation ... and by you all the families of the earth will be blessed (Gen 12:3; also 22:15).

Abraham believed God; and from him came the people of Israel from whom, according to the flesh, came Jesus Christ the Saviour and Lord of Creation (see Lk 1:55, 73; Rom 4; Gal 3).

The entire history of the Old Testament finds its fulfillment in Jesus. All that happened to the chosen children of Abraham happened in view of the eventual and final destruction of sin and death by Christ. The covenants of God with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (whose name was changed to Israel which means "the one who struggles with God); the twelve tribes of Israel; the story of Joseph; the passover, exodus and reception of God's Law by Moses; the entrance into the promised land by Joshua; the founding of Jerusalem and the building of the temple by David and Solomon; the judges, kings, prophets and priests; everything in the Old Testament history of God's chosen people finds its final purpose and meaning in the birth, life, death, resurrection, ascension and glorification of God's only Son Jesus the Messiah. He is the one who comes from the Father to save the people from their sins, to open their tombs and to grant eternal life to all creation.

....................................................................................

For a complete writing on the subject see St. Anthanasius http://home.comcast.net/~pasudduth/On_the_Incarnation.pdf

Forgive me....

 

[OrthodoxyUSA]

We have become sick unto death through sin (see definition above). We have inhereted death (sin) from Adam.

We are "blameless" for that sin.. but we still carry the stain of it... until it is removed by Christ God...

Thereby "All men have sin" or sinned (showing the inherited value from Adam).


Forgive me....

 

[BigNorsk]

Original sin definitely affects our nature, but it is real sin.

If there was no original sin, We would be conceived and born believers in God. The way things are, from the moment of conception we do not put our faith in God, we are both sinful and sin. We are ignorant of God, we despise God, we fight against God.

Unbelief is clearly sin. How could one have God as one's Lord and God and not believe? From the moment of conception our sinning starts.

So we are both unrighteous and we actually commit sins from the very beginning of our lives both are a result of original sin, you really can't separate them. Anyone who stands condemned before the judgement seat will not be able to claim that they are sinless and it is only due to Adam that they are condemned, their own sins will condemn them.

Marv

 

[BigNorsk]

The Lutheran Confessions spend a lot of time on original sin in order to get it correct.

See the Formula of Concord.
The Epitome (Summary) of the Formula of Concord which is a shortened version for the Formula which covers and follows the same order and topics.
The Smalcald Articles.
The Augsburg Confession.
And the Defense of the Augsburg Confession.

It all gets to be too much to post here, but I provide the links for those who want to read more and see better explanations.

If you want to read just one that is pretty comprehensive yet covers many different errors, I would recommend the Epitome.

Marv

 

[Debi1967]

What was the punishment given to Adam and Eve for their sin against God? was it not Death.... was it not shame .....

See most of you have lost the point of what truly Original sin is to begin with .... It is the very nature that one inherits all of Mankind that because of Adam and Eve's sin leads to Death and then is the very sint hat we are washed clean of by Christ's Blood ....

Gen 3:6 And the woman saw that the tree was good to eat, and fair to the eyes, and delightful to behold: and she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave to her husband, who did eat.

Gen 3:7 And the eyes of them both were opened: and when they perceived themselves to be naked, they sewed together fig leaves, and made themselves aprons.

Gen 3:8 And when they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in paradise at the afternoon air, Adam and his wife hid themselves from the face of the Lord God, amidst the trees of paradise.

Gen 3:9 And the Lord God called Adam, and said to him: Where art thou?

Gen 3:10 And he said: I heard thy voice in paradise; and I was afraid, because I was naked, and I hid myself.

Gen 3:11 And he said to him: And who hath told thee that thou wast naked, but that thou hast eaten of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou shouldst not eat?

Gen 3:12 And Adam said: The woman, whom thou gavest me to be my companion, gave me of the tree, and I did eat.

Gen 3:13 And the Lord God said to the woman: Why hast thou done this? And she answered: The serpent deceived me, and I did eat.

Gen 3:14 And the Lord God said to the serpent: Because thou hast done this thing, thou art cursed among all cattle, and beasts of the earth: upon thy breast shalt thou go, and earth shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.

Gen 3:15 I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.

Gen 3:16 To the woman also he said: I will multiply thy sorrows, and thy conceptions: in sorrow shalt thou bring forth children, and thou shalt be under thy husband's power, and he shall have dominion over thee.

Gen 3:17 And to Adam he said: Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, whereof I commanded thee, that thou shouldst not eat, cursed is the earth in thy work: with labour and toil shalt thou eat thereof all the days of thy life.

Gen 3:18 Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herbs of the earth.

Gen 3:19 In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return.

Gen 3:20 And Adam called the name of his wife Eve: because she was the mother of all the living.

Gen 3:21 And the Lord God made for Adam and his wife garments of skins, and clothed them.

Gen 3:22 And he said: Behold Adam is become as one of us, knowing good and evil: now therefore lest perhaps he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever.

Gen 3:23 And the Lord God sent him out of the paradise of pleasure, to till the earth from which he was taken.

Gen 3:24 And he cast out Adam: and placed before the paradise of pleasure Cherubims, and a flaming sword, turning every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.

See it is actually necessary to go all the way back to when it actually happened and listen to the words of God and what was said to Adam and Eve that day to understand the CURSE in which they bore not only on themselves but also on those that they produced and then those that came all along the line of lieage and since we all have the same lineage that brings us back to Adam and Eve then we all bear that same curse that was given unto them .....

This Original Sin committed by two that were never supposed to experience death nor were they supposed to toil or experience any sense of pain, nor were they to feel shame, nor were they to know the real difference between eveil and good and yet they did thinking that in this it would make them gods....

When we accept Christ we then are washed anew in His blood and we are renewed to the state of which they were in which we no longer carry that stain of Original sin with us....

Does this mean that we perfected here on earth in the fact that we now no longer sin? No it does not because as long as evil exists in the form of Satan having dominion over this world then sin will exist and because of our free will we will still succumb at times to that evil that exists. Remember Satan's only job is to keep those that are under his rule already away from God and to make those that under God's rule turn away from God to regain his dominion over them as well.

So, although, God does not author evil He does allow it to continue to exist and He does allow for us to be tempted .... Like Christ said the difference between the branches is in the fruits they bear and that this is the mark of His Righteous.

Lovingly In Christ
Debi

 

[mdvaden]

Someone should set a poll to see how many of us believe that the original sin was Lucifer's failure.
​

 

[Debi1967]

Someone should set a poll to see how many of us believe that the original sin was Lucifer's failure.
​

If it was such a failure then why did God himself condemn Adam and Eve and their lineage with it? Why then did He also provide us with a way out of it by the way of His Son? So, therefore what is it that you mean by failure as we always know that in the end Lucifer will lose .... It is just a matter of when and how God is using it to His advantage ....Simply put actually ....

 

[BigNorsk]

Someone should set a poll to see how many of us believe that the original sin was Lucifer's failure.
​

I know people come up with that but that isn't biblical. We are specifically told whose sin the original sin that affects us is.

Rom 5:10-18 NET For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, how much more, since we have been reconciled, will we be saved by his life? (11) Not only this, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received this reconciliation. (12) So then, just as sin entered the world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all people because all sinned — (13) for before the law was given, sin was in the world, but there is no accounting for sin when there is no law. (14) Yet death reigned from Adam until Moses even over those who did not sin in the same way that Adam (who is a type of the coming one) transgressed. (15) But the gracious gift is not like the transgression. For if the many died through the transgression of the one man, how much more did the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one man Jesus Christ multiply to the many! (16) And the gift is not like the one who sinned. For judgment, resulting from the one transgression, led to condemnation, but the gracious gift from the many failures led to justification. (17) For if, by the transgression of the one man, death reigned through the one, how much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one, Jesus Christ! (18) Consequently, just as condemnation for all people came through one transgression, so too through the one righteous act came righteousness leading to life for all people.

It's really not debatable that Adam and not Lucifer is the source of the original sin.

Marv

 

[OrthodoxyUSA]

Someone should set a poll to see how many of us believe that the original sin was Lucifer's failure.


​

Actually, that is Orthodox. "original sin was Lucifer's"

Not to imply that Lucifer created anything, but rather that he had turned away from God.

Lucifer fell before man... and wanted to drag man down with him.

But still Adam was the originator of our inherited stain.

Forgive me....

 

[Debi1967]

Actually, that is Orthodox. "original sin was Lucifer's"

Actually this is Orthodox AND Eastern Catholic theology .....

Forgive me......

Lovingly in Christ
Debi

 

[sawdust]

True, we don't inherit Adam's sin but do we really inherit the sin nature? I'm still a little confused about just what is the sin nature.

As I said, the sin nature is a genetic defect.

I've always thought of the sin nature as a state of being

That doesn't surprise me. My experience is that is pretty much what the Church teaches but it never made sense to me for a variety of reasons. The main one being is the failure to explain how one inherits a "state of being". As I said earlier, I have sought to understand for a long time. I knew I was a sinner at 4 years of age and it wasn't the Church or any Christian who taught me that. I also knew I couldn't control it. Although, that didn't stop me trying, being the utterly stubborn and proud wench that I am.

I don't know if I can explain it all that well because I am still learning myself but the best analogy that I can think of is to see yourself as a house.
The framework, walls and roof is the body. The furnishings, color scheme etc is your soul and in the midst of the house is a room known as the library which is your spirit. God made Adam to be a sound house. When he sinned the library was removed, leaving a vacuum that altered the compositon of the walls etc. (Let's call it "wood rot" for the sake of analogy.)
If we begin with the "sound house", the library is the place from where we get the right furnishings and colour (ie the knowledge of God or Truth) thus turning the whole from a house into a home. A most glorious abode really when it is as God intends. Christ, being the perfect man, has it said of Him...
John 1:14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only,[d] who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

We are born with "wood rot" and no library. It is not just the lack of a library that is our problem but the stench of wood rot gets into the drapes and sofa. We can't stop it happening it takes a power stronger than our will to stop the spread of the stench. Without the library we don't have a place from which to gather Truth so what furnishings we put in place can end up as any old thing. It might be the "right" sofa, because the Law of God is in the world (ie you shall not murder), but the stench will still ultimately corrupt even the "good stuff" (God's Law) you deck your house out with. (This is why good works can't save you)

Classic Romans 7:24 really.
What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?
You will and will to do what's right because you see what's right in God's Law but you fail to do it again and again because the wood rot stench keeps on overwhelming even the good you do. The sin nature (wood rot) is in the very walls and framework of your house. The only way to get rid of it is to destroy the walls etc or find a power greater than the power it exerts. Good News, that is what God did. It's called Grace.

This is why to be filled with the Spirit is a command to believers not an optional extra. You can't be holy without the power of the Spirit in control of you. He does two things. 1. He over-rides the power of the sin nature and 2. He provides the knowledge of God through the Word.

Well they odviously didn't die physically but their spirits died. The result of this effects all human beings from generation to generation. Maybe I'm splitting hairs here or makeing this too difficult but I see a difference between inheriting a sin nature and simply not having a live spirit in us.

That's because they are two different things. Technically we don't inherit the lack of a spirit from Adam. We inherit the sin nature, the biological defect that is in every gene of our body. But because we are born (indeed conceived) in that way, God cannot impute a human spirit. Only God can create human soul and spirit, man cannot. Remember what is born of flesh is flesh but what is born of Spirit is spirit.

To me, having a sin nature means that you have sinned and have the potential to sin again.

You don't have to sin to have a sin nature. You have a sin nature which is why you sin... eventually. It's having the sin nature that guarantees every one "falls short of the glory of God." If you are born and you live long enough? You will sin, absolute guarantee.

It's simple, you can't have your connection with God severed and expect to live a holy, sin free life.

True. But even once we are reconciled to God, we still sin. The knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ which is believed upon will reduce the occurence of sin in our life. "the Truth will set you free"

Psalm 119:11 I have hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you.

The Word heard and believed upon is taken into our spirit. From there it is "metabolised" into our soul so that when we are confronted with temptation or need to make choices we respond with the Word. Where there is no spirit (ie unbeliever), he metabolises his thinking from his flesh (sinful nature) and the world (cosmic thought pattern). The lusts of the flesh are plain and we all know Satan is the father of lies. The fact that unbelievers can be "good people" only goes to prove that 1. God's Law is Holy and 2. that He continues to pour out His mercy.

Hope I'm helping and not hindering.

peace

 

[mdvaden]

If it was such a failure then why did God himself condemn Adam and Eve and their lineage with it?

Oh...I wouldn't say that God darted the term "original" at Adam.

The Word does show what Lucifer did. And the Word is from God.

And the Word shows God confronting Lucifer too.

"till iniquity was found within thee"

So...was sin original to Adam? Or was Adam and Eve the first of mankind to sin and bring it into the world of mankind?