Sin and Sinners, continued...

I last asked if a sinner is a sinner because he sins or does he sin because he is a sinner and you might well ask as to what difference does it make and the answer is all the difference in the world. One way there is little sense to the matter of sin that we can make out, but with the other clarity comes.

"The day that you eat of the tree, you shall surely die," so God tells His two children in the garden. We, mostly draw the conclusion from that that the biting into the fruit is the sin when it is only the last act of a completed treason. It is like the seal on the envelope. First they had to entertain the idea, then they had to determine to do it. At this point the treason is complete. A new religion has come into being - the religion of self.

We often imagine that until the very moment that the fruit was bitten there was the possibility to go back and in a sense that was true. But before one partakes of the fruit you must commit yourself to a point from which there is no turning back. The act is like the sacrament of the new self-centered religion. The sin is to decide to ignore the God who has created and loved you for the advancement of the self. After all, they were promised promotion if only they would turn their backs on God - "you shall be as gods."

The effect of the fall is that every child that is born is born outside the garden, outside the fellowship of God's love. It is this isolation that is called the state of Sin. Everyone of us are born in this condition.

Stripped of that fellowship, we need restoration, for, being born outside the garden, come forth out of the womb into our present world, feeling our need and responding by demanding our needs be met from the time we breach the birth canal. What we will do to advance our own needs and status or deny the same to others is called our sins. So thee egg becomes the mother of the chicken where sin is concerned.

I am first a sinner, then I commit sins against God and man. it will never do to live a moral life by our personal standards because our standards are skewed by our world view - some variant on Adam's. We need to be delivered from ourselves and the righteous consequences that befall us because of our sin. We need a savior. We need someone who has born the the consequences of our sin and who can restore us to that life giving love that has always been there but has been beyond our grasp because of our rebellion and selfcenteredness. We need Jesus. The only question that remains is if we are willing to come, will He be willing to receive us. But he says, "Come to me all you who are heavy-laden and I will give you rest."

It is the plain teaching of the Bible that God is always present. That is not the problem. the problem is that we are either unaware of Him or unwilling to come. it is as if we live in adjoining rooms that you find in some hotels and motels, where there are two doors on one door frame. Each is controlled by the occupant in one of the rooms. When both occupants open their doors, an open pathway is available to each, but if one refuses to open his, the way stays barred.

Jesus said, "Behold I stand at the door and knock and if any man hear my voice, I will come into him and dine with him." So, then His side of the portal is open and we will not see Him until we open ours.

the trouble is that the door on our side is warped by our sin and we lack the strength to open it on our own. We need to ask for His help from His side. You could do that right now, and if you truly want that help, He will provide it, and if you don't want it at this point, He will continue to be available, even if you decide that you don't ever want Him in your life, until you come to a point where it would be utterly worthless to do so.