Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law
Sin
I.
A general account or declaration concerning “Whosoever committeth sin.” What such an one doeth. “He transgresseth the law.” By the law is here to be under stood the law of God, in and by which He hath commanded perfect obedience to every precept of it. Which law is as immutable as the nature and will of God: it can no more change than God Himself.
II. What sin is in its consequences: even in any, in the least act of it: yea, in any act of it: “Sin is the transgression of the law.” It is therefore most carefully to be avoided. Sin in its nature and quality, matter and manner, may seemingly to us be more or less sinful; yet it is one and the same as to the essence of it. Herein it is we are ourselves so often deceived and overcome by it. If we can dish up the sin we are in our own persons most inclined to, so as to have the gross parts of it so refined as to render it palatable, and that it may go down glibe, we are then able to act the same; yet as the nature of sin cannot be changed, so it is not the less pernicious, because we have so contrived as to swallow it most easily. It is in many instances so much the more poisonous. Sin is like a poisonous plant. The root, the leaves, the every part is full of it. Be it weaker or stronger in any part of it, yet it diffuses itself in and throughout the whole. There is the nature of sin in every act of it: and this more than we can, or ever shall be able to comprehend.
III. The antidote these saints had, which was all-sufficient to bear up their minds, and lift up their hearts with holy confidence, above and beyond the law, sin, and its curse. “And ye know that He was manifested to take away our sins; and in Him is no sin.” (E. S. Pierce.)
Sin the transgression of the law
I. Show that all mankind is under the law of God, which still remaineth in force as an inviolable rule of righteousness.
1. That man is God’s creature, and therefore His subject. The subjection of man to God is built upon his absolute dependence upon God, both as to creation and preservation.
2. Man being God’s subject, hath a certain law given to him, which doth require obedience from him, and doth determine his duty, particularly wherein it shall consist (Mic_6:8).
3. Man being under a law, should be very tender of breaking or disobeying it, for God never dispenseth with it, as it is purely moral, and standeth much upon keeping up His legislative authority; which may appear by these considerations
(1) If man could have kept it, he would have gotten life by it; that was God’s first intention; and the reason why it succeeded not was through our sin.
(2) In that God would not release the penalty of the law, nor pardon any sin against it without satisfaction first made by the blood of Christ; the law is both the rule of our duty and God’s judgment; it showeth what is due from us to God, and also what is due from God to us in case of disobedience.
(3) Before man can have actual benefit by this satisfaction, he must consent to return to the duty of the law, and live in obedience to God (Act_26:18).
(4) Christ merited regeneration, or the spirit of holiness, that all new creatures might voluntarily keep this law, though not in absolute perfection, yet in sincere obedience (Tit_3:5-6).
(5) The more we keep this law, the more pleasing we are to God, and the more communion we have with Christ.
(6) That we cannot have full communion with God till we are perfectly conformed to His law; for we are not introduced into the heavenly glory till we are perfect and complete in holiness (Eph_5:27).
(7) That the law is the rule of all God’s judgments in the world, and His righteous process, whether against nations or persons (Rom_1:18).
(8) That He will not spare His own children when they transgress it by heinous sins (Pro_11:31).
(9) That Christ came not to dissolve our obligation to God, or ever intended it, but to promote it rather.
II. The nature and heinousness of sin is to be determined by a contrariety or want of conformity to this law; for sin presupposeth a law and law giver, and a debt of subjection lying upon us.
1. By omitting what is commanded as a duty to God or man; as suppose invocation of God (Jer_10:25).
2. By committing what God hath forbidden, or breaking through the restraints God hath laid upon us, in worshipping idols, or satisfying our revenge, or fulfilling our lusts.
III. That those that live in sin, or any allowed breach of this law, are still under the curse of it, and cannot look upon themselves as God’s adopted children.
1. It is certain that when we come to take the law out of the hand of a redeemer, we are all sinners and transgressors before God.
2. Though God findeth us sinners, and we apprehend ourselves to be so, yet when He taketh us into His family He doth not leave us so; but on God’s part regeneration maketh way for adoption (Joh_1:12-13).
3. None are so exact with God in the obedience of His law but that still they need the same grace that brought them into the family to keep them in the family, and to pardon their daily failings.
4. Though God’s adopted children may through infirmity break His law, yet there is a manifest difference between them and others that live in a state of sin, either in enmity to godliness, or in a course of vanity, sensuality, or any kind of rebellion against God, rejecting His counsels, calls, and mercies, which should reclaim them. (T. Manton, D. D.)
Nature of sin
I. What law the apostle mentions in the text. There is no reason to think that He means any law given to Adam, or to Noah, or any law given by Moses, except the moral law, which is founded in the reason of things, and is of perpetual obligation. This He calls the law, in distinction from all positive laws and particular precepts. By the law, therefore, he means the first supreme and universal law of God’s moral kingdom, which is binding upon all rational and accountable creatures.
II. What this moral law, which is binding upon all mankind, requires. It certainly requires something that is reasonable, because it is founded in reason. Our Saviour perfectly understood the true import and perpetual obligation of the law, and came to fulfil and magnify it. There are but two things really valuable and desirable in their own nature. One is happiness, and the other is holiness. Happiness is valuable and desirable in its own nature, or for what it is in itself. And holiness is valuable and desirable in its own nature, or for what it is in itself. The moral law therefore which is founded in the nature of things, requires men to love and seek holiness and happiness for themselves and others. It requires them to love and seek the holiness and blessedness of God supremely; because He is supremely great and good. And it requires men to love and seek one another’s holiness and happiness as their own. And when they exercise such disinterested love to God and man, they fulfil the law, or do all that the law requires them to do.
III. What it forbids. Every law has both a precept and prohibition. It forbids whatever is directly contrary to what it requires, and requires whatever is directly contrary to what it forbids. It appears from what has been said under the last head that the Divine law requires disinterested love to God and man; and from this we may justly conclude that it forbids whatever is directly contrary to disinterested love to God and man. Improvement:
1. If the transgression of the Divine law consists in positive selfishness, then it does not consist in a mere want of conformity to it.
2. If the Divine law requires pure, disinterested love, and forbids selfishness, then every free, voluntary exercise of the heart is either an act of obedience or disobedience of the law of God.
3. If every selfish exercise be a transgression of the law, then those are under a deep deception who imagine that they have no sin.
4. If every selfish exercise is a transgression of the law, and every transgression of the law is sin, then every sin deserves God’s wrath and curse, both in this life and in that which is to come.
5. If the law of God forbids all selfish and sinful affections upon pain of eternal death, then mankind are all naturally in a very guilty and wretched condition. (N. Emmons, D. D.)
The evil of sin
1. There is folly in it, as it is a deviation from the best rule which the Divine wisdom hath given unto us. They who reject that which is able to make them wise to salvation, that in which all true wisdom consisteth, how can they be wise men? Every soul in hell is brought there by sinful folly.
2. Laws are not only rules to direct, but have a binding force from the authority of the lawgiver. God doth not only give us counsel as a friend, but commands as a sovereign. Therefore the second notion whereby the evil of sin is set forth is that of disobedience and rebellion; and so it is a great injury done to God, because it is a contempt of God’s authority.
3. It is shameful ingratitude. Man is God’s beneficiary, from whom he hath received life and being, and all things, and is therefore bound to love and serve Him according to His declared will.
4. It is a disowning of God’s propriety in us, as if we were not His own, and God had not power to do with His own as He pleaseth. It robbeth God of His propriety. If we consider His natural right, so sill is such an injury and wrong to God as theft and robbery. If we consider our own covenant by which we voluntarily own God’s right and property in us, so it is breach of vows. If we consider this covenant as being made in a way of devoting and consecrating of ourselves from a common to a holy use, so it is sacrilege; all which aggravate sin, and should make it more odious to our thoughts.
5. It is a contempt of God’s holiness and purity, as if He were indifferent to good and evil, and stood not upon His law, whether men broke it or kept it, and would not call them to an account, and judge them for it. Whereas God standeth punctually and precisely upon His law; the least point is dearer unto Him than all the world in some sense (Mat_5:18).
6. It is a denial of the goodness of God, as if He were envious of the happiness and welfare of mankind, as if He had planted in us desires which He would not have satisfied, only to vex and torment us, and had fettered us unreasonably, and His commands were grevious and His yoke intolerable; yea, ensnared us by keeping us from that which is good and comfortable for us.
7. It is a depreciation and contempt of God’s glorious majesty. What else shall we make of a plain contest with Him, and a flat contradiction to His holy will?
8. It is a questioning, if not a flat denial, of God’s onmiscieney and omnipresence, as if He did not see or regard the actions of men, since we dare do that in the presence of God which we would scarce do before a little child.
9. It is the violation of a law which is holy, just, and good. The matter of it recommendeth itself to our con sciences, as tending to the glory of God, and conducing to preserve the rectitude of our natures.
10. It is a disorder in nature, or a breach in the moral order and harmony of the world, whilst man, the most excellent of all visible creatures, is so perverted and depraved, like the chief string to an instrument broken and out of tune.
11. It is a disbelief of the promises and threatenings wherewith the law is enforced; for in the law, besides the precept, there is a sanction by penalties and rewards.
12. It is a slighting of all those providences by which He would confirm and back His law. The Lord knoweth how apt we are to be guided by present sense. So all those chastisings by which God will show us the bitter fruit of sin (Jer_2:19).
13. It is a contempt of all those means by which God useth to enforce His laws and quicken the sense of our duty upon our hearts; such are the strivings and pressing motions of His Spirit (Gen_6:3).
14. The slenderness of the temptation that irritates us to break the laws of God doth also show the malignity of sin; for what is it but the pleasing of the carnal faculty (Jam_1:14).
Practical lessons:
1. We see hence the folly of them who make a mock and sport of sin (Pro_14:9).
2. It showeth the folly of those that do not only make a light reckoning of sin themselves, but think also that God makes little account of it.
3. How just is God in appointing eternal punishment as the fruit and reward of sin.
4. If all sin be so odious, how much more a life of sin!
5. The necessity of entering into the gospel covenant. Now this is done by repentance towards God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.
6. The necessity of persevering in the gospel estate by new obedience, and a continual dependence on the grace of the Redeemer.
7. What reason we have to submit to the sharpest providences which God in His corrective discipline puts us under (Isa_27:9).
8. That a renewed heart should be affected, not only with the evil after sin, but with the evil in sin; for to persuade God’s children to a conformity to their Father, he urgeth this argument, that it is a breach of the law. (T. Manton, D. D.)
Sin and its removal
I. Sin is denounced as a transgression of the law. How fitted is such a representation to warn us against it! It teaches us what sin is. The very fact that a law exists to direct our conduct is enough to claim our attention. “Do this, and live; in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die”: these announcements may be regarded as beacons set up to warn us against shipwreck on the sea of life, or lights to guide us into a safe and peaceful haven. Not only, however, is it a solemn thing to know there is a law to which we are subject, but the responsibility is greatly increased when we remember it is the law of God. He is the lawgiver, and knows what to require, and has authority to enjoin it. It is the transcript of His mind, and to disobey it must be rebellion against Him. In its nature the law is absolutely perfect, being alike worthy of God and adapted to advance the best interests of those who are subject to it. It is holy--distinguishing in all eases between right and wrong, good and evil. It is just--never claiming anything beyond what God is justified to require and man is bound to render. And it is good--securing the highest advantages to all who obey it. It is well for time, and better for eternity. This law it is the purpose of God ever to maintain. No change in man can produce a change in it. It never was and can never be broken without entailing sorrow and suffering on the transgressor. Sin has been the cankerworm at the root of human happiness and prosperity. We must esteem it the enemy of God, the enemy of holiness, justice, and goodness; the enemy of man, of his peace and prosperity; the prolific source of all sorrow, because the transgression of that law which God has established as the directory of man and the safeguard of righteousness.
II. In pursuance of his argument, the apostle declares that the very purpose of Christ’s mission was to destroy sin.
III. It strengthens these views still further to observe that the apostle represents the believer’s union with Christ to be productive of the same result (1Jn_3:6).
IV. The distinguishing characteristic of the Christian is declared to be righteousness. “He that doeth righteousness.” He does it. He has laid the law of God before him, and seeks to walk in conformity to it. (J. Morgan, D. D.)
The nature of sin
Very little consideration may show us the importance of seeing wherein consists the real nature of sin. The empiric who sets himself, in dealing with any disease of the body, merely to counteract its external symptoms, often aggravates the malady with which he ignorantly meddles; and he assuredly runs a far greater risk of working a far wider ruin who attempts in such presumptuous ignorance to deal with the disorders of the soul. Weigh the effects of sin, and you must appreciate something of its deadly character; look what it has wrought in the heavenly world; remember that those natures, framed according to the wise design of the All-Wise and the All-Mighty with the largest capacities for blessedness with which created beings could be gifted, have all those vast capacities filled with anguish, unconceivable, unalleviated, and then see what sin has wrought, and measure as you can in that awful shattering of God’s great work of love what sin is. Or turn to this world, and compare what it was when, as “very good,” God’s blessing rested upon its rejoicing dawn; and then gather into one heap the sadnesses of this present earth--its darkened imaginations, its toiling, wearied, suffering multitudes--and remember that all these are the work of sin, and see what a poison must be in it. Or look to Calvary, and know that this too is sin’s work. For, secondly, all this belongs not to some distant world, not to beings of another kind from us, not to devils in hell; but it belongs to us, it touches us, nay, it is in us, in every one of us, ruling in some, struggling in ethers, present in all. What, then, is its nature? “Sin is the transgression of the law.” But, then, what is “the law”? It is the manifestation to reasonable creatures by the unapproachable and incomprehensible Lord of so much of the perfection of His own necessary character as can be comprehended by the creature to whom it is revealed, in order that the character of the supreme Lord may be formed and maintained, according to his limited capacity, in the creature also. This connection of the reasonable creature’s happiness with the existence of a true harmony between his own spiritual being and the character of God, is a necessary consequence of the inalienable relation between the perfect Creator, from whom we have our being and in whom we subsist, and the reasonable creatures of His hand. First, because only by this harmony of his own will with the will of his Creator can the perfection of the creature’s own nature be reached or maintained. And next, because only in the Creator can the creature, created with capacities for knowing, loving, serving, resting on his Creator, ever find complete happiness. By whatever means, then, the supreme Lord reveals Himself to His reasonable creatures, that revelation is to them “the law.” And as in keeping this law there is for the creature all blessedness, so in the transgression of it there is certain and inevitable misery. For, first, every variation from it is a disturbance, it may be a fatal disturbance, of the intricate and marvellous machinery of his own being, all of which was planned and executed with Divine wisdom for a purpose to which he in his waywardness is running counter. Here, doubtless, we may find the cause and the history of the fall of the apostate angels. Under some temptation of self-will they quitted that order in which God’s loving wisdom had placed them; and violating that, the indwelling grace of God, whereby alone the creature can ever stand upright, was first resisted and then quenched in them, and their nature became incapable of the bliss for which they had been created. And as it was with them, so it must be with every other creature; in choosing that which is at variance with the will of Him who created them, they reject all possible perfectness in their own nature. Again, they lose that which alone can fill with perfect and enduring happiness the reasonable soul created capable of knowing it, the loving revelation to itself of the Lord of all as its abiding portion. For the creature whose will, affections, and spiritual nature are diverse from those of the Almighty, cannot rejoice in Him; the contradiction between them makes it impossible; all the boundless reach of the Creator’s perfections becomes to such a fallen one the occasion of a more energetic repulsion of his own nature from that, the only true centre and rest of his being. All this leads to some most practical conclusions.
1. First, we have here some light thrown on the awful mystery of eternal death, and of the steps down which the creatures of the God of love are dragged into it. Malignity, hatred, despair, the last and blackest sins into which the smaller pleasurable sins have run, are often, even in this life, a visible anguish to their victim; and the reason of all this, and its end, is taught us as we gaze into the nature of sin. For sin is not a thing, but a certain mode of action by a reasonable creature, and that action affects his own inward constitution; and the misery of eternity is not the mere retribution appointed for something which happened in this life, but is a continuous and most intense course of action into which action here has by necessary steps run on.
2. Secondly, see here the true evil of the least allowed sin. For this, which is the consequence of the deadly nature of sin, must be in every sin; and when we give way to the least sin, we yield ourselves to it, and we cannot know how far it may prevail over us. The mere allowing our earthly hearts to fix with too much delight upon lawful things short of their true Lord--this of itself may destroy us, by being the first step which leads us away from Him as the centre of our being. Still more, one habit of sin, one allowed evil temper, one permitted lust, may be the acting of our soul against God which insures for us the eternal rebellion of a lost spirit in the blackness of despair. Doubtless, as some poisons destroy the life of the body more suddenly than others, so some sins lay waste the soul with a more awful rapidity than others, because they concentrate into themselves a more energetic contradiction of the holiness of the blessed God: but all have the evil nature in them; and one therefore which possesses the soul may, and if it remains, must, shut it out from heaven and blessedness, not because God is a severe exactor of a threatened penalty, but because sin must part the soul which it possesses from Him, who, by the necessity of His own blessed nature, cannot bear iniquity.
3. And again, see here the need we have of crying constantly to God for larger and yet larger gifts of His converting grace.
4. And, lastly, let us learn hence that lesson without which prayer for the gifts of God’s grace is nothing but delusion--the lesson of striving in act against sin. (Bp. S. Wilberforce.)
Sin
Aright knowledge of sin lies at the root of all saving Christianity. Without it such doctrines as justification, conversion, sanctification, are “words and names” which convey no meaning to the mind. The material creation in Genesis began with “light,” and so also does the spiritual creation.
I. I shall supply some definition of sin. Sin is that vast moral disease which affects the whole human race, of every rank, and class, and name, and nation, and people. “A sin,” to speak more particularly, consists in doing, saying, thinking, or imagining, anything that is not in perfect conformity with the mind and law of God. The slightest outward or inward departure from absolute mathematical parallelism with God’s revealed will and character constitutes a sin, and at once makes us guilty in God’s sight.
II. Concerning the origin and source of this vast moral disease called “sin” I must say something. Let us, then, have it fixed down in our minds that the sinfulness of man does not begin from without, but from within. It is a family disease, which we all inherit from our first parents, Adam and Eve, and with which we are born. Of all the foolish things that parents say about their children there is none worse than the common saying, “My son has a good heart at the bottom. He is not what he ought to be; but he has fallen into bad hands. Public schools are bad places. The tutors neglect the boys. Yet he has a good heart at the bottom.” The truth, unhappily, is diametrically the other way. The first cause of all sin lies in the natural corruption of the boy’s own heart, and not in the school.
III. Concerning the extent of this vast moral disease of man called sin, let us beware that we make no mistake. The only safe ground is that which is laid for us in Scripture (Gen_6:5; Jer_17:9). Sin is a disease which pervades and runs through every part of our moral constitution and every faculty of our minds. The understanding, the affections, the reasoning powers, the will, are all more or less infected. Even the conscience is so blinded that it cannot be depended on as a sure guide, and is as likely to lead men wrong as right, unless it is enlightened by the Holy Ghost.
IV. Concerning the guilt, vileness, and offensiveness of sin in the sight of God, my words shall be few. The blind man can see no difference between a masterpiece of Titian or Raphael and the Queen’s Head on a village signboard. The deaf man cannot distinguish between a penny whistle and a cathedral organ. The very animals whose smell is most offensive to us have no idea that they are offensive, and are not offensive to one another. And man, fallen man, I believe, can have no just idea what a vile thing sin is in the sight of that God whose handiwork is absolutely perfect--perfect whether we look through telescope or microscope--perfect in the formation of a mighty planet like Jupiter, with his satellites, keeping’ time to a second as he rolls round the sun--perfect in the formation of the smallest insect that crawls over a foot of ground. But let us nevertheless settle it firmly in our minds that sin is “the abominable thing that God hateth”; and that “nothing that defiles shall in any wise enter” heaven (Jer_44:4; Hab_1:13; Jam_2:10; Eze_18:4; Rom_6:23; Rom_2:16; Mar_9:44; Psa_9:17; Mat_25:46; Rev_21:27).
V. One point only remains to be considered on the subject of sin, which I dare not pass over--its deceitfulness. “It is but a little one! God is merciful! God is not extreme to mark what is done amiss! We mean well! One cannot be so particular! Where is the mighty harm? We only do as others!” Who is not familiar with this kind of language?
1. A Scriptural view of sin is one of the best antidotes to that vague, dim, misty, hazy kind of theology which is so painfully current in the present age.
2. A Scriptural view of sin is one of the best antidotes to the extravagantly broad and liberal theology which is so much in vogue at the present time.
3. A right view of sin is the best antidote to that sensuous, ceremonial, formal kind of Christianity, which has swept over England like a flood, and carried away so many before it.
4. A right view of sin is one of the best antidotes to the overstrained theories of perfection, of which we hear so much in these times.
5. A Scriptural view of sin will prove an admirable antidote to the low views of personal holiness, which are so painfully prevalent in these last days of the Church. We must return to first principles. We must go back to “the old paths.” We must sit down humbly in the presence of God, look the whole subject in the face, examine clearly what the Lord Jesus calls sin, and what the Lord Jesus calls “doing His will.” (Bp. Ryle.)
The lawless nature of sin
What do we mean when we say of others, or of ourselves, that we are sinners? And what is the kind and degree of feeling which ought to accompany this utterance?
I. Sin consists in action, in doing something. Sin, it is said, is the transgression of the law. Everyone, then, who sins acts, or does something; for transgressing is certainly acting. But in saying this, let me not be understood to imply that sinning is limited to mere external actions. In fact, we more properly say that the sin resides in the mind, and consists in the purpose there formed, even when the purpose is manifested in outward action. The outward act does not give character to the internal disposition and purpose; but the internal disposition and purpose give character to the outward act. The outward act is the internal spirit embodied; and in every case of open sin, both the mental purpose and this external embodying are sinful.
II. Sin always implies knowledge--knowledge of the law of which it is a transgression. It is the moral law, which is always made known, first of all, in the conscience. This peculiar faculty gives to every human being, in proportion as his nature is unfolded, the sense of moral obligation, makes him accountable, and capable of such actions as we call right and wrong, worthy of reward or of punishment. The law, in this form, is as old as man. He finds it in himself; and it reveals, in some degree, its binding power wherever man is seen on earth; though it speaks more clearly in proportion as the human faculties are improved, and man becomes more truly human. But since to the generality of men conscience, in the absence of an extraordinary revelation, speaks but feebly, God has more fully proclaimed His law in His Word. On the principle that to whom much is given, of the same will much be required, the possessors of this Word, if they fail to live answerably to it, will involve themselves in deeper and more inexcusable transgression than the heathen.
III. Sin always implies voluntariness, or that the action to which it is ascribed is the free action of its author. We may search indwelling grace of God, whereby alone the creature can ever stand upright, was first resisted and then quenched in them, and their nature became incapable of the bliss for which they had been created. And as it was with them, so it must be with every other creature; in choosing that which is at variance with the will of Him who created them, they reject all possible perfectness in their own nature. Again, they lose that which alone can fill with perfect and enduring happiness the reasonable soul created capable of knowing it, the loving revelation to itself of the Lord of all as its abiding portion. For the creature whose will, affections, and spiritual nature are diverse from those of the Almighty, cannot rejoice in Him; the contradiction between them makes it impossible; all the boundless reach of the Creator’s perfections becomes to such a fallen one the occasion of a more energetic repulsion of his own nature from that, the only true centre and rest of his being. All this leads to some most practical conclusions.
1. First, we have here some light thrown on the awful mystery of eternal death, and of the steps down which the creatures of the God of love are dragged into it. Malignity, hatred, despair, the last and blackest sins into which the smaller pleasurable sins have run, are often, even in this life, a visible anguish to their victim; and the reason of all this, and its end, is taught us as we gaze into the nature of sin. For sin is not a thing, but a certain mode of action by a reasonable creature, and that action affects his own inward constitution; and the misery of eternity is not the mere retribution appointed for something which happened in this life, but is a continuous and most intense course of action into which action here has by necessary steps run on.
2. Secondly, see here the true evil of the least allowed sin. For this, which is the consequence of the deadly nature of sin, must be in every sin; and when we give way to the least sin, we yield ourselves to it, and we cannot know how far it may prevail over us. The mere allowing our earthly hearts to fix with too much delight upon lawful things short of their true Lord--this of itself may destroy us, by being the first step which leads us away from Him as the centre of our being. Still more, one habit of sin, one allowed evil temper, one permitted lust, may be the acting of our soul against God which insures for us the eternal rebellion of a lost spirit in the blackness of despair. Doubtless, as some poisons destroy the life of the body more suddenly than others, so some sins lay waste the soul with a more awful rapidity than others, because they concentrate into themselves a more energetic contradiction of the holiness of the blessed God: but all have the evil nature in them; and one therefore which possesses the soul may, and if it remains, must, shut it out from heaven and blessedness, not because God is a severe exactor of a threatened penalty, but because sin must part the soul which it possesses from Him, who, by the necessity of His own blessed nature, cannot bear iniquity.
3. And again, see here the need we have of crying constantly to God for larger and yet larger gifts of His converting grace.
4. And, lastly, let us learn hence that lesson without which prayer for the gifts of God’s grace is nothing but delusion--the lesson of striving in act against sin. (Bp. S. Wilberforce.)
Sin
A right knowledge of sin lies at the root of all saving Christianity. Without it such doctrines as justification, conversion, sanctification, are “words and names” which convey no meaning to the mind. The material creation in Genesis began with “light,” and so also does the spiritual creation.
I. I shall supply some definition of sin. Sin is that vast moral disease which affects the whole human race, of every rank, and class, and name, and nation, and people. “A sin,” to speak more particularly, consists in doing, saying, thinking, or imagining, anything that is not in perfect conformity with the mind and law of God. The slightest outward or inward departure from absolute mathematical parallelism with God’s revealed will and character constitutes a sin, and at once makes us guilty in God’s sight.
II. Concerning the origin and source of this vast moral disease called “sin” I must say something. Let us, then, have it fixed down in our minds that the sinfulness of man does not begin from without, but from within. It is a family disease, which we all inherit from our first parents, Adam and Eve, and with which we are born. Of all the foolish things that parents say about their children there is none worse than the common saying, “My son has a good heart at the bottom. He is not what he ought to be; but he has fallen into bad hands. Public schools are bad places. The tutors neglect the boys. Yet he has a good heart at the bottom.” The truth, unhappily, is diametrically the other way. The first cause of all sin lies in the natural corruption of the boy’s own heart, and not in the school.
III. Concerning the extent of this vast moral disease of man called sin, let us beware that we make no mistake. The only safe ground is that which is laid for us in Scripture (Gen_6:5; Jer_17:9). Sin is a disease which pervades and runs through every part of our moral constitution and every faculty of our minds. The understanding, the affections, the reasoning powers, the will, are all more or less infected. Even the conscience is so blinded that it cannot be depended on as a sure guide, and is as likely to lead men wrong as right, unless it is enlightened by the Holy Ghost.
IV. Concerning the guilt, vileness, and offensiveness of sin in the sight of God, my words shall be few. The blind man can see no difference between a masterpiece of Titian or Raphael and the Queen’s Head on a village signboard. The deaf man cannot distinguish between a penny whistle and a cathedral organ. The very animals whose smell is most offensive to us have no idea that they are offensive, and are not offensive to one another. And man, fallen man, I believe, can have no just idea what a vile thing sin is in the sight of that God whose handiwork is absolutely perfect--perfect whether we look through telescope or microscope--perfect in the formation of a mighty planet like Jupiter, with his satellites, keeping time to a second as he rolls round the sun--perfect in the formation of the smallest insect that crawls over a foot of ground. But let us nevertheless settle it firmly in our minds that sin is “the abominable thing that God hateth”; and that “nothing that defiles shall in any wise enter” heaven (Jer_44:4; Hab_1:13; Jam_2:10; Eze_18:4; Rom_6:23; Rom_2:16; Mar_9:44; Psa_9:17; Mat_25:46; Rev_21:27).
V. One point only remains to be considered on the subject of sin, which I dare not pass over--its deceitfulness. “It is but a little one! God is merciful! God is not extreme to mark what is done amiss! We mean well! One cannot be so particular! Where is the mighty harm? We only do as others!” Who is not familiar with this kind of language?
1. A Scriptural view of sin is one of the best antidotes to that vague, dim, misty, hazy kind of theology which is so painfully current in the present age.
2. A Scriptural view of sin is one of the best antidotes to the extravagantly broad and liberal theology which is so much in vogue at the present time.
3. A right view of sin is the best antidote to that sensuous, ceremonial, formal kind of Christianity, which has swept over England like a flood, and carried away so many before it.
4. A right view of sin is one of the best antidotes to the overstrained theories of perfection, of which we hear so much in these times.
5. A Scriptural view of sin will prove an admirable antidote to the low views of personal holiness, which are so painfully prevalent in these last days of the Church. We must return to first principles. We must go back to “the old paths.” We must sit down humbly in the presence of God, look the whole subject in the face, examine clearly what the Lord Jesus calls sin, and what the Lord Jesus calls “doing His will.” (Bp. Ryle.)
The lawless nature of sin
What do we mean when we nay of others, or of ourselves, that we are sinners? And what is the kind and degree of feeling which ought to accompany this utterance?
I. Sin consists in action, in doing something. Sin, it is said, is the transgression of the law. Everyone, then, who sins acts, or does something; for transgressing is certainly acting. But in saying this, let me not be understood to imply that sinning is limited to mere external actions. In fact, we more properly say that the sin resides in the mind, and consists in the purpose there formed, even when the purpose is manifested in outward action. The outward act does not give character to the internal disposition and purpose; but the internal disposition and purpose give character to the outward act. The outward act is the internal spirit embodied; and in every case of open sin, both the mental purpose and this external embodying are sinful.
II. Sin always implies knowledge--knowledge of the law of which it is a transgression. It is the moral law, which is always made known, first of all, in the conscience. This peculiar faculty gives to every human being, in proportion as his nature is unfolded, the sense of moral obligation, makes him accountable, and capable of such actions as we call right and wrong, worthy of reward or of punishment. The law, in this form, is as old as man. He finds it in himself; and it reveals, in some degree, its binding power wherever man is seen on earth; though it speaks more clearly in proportion as the human faculties are improved, and man becomes more truly human. But since to the generality of men conscience, in the absence of an extraordinary revelation, speaks but feebly, God has more fully proclaimed His law in His Word. On the principle that to whom much is given, of the same will much be required, the possessors of this Word, if they fail to live answerably to it, will involve themselves in deeper and more inexcusable transgression than the heathen.
III. Sin always implies voluntariness, or that the action to which it is ascribed is the free action of its author. We may search among the Divine commandments in the Bible as long as we please, we shall not find one addressed to man which it is not in his power to obey, if rightly disposed. Thus falsehood, theft, and all kinds of dishonesty are sins, because everyone who chooses can refrain from these acts. The power of the will extends to everything which man can be said to do. It is a power over the movements of the body, and over the general state and exercises of the mind. It is seen in controlling the thoughts, restraining the imagination, regulating the affections, and subordinating the appetites and the desires. In confining sin to the voluntary actions, we give it then all the scope which it can have in fact, and a very wide scope; for as all our properly human actions are voluntary, they may conceivably all be sinful.
IV. Sin is a wrong act, or, as the text denominates it, a transgression. Holiness is the whole of that moral state, by which a temper of obedience to the Divine law is expressed. Sin is whatever appears in the form of disobedience. It is any and every state of mind and act of the life by which the precepts of the law are contravened or evaded. The object aimed at by the transgressor is not the commission of sin, but simply the gratification of an appetite or desire; sin, in other words, is not his end, but merely a means to his end: while yet in order to gain the end to which some whetted desire points, in order to secure a certain amount of pleasure, he commits the sin, sometimes recklessly, sometimes coolly and deliberately. Any desire of the mind, any freak of caprice or passion, the sensual appetites, the love of fame, the love of power, or the love of accumulation, may thus urge him across the boundary line which separates right from wrong, holiness from sin. Sin is thus, according to the true import of the Greek word in the text, lawlessness. No matter what the sin may be, whether evil-speaking, or dishonesty in business, or intemperance in any of its forms, or any of the legion of sins of which men render themselves guilty, all may be traced directly to that lawlessness, that denial of Divine restraint which is given as the fundamental characteristic of sin in the text. Conclusion:--
(1) From this exhibition of the subject we infer that all sin is personal, by which we mean that it belongs to some personal being who has committed it; and that in the sin of one being no other being whatever can have a share.
(2) Sin cannot be ascribed to the mere nature or mind of man, or to any latent principle of the mind. Everything sinful in man is his own act, or work.
(3) Keeping, then, this in view, we are conducted to the further inference, that sin is a great evil. It is a virulent, positive mischief, consisting in treason against the Divine government, and resistance of the supreme source of all rightful authority. (D. N. Sheldon,, D. D.)
The perpetual obligation of the moral law; the evil of sin and its desert of punishment
I. What we mean by the moral law.
1. The moral law signifies that rule which is given to all mankind to direct their manners or behaviour, considered merely as they are intelligent and social creatures, who have an understanding to know God and themselves, a capacity to judge what is right and wrong, and a will to choose and refuse good and evil.
2. It is found in the Ten Commands;it is found in the Holy Scriptures, scattered up and down through all the writings of the Old and New Testaments, and it may be found out in the plainest and most necessary parts of it, by the sincere and diligent exercise of our own reasoning powers.
II. This moral law is of universal and perpetual obligation to all mankind, even through all nations and all ages.
1. It is a law which arises from the very existence of God and the nature of man; it springs from the very relation of such creatures to their Maker and to one another.
2. This law is so far wrought into the very nature of man as a reasonable creature that an awakened conscience will require obedience to it forever.
3. This law is suited to every state and circumstance of human nature, to every condition of the life of man, and to every dispensation of God; and since it cannot be changed for better law, it must be everlasting.
4. It appears yet further that this law is perpetual, because whatsoever other law God can prescribe or man can be bound to obey, it is built upon the eternal obligation of this moral law.
5. Scripture asserts the perpetuity and everlasting obligation of the moral law (Luk_16:17).
III. The evil nature of sin.
1. It is an affront to the authority and government of a wise and holy God, a God who has sovereign right to make laws for His creatures, and has formed all His commands and prohibitions according to infinite wisdom.
2. Sin carries in the nature of it high ingratitude to God our Creator, and a wicked abuse of that goodness which has bestowed upon us all our natural powers and talents, our limbs, our senses, and all our faculties of soul and body.
3. Sin against the law of God breaks in upon that wise and beautiful order which God has appointed to run through His whole creation (Pro_16:4).
4. As it is the very nature of sin to bring disorder into the creation of God, so its natural consequences are pernicious to the sinful creature!
5. Sin provokes God to anger, as He is the righteous governor of the world; it brings guilt upon the creature, and exposes it to the punishments threatened by the broken law.
IV. The proper demerit of sin, or what is the punishment it deserves.
1. When God made man at first, He designed to continue him in life and happiness so long as man continued innocent and obedient to the law, and thereby maintained his allegiance to God his Maker.
2. By a wilful and presumptuous transgression of the law, man violated his allegiance to God his Maker, and forfeited all good things that his Creator had given him and the hope of all that He had promised.
3. This forfeiture of life, and the blessings of it by sin, is an everlasting forfeiture.
4. There is scarce any actual, i.e., wilful sin, but carries with it some particular aggravations, and these deserve such further positive punishments as the wisdom and justice of God shall see reason to inflict.
Conclusion:
1. Is the law of God in perpetual force and is every transgression of it so heinous an evil?--then let us take a survey how wretched and deplorable is the state of mankind by nature.
2. Is the moral law of such constant obligation, and is death the due recompense of every transgression of it?--then it is necessary for ministers to preach this law, and it is necessary for hearers to learn it.
3. What a holy regard and jealousy has God shown for the honour of His everlasting law, and what a sacred indignation has He manifested against sin, when He sent His own Son to obey this law, and to suffer for our disobedience of it!
4. How glorious is the wisdom and the mercy of the gospel, which does honour to the law in every respect, which prepares an honourable atonement and pardon for guilty rebels who have broken this everlasting law, and provides grace and power to renew our nature according to the demands of it!
5. Happy is the world above, where such natural and such easy obedience is forever paid to this law of God without the least transgression. (Isaac Watts, D. D.)
What sin is
Sin is the transgression of law. It is doing contrary to or without law. The first thing, in ascertaining the real nature of sin, is to get a clear notion of law, What is it? How does it arise? There seems to me but one possible way for us in this nineteenth century to ascertain what is law; and that is, by the observation of the consequences and tendencies of actions. The study of the laws of different peoples can only help us in this thus far--it enables us to see what they found to be useful and good to them, and so gives us a presumptive notion that the same may, in similar circumstances, be good and useful to us. But it is only by observing what are the consequences to which the action actually does tend under our circumstances that we can be sure of its real character in its relation to us. By our own observation alone we can arrive at certainty. But now, what is it that we are to observe in actions, in order to find out God’s law? What is the test by which we may discern what we should and what we should not do? The tendency of an action to promote the highest and most perfect happiness upon the whole is the sure criterion of its being according to the law of God. There is no other which does not resolve itself into this. For, just think a little within yourselves, how can you know that it is the will of God you should act in a certain way, but from the fact that God has so created you and others that, if you do so act, it will promote your highest and truest happiness? There is no mark, no sign put upon actions, distinguishing one from another, that all men can recognise, but this. On the other hand, this test is clear, adequate, and such as every man can appreciate and feel the force of. Whatever tends to promote human happiness upon the whole, and in the long run, must be good and according to the will of God. Whatever tends, ultimately and in the end, to produce suffering, pain, or misery, must be evil and opposed to the Divine will. The only point where the test can seem to fail, is where temporary consequences are mistaken for ultimate results. Self-denial for the sake of doing good to some one, may bring temporary suffering; but the pleasure arising from the contemplation of the good conferred, the vigour and high tone imparted to the mind by the act of self-denial, and the approbation and love secured by it from our fellow creatures, together constitute an amount of happiness which, while immeasurably compensating for the trifling suffering, declare the action to be according to God’s will. And so, too, the test requires that the kind or degree of happiness be taken into the account, in order to ascertain the whole law of God and our complete duty. We find, for example, that whilst some actions bring pleasure through our physical organisation, others bring pleasure through our mental constitution; and that those affecting us through the latter means, induce a more perfect sense of happiness than those affecting us through our physical organisation. And so, again, acts of kindness, love, truthfulness, honour, forgiveness, etc., bring a greater, intenser, more complete degree of happiness than mere culture of intellect; and the suffering or pain brought by neglecting them is, upon the whole, much greater; so that the Divine law requiring these is higher and more imperative than that requiring the intellectual culture. Still, in every case you will see that it is the happiness or pain which determines and makes plain the law or will of God; and it is the relative character or degree of the happiness which determines the relative stringency and imperativeness of the law. But, observe, I do not say that it is the tendency of an action to promote happiness which constitutes it virtuous, and the tendency of an action to promote misery or pain which constitutes it or causes it to be sin; but only that it is the tendency which is to us the test, criterion, or sign by which we know it to be good or bad, virtuous or vicious. But now, if you accept this test, and consider God’s law as requiring whatever tends to promote happiness, you will see that sin includes a much wider range of actions than is generally contemplated. For human happiness is dependent upon physical actions as well as upon moral, and the violation of the laws of our physical and intellectual being is, therefore, quite as much sin as is the violation of the laws of our moral nature. And you have no right to select this law or the other, and say, the transgression of this is sin, whilst the transgression of the other is only an act of imprudence and folly. The same authority which renders the laws relating to morals imperative, renders the laws relating to the intellect and body imperative. The tone of Greek thought and feeling was much higher and truer upon this subject than the mediaeval and later Christian thought and feeling. To the Greeks the body was as sacred as the soul--the senses and intellect as divine as the moral powers. And they were right. They are as essential to man’s happiness; they are, at least, in our present mortal condition, the very foundation of all other good--their healthful existence is the condition of all other forms of happiness. Leave the moral powers unguided by the intellect, and they lead into all sorts of errors and follies. Leave the physical powers a prey to disease, and the intellectual and moral powers sooner or later suffer the evil consequences. And you will at once discern for yourselves how this condemns the too common tendency amongst religionists to create artificial sins, that is, to denounce things which they them selves are not disposed to enjoy. No one can lawfully condemn anything which does not tend to diminish human happiness upon the whole; and therefore, however uncongenial an action may be to our own tastes, we have no right to reprove it, unless we can show that it necessarily tends to such diminution. Nay, we must go further than this. The different constitutions and temperaments of individuals are such that, what is perfectly consistent with the purest and most perfect happiness of one man, is altogether inimical to that of another. Each man must, therefore, be left free to follow his own course, and to determine for himself what is the will of God concerning him, excepting when he begins a course which, if universally followed out, would be injurious to mankind at large. From these principles there follow certain practical conclusions. First, we see the law of life allows of many modifications, according to individual circumstances and necessities. Physically, mentally, and morally, men have different requirements, which each one for himself must determine before God. Again, we may see human duty is necessarily a progressive thing, changing and purifying itself with man’s advancing culture. Many actions are necessary to happiness in a barbarous state which are altogether inadmissible in a more advanced stage. Civilisation, also, gives rise to many requirements to which the savage is a stranger. There can be no stereotyped law laid down, excepting in very rudimental and fundamental principles, as I said; but the law will always be rising higher, purer, and freer as men advance. (James Cranbrook.)
Sin
I. What is that law whereof sin is the transgression? It is the law of God, even any law of His whereby He lays any duty upon any of the children of men.
1. There is a law engraven upon the hearts of men by nature, which was in force long before the promulgation of the law from Mount Sinai. This is the light of reason, and the dictates of natural conscience concerning those moral principles of good and evil, which have an essential equity in them, and show man his duty to God, to his neighbour, and to himself.
2. There is another law which was given to the Jewish nation by the ministry of Moses (Joh_17:19). By this we are to understand the whole system of Divine precepts concerning ceremonial rites, judicial processes, and moral duties.
3. There is the moral law.
II. Wherein the nature of sin consists. It consists in a want of conformity to the law of God, or a disconformity thereto. The law of God is the rule; whatsoever is over this rule is sin.
1. Sin is no positive being, but a want of due perfection, a defect, an imperfection in the creature; and therefore it is
(1) Not from God, but from the creature itself.
(2) It is not a thing to glory in more than the want of all things.
(3) It is a thing we have reason to be humbled for, and have great need to have removed.
(4) It is not a thing to be desired, but fled from and abhorred as the abominable thing which God hateth.
2. Original sin is truly and properly sin.
3. The first motions of sin, and the risings of that natural corruption in us, before it be completed with the consent of the will to the evil motion, are truly and properly sin.
4. All consent of the heart to and delight in motions towards things forbidden by the law of God are sins, though these never break forth into action, but die where they were born, in the inmost corners of our hearts (Mat_5:28).
5. All omissions of the internal duties we owe to God and our neighbours are sins, as want of love to God or our neighbours.
6. Hence a man sins by undue silence and undue speaking, when the cause of God and truth require it; seeing the law bids us speak in some cases, but never speak what is not good.
7. Hence also a man’s sins, when he omits outward duties that are incumbent on him to perform, as well as when he commits sin of whatever kind in his life.
8. The least failure in any duty is sin; and whatever comes not up in perfection to the law is sinful.
III. Wherein the evil of sin lies.
1. In the wrong done to God, and its contrariety.
(1) To His nature, which is altogether holy.
(2) In its contrariety to God’s will and law, which is a sort of a copy of His nature. And God being all good, and the chief good, sin must needs be a sort of infinite evil.
2. In the wrong it doth to ourselves (Pro_8:36).
(1) It leaves a stain and spiritual pollution on the soul, whereby it becomes filthy and vile (Isa_1:15), and shame and Confusion on the sinner himself (Gen_3:7).
(2) It brings on guilt, whereby the sinner is bound over to punishment, according to the state in which he is, until his sin be pardoned. This ariseth from the justice of God and the threatening of His law, which brings on all miseries whatsoever.
1. It is high rebellion against the sovereign Majesty of God, that gives the life of authority to the law.
2. It is an extreme aggravation of this evil, that sin, as it is a disclaiming our homage to God, so it is in true account a yielding subjection to the devil; for sin is in the strictest propriety his work. More particularly, sin strikes at the root of all the Divine attributes.
(1) It is contrary to the unspotted holiness of God, which is the peculiar glory of the Deity.
(2) Sin vilifies the wisdom of God, which prescribed the law to men as the rule of their duty.
(3) Sin is a high contempt and horrid abuse of the Divine goodness, which should have a powerful influence in binding man to his duty.
(4) The sinner disparages the Divine justice, in promising himself peace and safety, notwithstanding the wrath and vengeance that is denounced against him by the Lord.
(5) Sin strikes against the omniscience of God, and at least denies it implicitly. Many who would blush and tremble if they were surprised in their sinful actings by a child or a stranger are not at all afraid of the eye of God, though He narrowly notices all their sins in order to judge them, and will judge them in order to punish them.
(6) Sin bids a defiance to the Divine power. He can with one stroke dispatch the body to the grave, and the soul to the pit of hell, and make men as miserable as they are sinful: and yet sinners as boldly provoke Him as if there were no danger.
Conclusion:
1. If ye would see your sins, look to the law of God. That is the glass wherein we may see our ugly face.
2. See here what presumption it is in men to make that duty which God has not made so, and that sin which God has not made so in religion.
3. Flee to Jesus Christ for the pardon of sin, for His blood and Spirit to remove the same. All the waters of the sea will not wash it out, but that blood alone. And repent and forsake your sin, or it will be your ruin. (T. Boston, D. D.)
The knowledge of sin necessary to repentance
1. The text supposes that there is some law given by the Almighty which sin transgresses. Now, the laws of God are of various kinds, and made known in different ways. The law of God requires certain dispositions and tempers. Now, if a man is not actuated by these dispositions, he is guilty of habitually breaking the Divine law, and therefore is habitually living in a state of sin. The law of God requires you to be heavenly minded, to be meek and kind, and to love your neighbour as yourself; it requires you to be pure and chaste, and to be “holy even as” Christ is “holy”: the man, therefore, who does not in the fullest degree possess these dispositions, is living, in the hourly commission of sin, however unconscious he may be of his transgression and guilt.
2. “Sin is the transgression of the law.” But, their, it is the transgression of a law of which the spirit is to be regarded rather than the letter. In criminal cases the judge will not suffer a penal statute to be strained beyond its literal meaning in order to condemn a prisoner; but the law of God, which requires the highest conceivable purity, both of heart and life, is to be interpreted in the most extensive sense: it forbids not only the sin, but everything connected with it, everything leading to it. It is not necessary, therefore, to the guilt of the criminal, that the particular crime of which he is guilty should be expressly named in Scripture. It is sufficient that the general class of sins under which it may be ranked, be forbidden; or that the disposition from which, in common with many other sinful acts, it proceeds, be contrary to the pure and holy law of God.
3. Again, “Sin is the transgression of the law.” But it is not necessary to the guilt of such transgression, either that the law should be distinctly known, or the transgressor be conscious that he has committed a sin in breaking it. The law may be broken, and man fall under its condem
