Fallen

A Theology of Sin

Christopher W. Morgan, Robert A. Peterson, Christopher W. Morgan, Robert A. Peterson

• Publisher: Crossway
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781433522253
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Theology

From marital infidelity to global war, the world is obviously broken, leaving people desperate to find an explanation for our universal sin problem. In the latest addition to the Theology in Community series, Christopher Morgan and Robert Peterson have assembled an interdisciplinary team of evangelical thinkers to explore the biblical doctrine of sin from a variety of angles. Among other contributors, popular scholar D. A. Carson discusses the contemporary significance of sin; seasoned professor Paul House details sin in the Old Testament law, prophets, and writings; and New Testament expert Douglas Moo explores sin from Paul's vantage point. This team of top-notch scholars offers modern readers a comprehensive overview of this oft-neglected, biblical theme so that readers might learn to live better in a sinful world.

Part of theTheology in Communityseries.

1

SIN’S CONTEMPORARY SIGNIFICANCE

D. A. CARSON

At first blush it may seem as if this volume has the ideal order rather badly reversed. Would it not be the part of wisdom to work through the biblical and theological material on sin before reflecting on its contemporary significance? Certainly a good case could be made for such a traditional ordering. So what defense can we offer for the fact that the editors in their wisdom have placed this essay first?

In fact, the editorial decision displays considerable insight—a kind of homiletical insight. A preacher may, of course, reserve the application of the message for the end of the sermon; alternatively, he may interweave application all through the sermon. On some occasions, however, that preacher is wise who sets the stage for the exegesis and biblical theology by displaying the relevance of the topic at the beginning of the address. Especially is this the case if for any reason the subject has become unpopular, or if it is often misconceived or induces cringe factors. In such cases, displaying the significance of the topic may constitute a compelling introduction to it.

It may be worthwhile to distinguish the topic’s intrinsic and contemporary significance. These two cannot, of course, be kept absolutely separate. Nevertheless, under its intrinsic significance we ought to recall what place sin holds in the Bible, in the entire structure of Christian thought; under its contemporary significance, we shall probe in what ways the Bible’s teaching on sin addresses some of the characteristics of our own age and historical location. The former is the more important heading, for it laps into the latter. Indeed, to outline ways in which sin is intrinsically important to a biblically faithful grasp of the gospel is to argue for its perennial significance and therefore is also to display its contemporary significance. Only then are we better positioned to reflect on ways in which a mature grasp of sin speaks prophetically and powerfully to our own cultural context.

Sin’s Intrinsic Significance

There can be no agreement as to what salvation is unless there is agreement as to that from which salvation rescues us. The problem and the solution hang together: the one explicates the other. It is impossible to gain a deep grasp of what the cross achieves without plunging into a deep grasp of what sin is; conversely, to augment one’s understanding of the cross is to augment one’s understanding of sin.

To put the matter another way, sin establishes the plotline of the Bible. In this discussion, the word sin will normally be used as the generic term that includes iniquity, transgression, evil, idolatry, and the like, unless the context makes it clear that the word is being used in a more restricted sense. In the general sense, then, sin constitutes the problem that God resolves: the conflict carries us from the third chapter of Genesis to the closing chapter of Revelation. Before the fall, God’s verdict is that everything he made is “very good.” We are not told how the Serpent came to rebel, but the sin of the first human pair introduces us to many of the human dimensions of sin. We find rebellion against God, succumbing to the vicious temptation to become like God, an openness to the view that God will not impose the sentence of death on sinners (and thus the implicit charge that God’s word cannot be trusted), defiance of a specific command (that is, transgression), the sacrifice of intimate fellowship with God, the introduction of shame and guilt, eager self-justification by blaming others, the introduction of pain and loss, and various dimensions of death. The fourth chapter of Genesis brings us the first murder, and the fifth chapter the refrain, “and then he died.” The following four chapters bring us the judgment of the flood and its entailments, but humanity is not thereby improved, as the eleventh chapter makes clear.

It would be easy to keep running through the drama of the Scripture’s story line, carefully observing the shape and depth of sin in the patriarchal period, in the years of the wilderness wanderings, in the time of the judges, in the decay of the Davidic monarchy, and in the malaise of the exile and the frequent sinful lapses among those who returned. Those whom Jesus confronts in his day are no better. The apostle Paul’s massive indictment against all humanity (Rom. 1:18–3:20) sets the stage for one of the deepest statements about what the cross achieved (3:21–26). Indeed, so much of what the triune God discloses of himself is revealed in the context of showing how each member of the Godhead contributes to the salvation of God’s elect—their salvation from sin. It is not for nothing that the very first chapter of the New Testament establishes that the child born of the Virgin Mary will be called “Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins” (Matt. 1:21).1 Very little of the tabernacle/temple system of the old covenant makes sense unless one understands something of sin; certainly none of its antitype does, worked out with stunning care in the epistle to the Hebrews. Whether one considers the theme of God’s wrath or the particular objects of his saving love, whether God thunders from Sinai or weeps over Jerusalem, whether we focus on individual believers or on the covenantal identity of the people of God, whether one stands aghast at the temporal judgments poured out on Jerusalem or stands in rapt anticipation of the glories of the new heaven and the new earth, the substratum that holds the entire account together is sin and how God, rich in mercy, deals with sins and sinners for his own glory and for his people’s good.

Sin “offends God not only because it becomes an assault on God directly, as in impiety or blasphemy, but also because it assaults what God has made.”2 Sin is rebellion against God’s very being, against his explicit word, against his wise and ordered reign. It results in the disorder of the creation and in the spiritual and physical death of God’s image bearers. With perfect justice God could have condemned all sinners, and no one could have justly blamed him. In reality, the Bible’s story line depicts God, out of sheer grace, saving a vast number of men and women from every tongue and tribe, bringing them safely and finally to a new heaven and a new earth where sin no longer has any sway and even its effects have been utterly banished.

In short, if we do not comprehend the massive role that sin plays in the Bible and therefore in biblically faithful Christianity, we shall misread the Bible. Positively, a sober and realistic grasp of sin is one of the things necessary to read the Bible in a percipient fashion; it is one of the required criteria for a responsible hermeneutic.

It may be helpful to lay out a handful of the theological structures that are shaped by what the Bible says about sin and that in turn shape our understanding of sin.

Sin Is Tied to Passages That Disclose Important Things about God

First, sin is deeply tied to any number of illuminating passages that disclose important things about God. Consider Exodus 34:6–7, where God intones certain words to Moses, who is hidden in a cleft of rock on Mount Sinai. Moses is neither permitted nor able to gaze directly on God; should he do so, he would die (33:20). He is permitted to see no more than the trailing edge of the afterglow of the glory of God. But he is permitted and able to hear: God discloses himself to Moses supremely in words, and those words are simultaneously moving and puzzling (the italicized words draw attention to what is puzzling): “The LORD, the LORD, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.” Here is the God who forgives “wickedness, rebellion and sin,” yet who “does not leave the guilty unpunished.” Is this some sort of strange dialectic? Alternating procedures, perhaps? The tension is not finally resolved until Calvary. Certainly the focus of this strange tension is sin.

Or consider the words of David after his seduction of Bathsheba and his cold-blooded arrangements to murder her husband. Brought low in brokenness and repentance, he not only begs God for mercy (Ps. 51:1) but tells him, “Against you, you only, have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight” (v. 4). At one level, of course, this is blatantly untrue: David has sinned against Bathsheba, her husband, her child, his family, the military high command, and the nation as a whole, which he serves as chief magistrate. Yet there is something profound in David’s words. What makes sin sin, in the deepest sense, is that it is against God. We let ourselves off the hook too easily when we think of sins along horizontal axes only—whether the horizontal sins of socially disapproved behavior or the horizontal sin of genocide. What makes sins really vile, intrinsically heinous—what makes them worthy of punishment by God himself—is that they are first, foremost, and most deeply sins against the living God, who has made us for himself and to whom we must one day give an account. In other words, this psalm of repentance from sin discloses important things about sin’s relation to God.

Or we might remind ourselves of the fourth Servant Song, including the words:

Surely he took up our pain

and bore our suffering,

yet we considered him punished by God,

stricken by him, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions,

he was crushed for our iniquities;

the punishment that brought us peace was on him,

and by his wounds we are healed. . . .

Yet it was the LORD’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer,

and though the LORD makes his life an offering for sin,

he will see his offspring and prolong his days,

and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand. (Isa. 53:4–5, 10)

Here is penal substitution by Yahweh’s own design, taking our suffering, our transgressions, our iniquities, our punishment, and our sin.

Again, once we recall how in John’s Gospel the word world commonly refers to the human moral order in deeply culpable rebellion against God (that is, the word world commonly means “this sinful world”), the words of John 3:16 shout matchless grace. God’s love for the world is to be admired not because the world is so big but because the world is so bad. God so loved this sinful world that he gave his one and only Son—and the context shows that the locus of this gift is not in the incarnation only but in Jesus being “lifted up” in death (cf. “lifted up” in vv. 14–15, and the consistent use of ὑψόω in John). The plan of redemption for this sinful world is driven by God’s undeserved love, most magnificently expressed in the gift of his Son, whose death alone is sufficient to lift the sentence of condemnation (vv. 17–18). To reject such love—that is, to continue in sin—is to remain under the wrath of God (v. 36). Even this handful of verses says much about God, his character, his redemptive purposes, his love, and his wrath—and the axis around which these themes revolve is sin.

One could easily draw attention to hundreds of passages where similar dynamics prevail between God and sin, but I shall restrict myself to one more. Toward the end of his famous chapter on the resurrection, Paul raises two rhetorical questions in words drawn from Hosea 13:14: “Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?” (1 Cor. 15:55). Then he answers his own questions: “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (vv. 56–57). In other words, the death-dealing power of sin has been defeated by God’s resurrection of his Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Once again, then, the display of what God has done, supremely in the resurrection of his Son, is occasioned by sin and all its brutal power.

Sin is deeply tied to any number of illuminating passages that disclose important things about God, and if about God, then about the salvation that God has wrought in Jesus Christ.

Sin Is Tied to the Work of Satan

Second, sin is radically tied to the work of Satan and of demonic forces. Otherwise put, sin has a cosmic/demonic dimension. The first human descent into sin is stimulated by the Serpent (Genesis 3), later identified as Satan himself (Rev. 12:9). The text in Genesis does not tell us how it happened that he first sinned, but the opening lines of Genesis 3 make it clear that, since he was made by God, the Serpent has no independent status akin to God’s but in darker hue. And since everything in the creation that God made was “very good” (1:31), one assumes that this was also true of the Serpent: when he was created, he was good. The obvious inference is that the Serpent had himself fallen at some point antecedent to the fall of Adam and Eve—an inference that Jude is prepared to draw (v. 6).

It follows, then, that sin has dimensions that stretch beyond the human race. I am not referring to the consequences of human sin that stretch beyond the human race—the corruption of the entire created order, the subjection of the created order to frustration, bondage, and decay (Rom. 8:20–21). Rather, I am referring to the sin of rebellious heavenly beings, of angels themselves. Although Scripture says relatively little about this wretched reality, the small windows it does provide into this antecedent fall are highly illuminating. Part of our own struggle is “against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms” (Eph. 6:12): there is a cosmic, indeed heavenly, dimension to the struggle, glimpsed again in the first two chapters of Job.

Three further characteristics of this angelic, nonhuman sin function in the Bible to provide something of a foil to the way human sin plays out: (1) the initial human sin infected the entire human race and brought down the wrath of God upon the entire human race; the initial angelic sin corrupted those who sinned, while the rest remained unaffected. Whether this fundamental difference in the way sin is structured in the two races turns on the nonorganic and nongenerating nature of angelic existence (according to Jesus, angels do not marry: Matt. 22:30) is nowhere made explicit. (2) In God’s grace, there has arisen a redeemer for fallen human beings but none for angels: “For surely it is not angels he helps, but Abraham’s descendants” (Heb. 2:16; cf. 2:5). The horde of demons lives utterly without hope: they know there is an “appointed time” for their endless, conscious torment (Matt. 8:29; cf. Rev. 20:10). None of them discovers that the words “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matt. 11:28) are for them. At very least, the recognition of this truth ought to engender in redeemed men and women awestruck humility and gratitude at the sovereignty of grace. (3) No text depicts angels as having been made imago Dei, the way this claim is made of human beings (Gen. 1:26–27). Moreover, to sweep these three observations together, the culminating blessing for God’s redeemed...