Mankinds Sinful Inheritance
Death is a great mystery that confronts us all. Societies down through the millenia have throught about it and have offered up various views on the topic of death and the existence of an afterlife. Atheists simply say this is the only life a person has and when you die you simply go into nothingness. Existence is no longer possible. The body just ceases to function and deteriorates and rots. There is no soul that continues on. No further existence. Just a transition to nothingness.
Agnostics neither believe or disbelieve in a god or religious doctrine. Agnostics assert that it's impossible to know how the universe was created and whether or not a divine being exists. Different religions and spiritual traditions offer various beliefs and perspectives on the afterlife, providing comfort, guidance, and hope to their followers. There are 15 or more views that include righteous deeds in life that provide an entrance into a heaven; Another is that of a cycle of reincanation where a soul is reborn into a new body after death. Or a view that believes in a spirit world or an afterlife where the souls of the deceased reside. Still another religion has a belief in multiple realms, including the realm of the living, the realm of the dead, and the realm of the gods. The list of different views teaches the concept of the soul's journey through different spiritual realms after death. And there's even a belief that a persons goal is to attain exaltation and become like God, living in eternal happiness and glory. And that's just a few of the various religious doctrines of the afterlife.
Christanity on the other hand teaches through the Old Testament of the Bible from the very outset of mankinds transgression, disbelief, disobedience to the command of God. That the first created persons chose rather to believe the serpent, the devil, satan who told them what God commanded them wasn't the truth. That God was holding something back from them. That if they disobeyed what God told them not to do they could be like God and they would not die for their transgression. But they would be like God.
They choose to believe satans lie in the garden rather than the God who created them, cared for them and loved them. And the punishment extended to all of adam and eve's progency and thus sin came into the world passing that corrupt nature down through the eons. And not only that. For God subjected all of His creation to futility with destruction, disarray, entrophy and death being the final result.
“What is man, that he could be pure? And he who is born of a woman, that he could be righteous?" Job 15:14
Because the carnal (fleshly) mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, nor indeed can be. So then, those who are in the flesh cannot please God. (Romans 8:7-8)
The wicked are estranged from the womb; They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies.(Ps. 58:3)
“The heart is deceitful above all things,
And desperately wicked;
Who can know it? (Jer. 17:9)
For we have all become like one who is unclean [ceremonially, like a leper], and all our righteousness (our best deeds of rightness and justice) is like filthy rags or a polluted garment; we all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away [far from God’s favor, hurrying us toward destruction].(Is. 64:6)
And you He (God) made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins, in which you once walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit who now works in the sons of disobedience, 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 (God's) wrath, just as the others. (Eph. 2:1-5)
The problem I see with our current age in both the secular and even with many evanglicals is that people are born basically good. The verses of scripture in this writing prove that to be in error. People may say we have these little sins in our lives but deep down inside our human nature mankind is basically good. God proves this wrong. Jesus made this very plain when he taught the people saying: "There is nothing that enters a person from outside which can defile them; but the things which come out of a person, those are the things that defile a them. For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders, thefts, covetousness, wickedness, deceit, lewdness, an evil eye, blasphemy, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within and defile a man.”
But their are many people who think we just need a little more self-esteem to get us through the day. What they won't tell you is when you sit around and mope and feel sorry for yourself that itself is being self-consumed with the emphasis on yourself and that is itself sin.
Biblically speaking all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. We're not Sinners because we sin--we sin because we are sinners--we are born that way. Psalm 51:5 prophet and King, David totally understood that when he proclaimed : "Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, And in sin my mother conceived me."
For from within a person there does not proceed basic goodness, righteousness, and belief in a Sovereign and Holy God. That is not natural. What is natural to all mankind is an adversion and enmity or hatred of the God of Scripture. How dare God say I am not righteous, I'm not a good person. And that my good works won't count for anything. Good works do not warrant a righteousness that allows anyone an entrance into God's Kingdom. Why? The Apostle Paul says that so succinctly with the words " When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness." Without Jesus Christ's imputed righteousness by grace through faith and not of yourselves...no one will see the Lord. For Jesus the Christ, the Only begotten of the Father full of grace and truth Himself said to the people, "you being EVIL...." And also "you must be perfect as the Father in Heaven is perfect." No one comes to the Father except through Jesus Christ. For both gifts, grace and faith, are given by God for those who are born again and believe in the only name under heaven by which we can be saved. For the natural man or woman is a slave to their own evil desires. Sin is their master. Disobedience to God tantamount to their actions. As Jesus proclaimed....I Am the Way, the Truth and the Life no one comes to the Father except through me.
The first created human beings, Adam and Eve, disobeyed their maker and believed the LIE of Satan that if they would disobey God they would themselves be like God. That is what they hungered for. That is what they desired. That is what they were passionate about achieving. For they wanted to be like God. And that desire of fallen humankind continues to this very day.
Instead they came to know evil from the inside out. It was fallen mankinds way of knowing evil not God's way. For God is light, and in Him there is no darkness (NO SIN OR EVIL INTENTS) at all. For our first parents transgression God subjected all He had made to futility and Mankind and all creation began to age and die. And all their progeny after them born with a corrupted, tainted, fallen nature prone to sin.
SIN IS THAT SERIOUS. Sin is what taints every fiber of every human beings person. It is in our very nature to sin. It is in our very being that sin rules the heart. Only God can open the heart of a wretchful, lost, unworthy human being to believe his truth.(John 6:44;65) It is God who delivers one from darkness to light. From death to life. And it is through His Son that God the Father proclaims His people are washed (through ther Holy Spirit) sanctified (made Holy/ Set apart), and justified (as if one never sinned) in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. (1 Cor. 6:9-10)
God hears the, the plea of a repentant sinner and regenerates that lost soul from being at enmity (hatred) with God; being an enemy of God; to being His child. Born from above with a citizenship in heaven and the promise of everlasting life. It cost Jesus His life yet His spilt blood, His sacrifice brings all those the Father gives Him into the kingdom of God.
We all need a radical transformation. To be born from above. Born again into New Life. A life that understands our sin predicament and our insatiable lust for the things of this world. A process that is tamed only by the lion of Judah. The lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.
We are the Ferocious Beast of which concupiscence has its grip and by which the God of this age, Satan, has blinded the minds of the unbeliever so that they cannot see the light of the gospel of the glory of God in the face of in the face of Jesus Christ.
That is only loosed by The Only Name under heaven by which anyone can be saved. From the wrath and judgement of Almighty God. Brought from the spiritual Darkness that infects every single human being and rescued by the Son of God Jesus Christ by grace through faith and not of ourselves. It is a gift of God. Not of works. Lest anyone should seek to boast.
For all God's chosen, who's spiritual eyes were delivered from blindness, who cried out have mercy on me a sinner, are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praisesd of Him who called you out of darkness and into His marvelous light. (1 Peter 2:9)
“For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, througfh His blood, the forgiveness of sins.” – Colossians 1:13-14
“For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” – Luke 19:10
This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. (1 John 4:10)
But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:12-13)
Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that having been justified by His grace we should become heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 3:5-7)
“Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life. (John 5:24)
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new. (2 Cor. 5:27)
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