The Awful Nature of Sin

ok Israelite007 you have a lot here so if it be ok with you, I would like to focus on judgement....

If one has a choice, why? I mean it could just because you can. And why? Then if one can makes a choice, then who made the judgment? And how does one prove the result, or is the result already experienced once the choice is made?

You speak about heaven and hell. What is "heaven" and what is "hell"?

And what is sin? It might be fair to generalize that a sin is a human thought, intent, or action that is in opposition to God's wishes.

But tell me how you would weigh the following three people:

1) a godfearing, religious person who constantly sins, who gambles and lies and cheats and drinks and betrays and even steals, but is aware of these transgressions and prays to God for forgiveness despite knowing that he'll sin again tomorrow.

2) someone who has never considered or been told about God, who is neither theistic nor atheistic, who doesn't really do anything bad, but also doesn't do anything exceptional, who leads a simple and humble and unassuming life in which no action is really "godly" but no action is really "sinful" either

3) someone who lives a model life, who goes out of his way to help others, to ease suffering and pain, to give, to self-sacrifice, and never ever commits an action or even has a thought that is sinful; but in his heart this person self-consciously rejects God, and in fact believes that his humanitarian actions in this world are meant to correct the injustices that God allows.

How do you reconcile these three?

Israelite007
Some of what I am trying to get at is this and what do you think

To make a deliberate decision is the obligation of man, he must make a deliberate decision and will make a deliberate decision according the judgement he accepts as the truth of a statement without evidence or investigation, or fact.
He believes his pain for he experiences it, but if he had judgement before hand he would make chooses to avoid the experience of pain.
But if he know not pain then he know not what to avoid unless he be aware of the judgement of pain before hand. So should he accept fact as the truth of a statement without evidence or investigation without experiencing it first. Then he knows what choice should be made to not experience pain. But if he choose to require the experience first.
Therefore being aware of the fact which gives view, he trusts the Fact, then his choices should be wise. But if he know not the fact he have no good judgement. For the fact is and he who chooses to trust or to trust otherwise has made his own judgement upon him self.
Does not the desire rule your choices then change from the desire for the desire is in the heart and the change of is do to the knowledge of the fact. The fact does not change but man can.

Israelite, if you started this thread, you should respond..

Agreed. This is I believe the 2nd time in which I've asked this scenario of you, and I'm interested to hear a well-considered response.

My apologies if I seem to have missed the topic somehow, but the only real topic of debate I see in the original post is whether or not hell exists.
The rest seems very conclusive and closed for debate.
It is an interesting subject however, and I would like to see a revised version of this post that offers more room for community involvement and less room for spectators.

Okay well I have been giving it thought so the topics are
Hell,judgement, and sin

Forgive me for not responding I will think on these things and replay later today

You all ask some difficult questions I hope that my answers finds you well. Ya'll have asked about Heaven, Hell, Choice, Sin, and Judgement So I will try this in succession.

Why were we created with a choice, what is it? What does sin have to do with it? why are our choices and sin brought to judgement? Why does judgement ultimately lead to Heaven or Hell? Thats that jist of what you have all asked separately of course but this is the basis no?


Someone had asked about if we have a choice, why? and if so why the judgement? Very important questions yes thank you they are a good starting point I might add.Why were humans created with a choice and what for? And what is sin?

When G-d created the universe he intended for us to to live a life in complete fellowship and relationship to him. It says on the days G-d created the earth(not literal it could have taken millions of years for the universe to be created) The day he created man G-d called it very good and the others day only good! On the basis of the Word we started out in a sin free enviorment. Until the serpent tempted Eve. Now let's see how this unravels I am sure you know the age old story but I will put a spin on it.

Genesis 1:8-10
8 God called the expanse "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning-the second day.

9 And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so. 10 God called the dry ground "land," and the gathered waters he called "seas." And God saw that it was good.

Genesis 1:27-31
27 So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them

28 God blessed them and said to them, "Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground."
29 Then God said, "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground-everything that has the breath of life in it-I give every green plant for food." And it was so
31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning-the sixth day.

Genesis 2:15-17
15 The LORD God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. 16 And the LORD God commanded the man, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; 17 but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die."

When G-d speaks the oceans roar, the mountains bow down, the trees leap, the fields sing, the very sun shines, but why oh why when G-d speaks do his people not obey?! This has to be the most profound thing in the universe do you want to know why they don't obey G-d's command? It's because when G-d commands us to do something regardless of who,what or where it's a law he is the commander of the universe and when we don't listen to his instruction of good conscience we are in fact rebelling against his command and trying to create our own reality which is apart from him this is why it's serious.The best I can describe sin is offense to God his commands, laws, or instruction. Now knowing that he is a good God his commands not to kill not to steal and not to eat fruit that will bring our own death is for our own good and the good of others! We should want to obey not only because he is our creator but because it is for our own well-being....


So the reason they would die from eating is not because its poisonous or something but because it is G-d's will for us to obey and live or rebel and perish. When we don't obey our creator G-d we are saying "I don't need you to make my choices for me" in a sense we are playing G-d. That is why it is a serious offense to disobey our creator because he is our maker and who says to their maker "what have you made?"


Isaiah 29:16
You turn things upside down, as if the potter were thought to be like the clay! Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, "He did not make me"? Can the pot say of the potter, "He knows nothing"?

So back to the original question about choice. Yes we have a choice, G-d gave us the choice to eat the fruit or not this was our free will to obey G-d or not. That is what it comes down to. You can reject everything I say but that's because you have a choice to some say we don't really have a choice but that's denial and their choice to believe so. The purpose of choice I think is because G-d didn't want to just program our choices for us he gave us the option to choose him or not. It's our choice that is our only true power we have as humans and what makes us differnt from beasts we don't act on instincts we act on free will which even that belongs to G-d. You can live anyway you want I can't tell you what to do but I can give you a message.
So what is this choice? To choose G-d or be rejected by him, to live for him or die apart from him. To know him or to be alone. That is the basis of our choices, the most prevailant question in history should be "What is G-d?" the second is like it "What is life and why are we here?" Now given we are all in this together and there are many choices in life to make what I am saying here is these are the most important

1. What is G-d to you

2. What is life to you

On the basis of these values you will live your life according to what's in your heart, mind and soul. Choice exists for the purpose of making us free moral agents even the angels rejected G-d and have a choice

Matthew 25:41
41"Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into theeternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

I think G-d gives us a choice to see if we really love him because again true love is not a program it's a choice. The purpose of choice obviously comes back to the question of love.

Now what about Sin someone asked? This is a very serious issue. Sin is any offense against G-d in fact sin is hatred to G-d because his children will want to obey and not anger his righteous nature. Anything G-d commands and we do not do that is rebellion unless there is some remission of the command which most cases there is not. In most cases sin is harmful to us (suicide, bitterness, envy, pride,sloth, grudges) and is harmful to others (lack of concern for poor,charity,adultery) So sin is really living for ourselves or the flesh.


Do not let your hearts be decieved lest you fall into temption. Sin is defilement and will be abolished at the end of time. Make no mistake G-d did not create us to practice Sin. It angers G-d and he brings the sinner not sin into judgement.


The reason for judgement then is because G-d is just. He does not just let us live our lives with no accountability to his creations of course he expect us to live righteously because he has given us the tools (ministry,bible,laws, hearts, minds, conscience) When you play ignorance you always lose because G-d made us all intelligent beings. Of course some are less fortunate but that is rare and if everyone cared this would not be any issue. So however severe the punishment is it may be based on the level of knowledge of G-d the more you know the more accountable you are. We are all accountable to G-d because we are his creations. YHWH is just in the sense that he not only punishes sin but forgives it as well he provided his own son Yashua for our salvation and we have no excuse he is our rescuer this is why we must repent of our sins and turn to Yashua and obey G-d's laws of love for living our lives for him. Those who choose not to just want to live their own lives of rebellion. As the saying goes "Some Rather reign in Hell than Serve in Heaven." Some people simply won't give up their free will.


Acts 17:30
In the past God overlooked such ignorance, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.

Acts 2:38
Peter replied, "Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

The reason Hell is the result of punishment to some is unbearable. However people we must realize that Hell no matter how painful how dark and and how terrible it has nothing with the fact that it is separtion from G-d and ultimately love YHWH's Love that is the most unbearble of it all. Some people are terrified at the thought of the tempature, torture, and horror but that did not lead me to G-d what lead me to G-d was the thought that It would be total separtion from G-d and love and not just any love his love..perfect love...that..is..
unbearable...a...world..without...G-d...is...a...world...without...Love...

Hell was intended for the tempter the Devil and his Angels but it just so happens that those who continue to live a life of sin and not a life of loving of G-d and serving G-d then that is where we are sent. Man is fortunate though because the Angels are not offered the chance to repent everday Man can turn from his ways and follow Hashem's ways.

Matthew 25:41
"Then he will say to those on his left, 'Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

As for Heaven well that is something truly wonderful and I love to talk about it! There is not much in the Word about Heaven but can you truly imagine?! Just think we see all this beauty,love,joy, happiness, on earth how much more in Heaven! Some people may want to go to Heaven just to get out of Hell but that is being fearful of punishment and is not the way of YHWH. The Way of YHWH is love,peace,joy,mercy,grace,friendship, and humility these are all spirits that Yashua demonstrated and this is the way of Heaven and the way his children should live. Just think how much more Love in Heaven! How much more Peace in Heaven, some have peace on earth but peace in Heaven is an eternal joy. Imagine that always being happy never becoming sad it's just so incredible! But to also think many people enjoy Love,Joy,Peace here on earth those are part of G-d's nature how can you live at YHWH's expense people could be enjoying his nature with no desire to honor or glorify G-d with those blessings. How can anyone enjoy's things of G-d and not G-d its just so mean and cruel to do to our maker I am repulsed by those who live their lives to please themselves and not YHWH.


That's all for now, I hope I have answered your questions well and in good faith. Peace be with you friends always. Please recognize the maker of those things we enjoy they are because of him. He entitles us to good pleasure. How wonderful. I am sure I will bring about many more questions and thoughts so keep on questing for G-d!

Israelite, I wish you'd directly answer the question I posed in my first reply here. Do it without scripture. Do it with understanding.

Well I did try to answer what is sin yes?
Aedes you have placed a very possible scenarios the thing is I just don't know which one of these is better than each other. G-d weighs the heart who can know it? G-d also doesn't look to our achievements or works in the sense of WHAT we do as so much as WHY we do G-d weighs our motives. Hopefully our hearts are not heavy to the LORD and liken unto doves.

As for the three types of people I'm not sure which one to choose but this is the type of person G-d esteems someone who is humble in heart and whatever he or she does it is done with a joyful and servant attitude. G-d does not esteem complainers or bitter servants these may not be servants at all. Those who serve G-d with a pure heart regardless of our outword actions whther they be great or small what matters most is in the heart so even if someone does a great work in the name of G-d its still isn't great unless their heart is in the right place which is in humility and love.

There are many many types of religious people, moral people, dreamers, sinners, and saints but more than any title living for G-d is within the heart and soul and then effects the outward for change, many people miss this they change all the external and forget the internal but true change is from the heart

I appreciate the effort, but this seems like an evasion of the question to me. If you're not comfortable or capable of inferring how God would judge those three very different scenarios, then how can you start a thread about 'the awful nature of sin' to begin with? I don't have strong religious convictions. So as far as I'm concerned, to hell with God as long as people treat each other with kindness, empathy, generosity, and understanding; and someone who spends his life worshipping God but never helps another person is selfish and a waste. But I'd imagine these are not orthodox views. A monk might somewhat disagree with this assertion. What about you? Is your ethic one that would value person 1 over person 3?

Hi Aedes. Good questions for a beast of a topic. Your definition of sin works for me. I'll try to skip any extras of theology/philosophy and answer as directly as I can, without getting too involved with the many other ideas brought up already. (But first I do have to say that at the core of my belief is the belief that it God who has understanding enough to judge justly, and that if the Bible is a good indication of what is to come, those judgments will probably most surprise those who think they know the most about how God "should" judge. So this is by my own acknowledgement my feeble attempt at answers, not God's.)

1) This man is either not "godfearing", or is in desperate need of help. If "knowing he'll sin again tomorrow" means he's accepted sin in his own life and plans to nothing about it, then I would say he's on very shaky ground, and is "a waste" indeed. If "knowing he'll sin again tomorrow" means that he's going to do everything in his power not to sin, including humbling himself to the point of asking for human help, then I think that he's on the right track. And I would expect his outward life to improve based on his heart's condition, even if with relapses at times.

2) Again, I don't know the answer, but I would consider that Jesus teaches that "to whom much is given, much is demanded". It appears that this person has not been given much to believe in or to obey, nor have they rejected the little they have. Perhaps such a person has lived as they should? Still, I would personally be surprised if anyones life, especially thier complex inner life, could be reduced to such simple terms as your description, so I expect that an all knowing God would know a lot more about them than we do.

3) You may disagree whole-heartedly with me, and I could be wrong, but I would think that if a person's whole motivation for their "goodness" is akin to pride and self-righteousness that God will be none too impressed. I also expect that that internal pride and self-rightousness would find other outlets in a preson's life, even though that person quite possibly would not be aware of it or acknowledge it. This is not to say that people who try to follow God's will will never be prideful or self-righteous, but that an inward acceptence of the need for God's forgiveness is a big part of what is important to God.

As far as the monk goes... I personally would feel similar to what you described. At the same time, monks have done a lot for people and humanity in their own ways, and have tried not to do harm, so there may be more than meets my eye on that one.

Just to comment or two- you say that you don't care about God as long as people are good to each other... First, I have to admit that through all my discussions with you I have been impressed with your strong belief in the morality of "being good to each other". (I know that's simplified...) If I held the majority of your beliefs, I don't think I could sustain that morality for long at all... mabye that makes you a better preson than me. Anyhow, when I look at humanity I have a hard time believing that the bulk of humanity could ever sustain such morality apart from belief in a God-inspired morality. It seems that we have a hard enough time doing that even though most of the world religions seem to give a base for it in at least some form or another. I don't like to think what we would look like if the base were removed. So for me, I must care about others on the base of my belief in God, and in turn I care about God all the more because I believe we need Him as a base before we (humanity) will care about others.

Thanks very much for the effort! I'd like you to try again, though. You've critiqued the "realism" of these archetypes and analyzed them psychologically, but you've not addressed the religious question I've asked. Take these archetypes at face value and decide which is the best person, the most good, the one we should look at as a model, the least sinful, etc.

You're taking apart his psychology, but that doesn't address the question. This is meant to be an example of someone who is weak, who knows he's weak, who has great faith in God and seeks strength as well as forgiveness, but who cannot escape his weakness. And my question is not psychological -- that's food for a different discussion. What I want to know is if in the eyes of God or religion this person is better or worse than person #3. And if so, why?

Not everyone is bright or educated. But you're missing the point. I'm not portraying someone realistic. I'm giving charicatures for us to distill out the most important moral elements.

This example I'm giving is of a person who loves other humans and wants nothing other than to ease suffering. It's someone who has great empathy, who feels other people's pain, and is a crusader against suffering and deprivation. Never is there a thought of pride in his heart.

You're again making psychological inferences and in-so-doing missing the points I'm trying to extract. Reread these three cases with reference ONLY to weighing this spectrum -- at one end sincerely godly thoughts but ****ty actions, and at the other extreme sincerely benevolent actions (i.e. done without pride or self-interest) but with rejection of God -- in fact seeing himself as crusading against all the suffering that God allows.

If you had to pick one to send to hell, would you pick a virtuous, humanitarian atheist or would you pick a god-loving weakling who lives like a scumbag?

Well, all I can say is that empathy is not really a value as such -- it's an emotion that informs people's feelings about other humans and that motivates behavior. It's internal, visceral, psychological. It causes people to self-select into humanitarian walks of life, as it did with me in my own job. To the degree that empathy finds roots in religious ideas, it's almost certainly because people back-rationalize their morality onto their religious structure. And because the religious structure is culturally validated, it appears to most people that their morals were religiously derived all along. This is somewhat of a supposition on my part, but there IS evidence that moral decisionmaking is cross-cultural and pan-religious, and has biological roots (empathy clearly exists in many animals). So while relativism may rule at a psychological level, it turns out that people aren't all that different from one another.

When it comes down to it, the greatest gifts and the worst horrors that humans have given one another are united by nothing other than humanity. Religious societies have committed horrible acts of barbarism just as iconically as they've committed glorious acts of humanity. Having religious inspiration is not some kind of predictable inoculation against selfishness or brutality. So why should we assume it's required for empathy, which is the very opposite? Humanity can justify ANYTHING by invoking God's inspiration.

Which leads me to MY feeling about these archetypes I've asked Israelite007 to comment on. I feel like person #1 is a waste of flesh until he actually does something good with himself. His worship of God is entirely meaningless. And I feel like person #3 is a model of goodness -- it's a person who is grounded in the need that surrounds him; and if there is a God what he should reward is the kindness we show to one another and not the worship we show him.

Ok, I'll try again! Well, maybe...

I don't think I'm going to be able to sperate my religious understandings from my view of reality, or real options. I hope that my beliefs reflect reality, so I'm not sure why they would need judged by their application to impossibilities or paradoxes. Hopefully that will make sense.


I can't agree with this spectrum. First, I think it's a bit skewed or uneven. I think you've tried to put (what I would consider) good thoughts/bad actions on one side, and bad thoughts/good actions on the other. But what I really see here is a spectrum that seems to put good thoughts/bad actions one one side and good thoughts/good actions on the other. Then you've applied "christian faith" to the bad side and "athiest faith" on the good side. I have a number of problems with that scenerio:

Person 1 is apperantly a godfearing, repentant, and humble person who refuses to do anything to improve on his behaviour? Thoughts and actions must relate. So to me, this represents a non-sensical paradox. So I had to split it into two more possible scenerios and dealt with them individually.

Person 2 is too simple for me to give much comment on, aside from what I gave.

The problem with person 3 is that you've put the answer you want in the question. Person 3 is perfect, yet rejects God and could not be improved at all by accepting or submiting to Him. If I accept that scenerio, then I accept that it is perfect to reject God. Personally, I don't believe anyone lives in the perfect manner you've described, with or without belief in God. And I believe that honest, humble, and heartfelt belief in and submission to the Biblical God will always cause a person to be better than they could be otherwise. You, and anyone else, are totaly free to disagree with me of course, but you're asking about my beliefs...

I do believe (and I think the Bible teaches) that God will very much take into account how we treated others on earth. He will also take into account how much we knew. And He will take into account the heart that motivated us. I know I can't judge all that, even in myself- and that's why I am glad to know that God is interested in forgiving as well as judging, and why I am willing to submit to Him. If you want to see where I'm coming from Biblically, I can paste some references here, but I won't do that unless your interested.

Just some thoughts... Push me out if you'd like. I'm sure they aren't perfect!

I can't understand how a god that has created us to live on the earth that he has created solely for the purpose of us to live in, a god of love that is...would create a receptacle of punishment that would last for an infinite amount of time based on
our choices that we have made in a finite amount of time in a world that obviously has difficulty grasping the situation.

If I gave you a hundred years to live...of which the first 5 were learning to read and write, the next 10 are based on maturing to the point of making decisions for yourself based on little to no experience of the real world...then another 50 years just trying to mete out a meager existence for yourself and perhaps your family, top it off with the last 10 years of your life just trying to maintain a grasp on yourself as your mind slips away while you age to death...you're really only given about 25 years to redeem yourself according to the standards given to you that you will probably reject, since they involve a great amount of discipline and sacrifice.
I don't see how an eternity in a fiery pit of torture is fair punishment for any failures that you could make in such a short period of time.

Which brings me to my own personal opinion of what mankind has come to label as Hell:

If god has truly created a place such as this, then he surely is a god of hatred and malice, and not the god of love and forgiveness that the bible tells us he is.

Aristoddler

If a Loving God was to give life and the means to believe Him. And the recipient hated that which was offered , considering God has no obligation to give the life nor the means to believe. What would be a just decision on God's part?

That's more like what I'm looking for. What I want religious people to discuss is which is more important -- how we treat each other as an end unto itself versus how much we worship God.

And like I've said, if religious belief and love of God can motivate people to do truly horrible things, then I'm not sure how we can argue that religion is somehow necessary for people to do truly good things. I think we have good and evil within us as humans -- religious people use religion to justify their acts, and non-religious people use other rationale.

Easy. The "Loving God" would love and forgive, because the humans he created were imperfect by design. Unless God is wicked, malicious, and vengeful, then it would be ridiculous for him to cast imperfect people to hell for an eternity because they failed his little tests.

Aedes

"Easy. The "Loving God" would love and forgive, because the humans he created were imperfect by design. Unless God is wicked, malicious, and vengeful, then it would be ridiculous for him to cast imperfect people to hell for an eternity because they failed his little tests."


Ok then, let us say He has provided a track prepared or available for forgiveness in His loving kindness. Would this be just according to a reasonable human understand of what a loving being is? And would that track prepared, be according to our own judgment of what it ought to be, or His? Presuming He knows what will reconcile the difference, and therefore it would require His choice for that path.

If we are imperfect, by design or not by design. Then would there be the need for a promise of mercy, that can not be reversed? Presuming that we are imperfect.