Being Sin Versus Sinning

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Hi S_____,
Thanks very much for taking the time to share your thoughts with me. The verse you point out in Rom 7 is powerful:

Rom 7:20  Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.

Paul presents this as it really is. Even when he wants to do the right thing, “sin that dwells in me” wins the spiritual battle, and he sins against his own will. I, for one, can certainly vouch for the veracity of that statement.
But yes, it is true, what we are and what we do are indeed synonymous to many who fellowship with us and to the whole orthodox Christian world. There are many Protestants who can see through the doctrine of the immaculate conception by simply realizing that the only way for there to be any truth to that doctrine would be for every mother of Christ since Eve to have been immaculately conceived, in order to keep Eve’s sinful nature from being passed on to Christ.
But even those Protestants who see through that absurd doctrine, have no interest in the details of the differences of the various sacrifices and their various varieties as revealed in the shadows given us in the law of the offering of the first six chapters of Leviticus. The whole orthodox Christian world is foreshadowed by this verse:

1Co 2:1  And I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God.
1Co 2:2  For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.

I actually had a minister, who was also a Delta pilot, tell me that 1Co 2:2 proves that we are not supposed to go beyond Christ and Him crucified. That is the spiritual state of most ministers of orthodox Christianity and sadly, it is the spiritual state of some of those who are in our own fellowship via the internet. I was told in an e- mail from a brother who has been listening to our live stream in Liverpool, England, “The sin and the trespass offerings are one and the same, Mike.” So I feel the need point out what exactly is a sin offering; that it is an offering for what we are, and to make it clear that while Christ is indeed a sin offering, Christ is much more than a sin offering.
One point that is especially misunderstood is the fact that even Christ is “clothed with a robe, down to the foot… to cover the shame of His nakedness.” Such a thought, though it is implicit in Rev 1:13, is considered as blasphemous as saying Christ was “made sin.” It is a thought that is foreign to a world who thinks that Christ being made sin was the result of being nailed to the cross, rather than being “made of a woman, made under the law”. How many Christians do you know who have taken note that Christ told his followers to take up their cross and follow Him with His cross long before he was actually nailed to that cross?

Mar 8:34  And when he had called the people unto him with his disciples
also, he said unto them, Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.

“Denying ourselves” is the same as dying daily, as is made obvious in Luke’s account:

Luk 9:23  And he said to [ them] all, If any [ man] will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.

So Christ’s flesh had to be covered just as our flesh has to be covered. It too, was a body of death by virtue of the law of sin that is corruptible flesh.

Rom 7:24  O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
1Co 15:50  Now this I say, brethren, that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; neither doth corruption inherit incorruption.

I know I am preaching to the choir, so I will stop here. Thanks again for your help on this subject.
Your brother in Christ,
Mike

Other related posts