Can
Sinning
COST
Salvation?
By Bernie Koerselman
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Table of Contents
Introduction.
3
In
the Beginning . . .
3
In
the Law . . .
3
The Cost of Sin.
4
What
Our Sinning Cost God!
4
What
Our Sinning Cost Jesus!
4
What
Our Sinning Can Cost Us!
5
Sinning That Can Condemn Us To Hell
5
Sinning
That Will Deny Us Salvation.
5
Unforgiveness
Condemns.
7
Parables
of Jesus Showing Sinning That Condemns.
8
The
Parable of the Wise and Faithful Servant
8
The
Wedding Banquet
9
Parable
of the Ten Virgins.
9
The
Parable of the Talents.
10
The
Parable of the Sheep and Goats.
11
John’s
Tests Showing Sins That Condemn.
12
Hating
Your Brother
12
Loving
the World.
12
Continuing
In Sin.
13
Denying
Jesus Is the Christ
13
Sins
of Omission That Cause Condemnation.
14
Failure
To Do Good.
14
Failure
To Forgive.
14
Failure
To Produce Fruit
14
Failure
To Remain In Jesus.
14
Failing
To Obey.
14
Failure
To Deny Yourself
15
Failure
To Take Up One’s Cross Daily.
15
Failure
To Follow Jesus.
15
Failure
To Hate One’s Own Life And Those Most Loved By Us.
16
Failure
To Give Up Everything.
16
Failure
To Do The Will Of God.
17
Failure
To Repent
18
Failure
To Be Born Again.
18
Failure
To Be Righteous.
18
Failure
To Persevere.
19
Doctrines That Excuse Sinning!
19
The
Doctrine of Unconditional Eternal Security.
19
Dr.
Stanley’s Teachings.
19
Calvinism..
22
Man
is No Longer Accountable.
22
Future
Sins Forgiven.
23
Forgive.
24
Repent
25
Romans
7:14-24.
26
Differences In Sin.
27
The
Unforgivable Sin.
27
Sin
Beyond Repentance.
27
Pray
for Some Sins.
28
Deliberate
Sin.
28
Sin
By Actions Not From Faith.
29
Sin
Is Lawlessness.
29
What
About Those Who Cause Others to Sin?.
30
The Fate of Those Who Sin and Do Evil
30
Parables.
30
Parable
of the Weeds.
31
Parable
of Lazarus and the Rich Man.
31
The
Parable of the Unfaithful Servant
31
The
Parable of the Wedding Banquet
32
Parable
of the Talents.
32
Parable
of the Sheep and the Goats.
32
Jesus’
Description of Punishment
33
The Standard For Judgment
34
Instructions for the Church.
35
Shunning!
35
Teaching
About Sin and Righteousness.
36
The
Mind of Christ
36
Jesus
Is Our Model
36
Be
Perfect?.
37
Conclusion.
38
In the
“Christian” world today, we see little emphasis on sin, little preaching on
it, little rebuke of it, and little abhorrence of it. It seems we’ve lost sight of what God thinks of sin and how
he speaks of it in his Scripture.
As an
example, today we see men and women of all ages living together out of wedlock.
Many times these are people attending church regularly.
The Christian culture no longer condemns this.
In the Bible belt of America, we find divorce more common among purported
Christians than among American atheists, according to a recent poll.
For a more complete discussion of this subject, see the article “May
Christians Divorce – And Remarry?” on our website at: www.bereanpublishers.com,
under "Important Issues"
I
suggest that many “Christians” neither live, nor even know, biblical
Christianity. Instead they live in
what I call a Christian culture. This
culture has nominal Christian values, but doesn’t preach or teach the
teachings and commands of Jesus (commanded to be taught by Jesus at Matthew
28:20); instead it has picked and chosen favorite verses to comprise its
theology. As a result, false doctrines abound. Indeed, I fear that Jesus’ question is in danger of being
answered in the negative when he asked, “When the Son of Man returns, will he
find faith on the earth?” (Luke 18:8).
This
article will view the subject of sin. If
you presently have other than a biblical view of sin, it is my hope that you
will begin to see it as God sees it.
In the
beginning there was no sin. But
then Adam and Eve believed the lies of the serpent and ate the fruit God
commanded them not to eat. And that
was the beginning of the sin nature of mankind that has been passed down to the
successors of Adam and Eve. The
first death occurred when God took the lives of animals to make garments for
Adam and Eve who suddenly realized they were naked.
It was
after that first sin that God apparently told Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel
what kind of sacrifices would please him and cover over their sin – sacrifices
that required the taking of life and the shedding of blood.
The jealousy of Cain caused him to kill his brother Abel after God was
pleased with Abel’s sacrifice of fat portions of the firstborn of his flock,
but displeased with Cain’s offering of fruit of the soil.
Cain tried to do it his way, failed to please God, and then committed
another sin by killing his brother.
At
Exodus 29:10-14, God taught the children of Israel how to make a sin offering.
They were to take a valuable bull, slaughter it, and follow God’s
instructions as to the blood and the fat, as well as how and where to burn the
flesh, hide, and refuse. The people
were being taught that sin is costly! God
taught that sin has consequences and the cost of getting right with God is high.
Further, it will require the shedding of blood.
We learn from the book of Hebrews that without the shedding of blood
there is no forgiveness of sin (Hebrews
9:22).
One of
my favorite summaries of the Gospel tells us what sin cost God:
21
Once you were
alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.
22 But now he [God] has
reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you
holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation— 23 if you continue in your faith, established and firm,
not moved from the hope held out in the gospel. This is the gospel that you
heard and that has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven, and of which
I, Paul, have become a servant (Colossians 1:21-23).[1]
It cost
God the death of his Son, his only begotten Son.
God had to have a spotless “lamb” to die so that his blood could
redeem mankind. But this “lamb”
had to be human, a kinsman-redeemer who would pay the price with his own life
and blood to redeem mankind from its slavery to sin.
When John the Baptist saw Jesus pass by he exclaimed, “Look, the Lamb
of God, who takes away the sin of the world! (John
1:29).
Peter
later explained it for us:
18
For you know
that it was not with perishable things such as silver or gold that you were
redeemed from the empty way of life handed down to you from your forefathers, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb
without blemish or defect (1 Peter 1:18).
When
John was caught up to heaven, he was privileged to see a ceremony which honored
the Lamb, looking as though it had been slain.
The Lamb was handed a scroll. 8
And when he had taken it, the four living creatures and the twenty-four
elders fell down before the Lamb. 9 And they sang a new song:
“You
are worthy to take the scroll and to open its seals, because you were slain,
and with your blood you purchased men for God from every tribe and language and
people and nation. 10 You
have made them to be a kingdom and priests to serve our God, and they will reign
on the earth.”
It is
hard to imagine the cost for God the Father and Jesus the Son.
The Apostle John revealed that Jesus, previous to his birth on earth, was
“The Word.” John wrote, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God. 2
He was with God in the beginning” (John 1:1-2).
He was in heaven with God. He
was God and was with God in the beginning.
Paul
gives us another glimpse as he exhorted the Philippians:
5 Your
attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: 6 Who, being in
very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, 7
but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being
made in human likeness. 8 And
being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to
death — even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:5-8).
It was
not enough that Jesus should die for our sins.
The method by which he was to die – public crucifixion – was invented
by the Romans to act as a deterrent. It
was intended to be the most painful, agonizing, humiliating way to die they
could devise. God used crucifixion
to have his son shed his blood and die to redeem you and me from our sins.
Knowing
that his purpose on earth was to redeem mankind from their sins, Jesus was aware
of the punishment in hell for sinning. He
warned:
29
“If your right
eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to
lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell.
30 And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off
and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than
for your whole body to go into hell” (Matthew 5:29-30).
What a
dreadful illustration! We think of
gouging out our eye or cutting off our hand as beyond contemplation in a
civilized world. The world has been
made aware, however, that the strict followers of Islam still cut off the hands
of thieves and kill people for a variety of offenses.
Why does
Jesus use such a terrible example? Likely
he did it to get our attention and make us realize that sinning can cause us to
go to hell! That isn’t a popular
notion these days, is it? After
all, aren’t we able to simply ask God to forgive us and we’ll be cleansed
from our sin and on our way to heaven? Perhaps it isn’t as simple as that. Let’s consider additional Scriptures on that issue and
about the consequences of sinning.
The
Apostle Paul’s ministry was to the heathen of his age – Gentiles who had not
known the Scriptures or God’s requirements for his people. He had to start from the beginning to teach them God’s ways
and God’s commands and what God defined as sin.
One of the things he had to do was make them aware that there is a
penalty for sinning – for committing the very acts they previously thought
nothing of before they became Christians. Paul
defined sin as he warned the Galatians about the penalty for sinning:
19
The acts of
the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; 20
idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish
ambition, dissensions, factions 21 and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and
the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not
inherit the kingdom of God (Galatians 5:19-21).
Could
this be a mistake? Can sinning
deprive us of salvation? Paul
warned the Corinthians:
9
Do you not know
that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God?
Do not be deceived: Neither
the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor
homosexual offenders 10 nor
thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will
inherit the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:9-10).
Paul
phrases the words as to be objective, neither accusing the recipients nor
excusing them. It is the kind of
language that says, “If you are one of these, you will not inherit the kingdom
of God.” It is inclusive in that
he is including those to whom he is writing.
He isn’t writing about only the wicked people in the world.
Paul
defines sin for the Ephesians and warns them of the consequences of sinning:
Lest
there be any question that these warnings include those who hold themselves out
as Christians, Paul begins his warning to the Ephesians with the words, “But
among you . . .”&nbs