Am i a sinner?

Hello lovely you😉, I thought we would do some bible study today; hope you learn a thing or two. I did.

For the longest time, this issue has been on my mind, to talk about it, to write about it, to do anything but be quiet about it. Initially I used to get upset about it, wondering why others couldn’t understand, but I’ve learnt that if Christ himself was patient enough to teach me and wean me from my foolishness then I have no right to be upset that someone doesn’t get it.

The ‘it’ on my mind today is the issue of Christians calling themselves sinners. Juxtapose those words and see for yourself; “Christian sinner” it’ quite the oxymoron.

I was in a gathering of CHRISTIANS some time back and prayers were being said, one of the prayers was the prayer of repentance and someone said this “please let’s pray for forgiveness because we are all sinners, the eyebrows of my spirit shot up and in my heart I said “o really?” that’s just one of many times that I’ve heard believers refer to themselves as sinners so I’ve come to believe a lot of Christians are getting it wrong and I want to help the little I can. So let’s search the scriptures and see… please join me.😊

In Genesis, Adam sinned and by so doing, created a great rift between God and mankind such that any man born of a woman is born into sin

Romans 5:12 “therefore just as sin entered into the world, and death through sin and so death spread to all men, because all sinned.”

So we can say that being a sinner wasn’t (and isn’t) a function of men’s actions but of their birth. Just like being a dog isn’t a function of whether the animal barks (I’ve had a dog that didn’t bark, and I’ve seen humans that do😁) it’s because it was born a D O G. So who we are is a function of birth and not of action, and we were all born sinners.

Psalm 51:5 David said “surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me”

Every man born of a woman is by nature a sinner because of Adam’s mistake.

Romans 15:14a “Nevertheless death reigned from the time of Adam until Moses, even over those who did not sin in the same way Adam did when he disobeyed……”

So there is a nature called the sinful nature which everyone is born with, and a sinner is a man (or woman) who has this nature. One of Jesus parables proved this to me (I’d share that some other time, or else this post would be reallllllllyyy lonnnggggg…..😌)

So what did Jesus Christ come to do?

Since being a sinner is a function of our birth and by effect the nature in us, Jesus came to give us a new birth and a new nature. Hence all the talk of being “born Again” John 1:13 puts it beautifully;

Children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a Husband’s will, but born of God.

Isn’t it just amazing that Jesus came to change our pedigree, such that we are no longer dominated by a sinful nature, but as many as receive Christ are born of God himself! How can you call a child born of God a sinner? That’s like an insult on God himself. It’s like being called an orphan while your parents are still living and breathing.

Just the same way a man isn’t a Christian because he does good deeds, but because he has Christ as Lord and lives out that nature, a man isn’t a sinner because he sins but because he has the nature of sin in him. So a sinner can do all the good deeds and still not be right with God, because what God desires first is a change of NATURE.

So does this mean a Christian that sins is not a sinner, of course yes! But does this also mean a Christian has a license to sin, of course not! Scriptures say

Romans 6:1-2 what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?

AND

1John 1:2 My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous.

When a Christian out of immaturity or foolishness or defiance sins, what is he? He’s still a child of God, why? Because that’s the nature he bears from the day he asked Jesus into his heart and was born again through the new birth. At worst such a Christian is a carnal Christian, but never a sinner.

In Christ Jesus we aren’t just forgiven sinners, we are new creatures.

2^nd Corinth 5:17 says…

This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone; a new life has begun! (NLT)

It is not a matter of pride that I declare that I’m no longer a sinner but an act of gratitude to God who picked me out of quick sand and set me on a rock.

Jesusrules#😉