Gooding, David: 1 - Original Sin

We have entitled these ten lectures Christian Foundations, and I wish this evening to go right down to the basement of the Christian edifice and discuss with you a passage of scripture that diagnoses what is the trouble with the human race. I take it that I shall not need to convince any here present that there is something drastically wrong with humanity. Now and again, evidence comes across our paths that is overwhelming. Someone handed me a book last night in the kindness of his heart, and flipping over the pages, I observed a remark and a footnote that pointed out that in the First World War, eight and a half million people lost their lives. In the last World War, according to the figures given by the Swiss Red Cross, a total of fifty two million people were fatally wounded. That omits another five million who were unaccounted for, and doesn't stop to describe all the virtually indescribable suffering, mental and spiritual torment that came on those who survived. We who have lived through at least one of those wars will scarcely need any convincing that there is something wrong with the human race. And as we read our history books, we find that history has been full of this kind of thing. We may be blind to the fact, sometimes because the great generals of the past have been called great. Alexander, who triumphed over such a large part of the then known world, we were taught to believe in our school history books, was a great man. But he, in his way, with his limited weapons, was doing what we have just seen done in the modern world, with modern weapons. Somebody will perhaps retort to me, but, uh, Mr. Lecturer, have you not been, uh, dwelling too much upon the unhappy side of life? Granted that there have been these extraordinary times in history when men and women have murdered each other. Is there not, on the other hand, much evidence of real goodness in people's hearts? And taken by and large, would it not be true to say that the majority of people are not such fiends as these awful times of history would suggest, but are decent people, full of goodness and love and kindness to their fellow men. At once, let me agree with you that this world has seen a tremendous amount of human goodness. And the Bible, in all its realism, does not hesitate to say the same thing. It reminds us that men have been found to give themselves to pay the ultimate sacrifice, to give their lives for their fellow men. It reminds us that there is much to be seen of parental love and fellow feeling. But nevertheless, the Bible has some other observation to make, which immediately shatters any complacency that might arise in our hearts. In fact, the Bible is not in the habit of dwelling on the major catastrophes that show humanity at its worst. You see, these major catastrophes, we might argue, are merely exceptions to a general rule. Therefore, the Bible makes this other observation. Not that history has from time to time, witnessed terrible wars or outstandingly wicked crimes, but that rather, if you will take humanity one by one, taking the good as well as the bad, you will find that all have sinned and do constantly come short of God's standards. And a moment's thought will show you that that observation is overwhelmingly shattering. If I go into my orchard and go up to a tree, and I find a tree full of apples, and here and there I see an apple that is completely rotten from the skin to the core. Maybe there are half a dozen on the tree. I say, too bad. I pick them and throw them away. And I'm left with a tree still full of moderately decent apples. And I don't condemn the tree because here and there there are apples that are absolutely and without any modification bad. Ah, but suppose I go into an orchard and here is a tree, and there are on it a half a dozen apples absolutely putrid. I pick them off and throw them away. And then I start to look again, and I find one here that is just half bad, and another here that's half bad. And then I look more closely, and upon investigating every single apple on that tree, I find that every single apple, without exception, has some corruption in it. Then it would be that, suppose it were only a little piece of corruption. The fact that that little piece of corruption was in every single apple without exception, that would be far more serious evidence than the fact that there were one or two apples that were absolutely bad. And if I observed that tree over many years and found that never was there in any one year one apple that was completely free of corruption, but that always and invariably every apple on the tree was corrupt in some measure. Then I should begin to draw far-reaching conclusions. I should say the fact that that, uh, those half-dozen apples there are very bad, absolutely putrid, is not, um, some strange chance, some curious exception. There must be something fundamentally wrong with this tree, some fundamental weakness that makes it impossible for the tree ever to produce an apple that is completely sound. And it is this latter observation that the Bible makes that is so overwhelming. It bids us consider ourselves and our fellow men and women. It asks us bluntly to consider, have we ever met a single man or woman that has been absolutely free of sin? Have you ever met one? Have you ever heard of one? I submit to you that so universal is this disease of sin, that if anyone came to you and said that they had found a man in your street that was sinless, you would be utterly incredulous. There has only been one man in all history that people at large have been prepared to believe was utterly sinless. That man was Jesus Christ. I ask us, therefore, tonight that we listen to what the Bible has to say as it diagnoses this trouble and tells us its cause. If sin is universal in the human race, without exception, I submit to you that there must be a universal cause. Why should we travel, says someone, to fill our minds with such a gloomy topic, as to try and account for this universal disease of sin? The answer is that unless we find out what is the true cause, all the remedies that we seek to apply will probably be in vain. If you go to the doctor with a sore throat, and he diagnoses the common cold and treats your ailment as the common cold, when all the time it is the beginning of polio, the results for you could be fatal. Unhappily, men and women have been won't down the centuries to think too lightly of this serious problem. In fact, the Bible often reproaches the old Testament prophets that they healed the hurt of people too lightly. They said, peace, peace, when there was no peace. Their recipes for human improvement consequently were too shallow. We would understand God's answer to this terrible malady of human sin. We must let God tell us what is the real cause. When we begin to go deeper, we make another observation from scripture that is exceedingly important. If we ask ourselves, how is it that, um, people become sinners, the Bible soon gives us to see that we do not become sinners by sinning. On the contrary, we sin because we are sinners. Let me try and explain that a little bit, lest you think I'm splitting hairs. What is true of sin is true of apple trees. I go into your orchard once more. I go into your orchard. I see a big tree full of apples. You say to me, that's an apple tree. I say, yes, I can see that. The fruit on the branches is an evidence that the thing is an apple tree. Then you move across and you show me a little sliver of a thing, a few feet tall with one or two whispery looking branches. You say, that's an a- apple tree too. And I say, I doubt that. I don't see any apples on the thing. Ah, but you say it is an apple tree. Well, I said it can't be. There are no apples on the thing. Did it bear any last year? You say, oh no, it didn't bear any last year. And none this year either? No, none this year either. But it is an apple tree. How can it be an apple tree if it hasn't yet brought forth apples? Well, you say, obviously. A tree doesn't become an apple tree by bearing apples. It is an apple tree already, even though as yet it has not borne any apples at all. It is an apple tree because inside that bark, inside that wood, it has the nature of an apple tree. Maybe it hasn't had a chance yet to bear apples and to show you what it really can do. You have patience a moment and give it the right weather and the right climatic conditions, you'll see. Presently, because it is an apple tree, it will begin to bring forth its fruits in the form of apples. It won't be any more an apple tree then than it was before. The same is true with human beings. Some men, it is obvious that they are sinners because they have done a long, long list of crimes. But they don't become sinners by doing those crimes. They were sinners before they started doing the crimes. And if by great efforts of self-restraint they were to stop doing some of these outwardly wicked things, yet God wor- God's word tells us that they would still be sinners. The trouble is not merely in the outward acts, it lies deep in human nature. Human nature is basically sinful. This is an exceedingly important thing to get hold of. I say again, it is for lack of understanding this that many people have sought to cure their sins by methods that are far too shallow, and some have regrettably thought that they have succeeded, when all the time they had left the real trouble untouched. It was so with the Pharisees that lived in the time of our Lord Jesus. They had observed that God's law says, thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt no- commit no murder. And by great self-restraint, many of these Pharisees could honestly say that they had never committed adultery. They had never murdered. And in consequence, some of them secretly felt a little bit proud, uh, at least a little bit, uh, complacent and satisfied. They felt that in their lives, all the outward, uh, fruits of sin, those ugly things, had been cut off. They felt that they were soon qualifying for God's heaven. Our Lord had to remind them somewhat rudely. Gentlemen, said he, if your righteousness do not exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall never enter the kingdom of heaven. Why? How was their righteousness not enough? Well, said our Lord, maybe you haven't murdered. You haven't yet borne the fruit of murder. But you see, the trouble is deeper than that. Every man that hateth his brother is a murderer. And in your heart, gentlemen, there is a corrupt, sinful nature that very often has hated its brother. We need to listen well to the Savior. I know it is a painful thing sometimes when the doctor puts out his hand and touches a sore point that we would fain cover up, and reminds us that we are not so healthy as we might think we are. But it is a good thing and a healthy for us to remind ourselves that even if we have cut off from our behavior all the outward evidences of sin, the fact remains that inside we are still sinners. And the cutting off all the outward evidences of sin will not make us fit for God's presence. Something far deeper must happen. You see, I may have perhaps in my garden a crab apple tree, and I say to myself, you know, those crab apples, they are horrible things. Perfectly awful taste, utterly useless. What shall I do to improve the situation? How shall I improve the tree? Uh, come now, I say to myself, first let me strip off all these crab apples. Then let me dig around the roots and put some fertilizer around the roots, and let me prune the tree carefully, and let me see that it gets all the sunshine it needs. Now I say, crabapple, have another go. And the thing still brings forth crabapples. The inner nature is unchanged. And God always looks upon the heart. That is why we do not well to compare ourselves with other people. There was a book on the accession shelf in Queen's Library the other day, and I picked it up. It was an official history of Hitler's extermination of the Jews. He and his helpers murdered in one way or another, systematically and deliberately, five million Jews. You say that's utterly ghastly. The man was rotten to the core. Ah, but wait a moment. There is maybe a Mr. Smith up my street, and I don't like Mr. Smith. In fact, I hate the man. I don't know what it is. I hate him. No, I'm not Hitler. I haven't got a whole Gestapo at my, at my beck and call, nor army of stormtroopers, nor a few he- hidden secret factories where I could get rid of this Mr. Smith on the quiet. Nor a nation around me that would approve of it if I did. But perhaps I hate him still. Perhaps I've no other facility of getting at the man. No more, perhaps, than when it comes to his turn to an a- to apply for a job and I'm on the committee. I do everything I can to stop him getting the job. Who's worse, Hitler or me? God says that, um, while it is important that we abstain from the outward works of sin, yet nevertheless he always reads the heart and judges by the heart's potential, and not merely by what we actually do. Then what is the cause? I read you, uh, so a few excerpts from a paragraph in the New Testament that talks of this thing. You who care to take the reference, it is in the Epistle to the Romans, chapter five. I read a few verses here and there, beginning in verse uh twelve. Therefore, as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so death passed unto all men, for that all sinned. For until the law, sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. For until the law, sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam until Moses, even over them that had not sinned after the likeness of Adam's transgression, who is a figure of him that was to come. And then from verse nineteen: for as through the one man's disobedience, the many were made sinners, even so through the obedience of the one shall the many be made righteous. There, in plain, straightforward English, is God's account of the root of the problem. Through the one man's disobedience, the many were made sinners. As you know, the passage is referring to our ancestor Adam. And here is the Bible coming up with its old-fashioned explanation of human troubles, that all mankind are sinners because the first man Adam, disobeyed God. I'm well aware of the many objections that have been made to that, uh, account of affairs. It is still the only satisfactory one. Somebody will object, but then this is horrible. The normal objection comes in these terms, then does the Bible say I am to be condemned not because of what I have done personally, but because of what Adam did? Surely that is grossly unfair, that I am condemned because of what another did. Allow me to point out that there are many fallacies in that objection. The one is that nobody will ever be condemned because of what Adam did. God will hold every man and woman responsible for his personal acts of sin. God will never condemn anybody because of what Adam did. That does not eliminate the fact that we are born sinners because of what he did. You say that is not fair? Then I answer, but it doesn't alter the fact. A man might as well complain against the shape of his nose, and many of us have had good cause. I don't like the shape of my nose. Why is my nose this shape? Oh, well, I inherited that shape of a nose from my ancestors. I say, well, that's grossly unfair, but that doesn't alter the fact. Moreover. Moreover, it is the only kind explanation. Men and women are sinners enough, without your loading them with too much blame. God does not say that we have become sinners by our personal choice, that we engineered the root of the trouble ourselves. He says we were born sinners, and that wasn't our fault. Our God is kinder than some moderns with their explanation. You say, but what evidence have we that is such is the case? This particular passage quotes one piece. It says that by one man, sin entered into the world, and death through sin. And so death passed unto all men, on this condition that all sinned. I must trouble you to get hold of the exact technical point here. Death passed upon all, not because all have from time to time personally sinned. That is not true. The babe that is born from half an hour and lives a half an hour and dies has not personally sinned. Why then does it die? Death has passed upon all men. Because all men were wrapped up in their first ancestor, Adam. When he sinned and disobeyed God, through him that infection was passed on to all his posterity. I have not discussed all this with you here tonight to ask the deeper point, then why did God allow sin? Interesting as that would be. But I have raised this matter in this first lecture, in order that I might begin to set the stage to discuss with you the great program that God has for man's salvation. I repeat, the Bible asks us to be realists. We shall find that God is realist enough. God, who has told us bluntly the tremendous cause of the trouble, has Has provided provided a a salvation that is realist enough to grapple with this fundamental need. I shall be many times saying in the course of these lectures, what the Bible itself stresses so frequently, that salvation is not by our human works. Very often that falls very strangely on the ears of people. They say, but surely, my dear sir, if we are to be good Christians, we must do our very level best. People feel that difficulty because they really have not considered what is the basic trouble. You are being very unkind to your fellow man if you teach him that he is by his own efforts to work out his salvation. You might as well stand by my crabapple tree and say, crabapple, bear blenham oranges. Or at least try, old tree, do your little best. But what mockery it would be. That tree will never grow blenham oranges. Unless somebody is able to graft into that tree the kind of nature that grows blenheim oranges. In a much more wonderful sense, that is precisely what God offers the human race. Not that they shall strive to cut off the outward fruits of sin, or attempt the impossible of changing their corrupt and fallen nature. They should allow God to graft into them a completely new life with a new nature and a new power. God's answer where to Adam's sin and the fall of the human race is to start a new race. From a new man. Who shall spread his life to all the members of this new race. It will be the purpose of most of the lectures in this series to consider the practical means by which that is accomplished. Let it suffice us tonight to notice that that is the basic scheme. If by one man's disobedience the many became sinners, then on the other hand, they become right, says the Bible, not by their self-effort, but by the obedience of one shall the many be made righteous. And this is a glorious thing. It tells us that though we could not help being born sinners, we may be made right by a similar method, by allowing another man to transmit to us a life that in itself is sinless. This, of course, is as different from the gospel of doing your best as the heavens are higher than the earth. This new man, of course, is our Lord Jesus Christ. The obedience that our verse refers to, by the obedience of one shall many become righteous, is that one great act of obedience that he performed when, for our sakes, he faced this vast force in God's universe that God calls sin, and meeting it, triumphed. And then, having triumphed himself personally, took upon him the guilt of all who will trust him, and suffered for it, and put it away. The scheme is, if I might reverently refer to it as a scheme, that all that Christ did as he faced sin, triumphed himself personally, bore its penalty for those that had failed. All that Christ did, and the power with which he did it, can be transmitted in its value to us men and women, so that a new life is grafted in. I do not mean this in any empty imaginative sense. I mean this literally. I do not mean that when we trust the Savior and receive him, we become sinless. Like the old crab apple that has blennings grafted on, if that is possible. We shall still produce crab apples here and there. But the Bible says that if any man be in Christ Jesus, uh, something wonderful happens. There takes place a new creation. A new something is formed in that person's life, with all the marvel and wonder that pertains to a, a new life when it is born physically. Oh, admittedly, this new creation that is formed may be exceedingly small. But then life has a way of starting small. It is incredible that the vast complex of a human body should start from an infinitesimally small cell. So small that you would need a very powerful microscope to detect. Yet we know it is true. That minute cell is equipped with all the possibilities of bringing forth a human being. Now, if any man be in Christ and comes to the Savior for this new work, says the Bible, there is in that man or woman a new creation, small may be in its beginnings, but eternal in its potentiality. If any man be in Christ, there is a new creation. Let me not not make it sound as if it is difficult. I say again, the how and the where of these things we shall be discussing in later evenings. Let me not give you the impression, first of all, it is difficult. The mechanics of human life are certainly exceedingly complicated, but watch a newborn baby. In that baby is all the mechanism. The life that is started now possesses, um, qualities and powers that will direct its development. In a few years' time, the first teeth will drop out and new teeth will come. Arms will grow. Certain chemicals will presently cease to be needed, and the nature will shut them off and supply other chemicals. You say that must be an extraordinarily difficult thing to be a baby. How on earth does it know what to do at the right time? Well, of course, it doesn't worry its head. It got this marvelous life as a gift, and the life inside is just working itself out. Oh, I know it is a perfect miracle how it's all done. No less a miracle is God's great work of new beginning that he offers to us all without exception. Complicated in one sense, if you like, but utter simplicity. We are asked to come and take this implantation of new life as a free gift. It is as easy as that. Many times over, the paragraph that we have referred to stresses the fact that this new life that we get from this new head is a free gift. It is simplicity itself to obtain. But there is one difference between it and our physical life that is important. We got our own physical life, our fallen nature, without any choice on our part, without any exercise of our will. That will not be so with this new life. This new life is altogether of a higher sort. And God allows us to choose whether we will have it or not. And therefore, as we come to the end of this lecture, shall we gather up its practical implications? Shall we face the fact that God's word diagnoses our own personal trouble in this drastic fashion, that we are basically, all of us, corrupt and sinful. That we cannot improve ourselves and make ourselves fit for God. By our self effort. But that God is doing at this moment an exceedingly wonderful thing. God is starting again. He has already provided the head of a new race, which is Christ, and this Christ offers to each one of us that he impart to us his own spiritual life. So that if any man be in Christ, he is, there is, there takes place this new creation. Obviously, the practical upshot is simply this. It is true that I was born sinful, but has this other thing taken place in my life? Have Have I I become what the Bible means by in Christ? Have I? Or is that utterly double Dutch and mysterious and unmeaningful? As one good lady said to me the other week, she said, you know, you sound horribly ersatz. You sound so thin- so synthetic. I guess I did. Perhaps I sound like that to you. To you, being in Christ may sound, will sound a very curious notion. But then let's not empty Christianity of all its reality by refusing to give time and thought to its basic term. In Christ, the Bible says, there is no condemnation. In Christ, all shall be made alive. In Christ, there is a new creation. Obviously, I must ask myself, what does it mean to be in Christ? Am I in Christ? And has Christ in fact imparted to me this new kind of love. And if we cannot answer that as we ought to answer that, God give us the grace to inquire just what the Bible means, and just how this thing does take place.