Consciousness (Cognizance) Of Guilt

".. For I didn't come to call the righteous, but sinners" (Matt. 9:13, HCSB). 
"Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man!" (Luke 5:8, NASB).
"... God, turn Your wrath from me--a sinner! (Luke 18:13, HCSB).  

That (the title) is a legal term, or lawyers' parlance, for behavior such as some suspect hiding info, engaging in a cover-up, lying, etc., and is an explanation and description of their dubious demeanor.  It is evidence and can contribute to the conviction of the crime in question.  Likewise, in our faith, we don't come to repentance without cognizance of guilt! Before the good news of salvation, we must hear the bad news of sin--that we personally are guilty, not just mankind.   People are claiming they have faith without ever coming to an awareness of their own sin and how they fall short of God's ideal and standard, realizing they are lost ("I was lost but now am found!").  Repentance and conviction go together--you must not only fall short of your own standards but realize you fall short and miss the mark with God.  How can you claim to be found without realizing you were lost!  Jesus came to seek and to save the lost and the sinner--we must be cognizant of this.  We must realize the verdict:  guilty as sin (and that isn't even a strong enough word for it)!

To maintain we are righteous and need no repentance is an insult to God, for our righteousness is as filthy rags (cf. Isa. 64:6). If we are righteous in man's eyes, it is a gift of God.  Our righteousness is God's gift to us, not our gift to God (cf. Isa. 45:24).  We don't ever have the freedom to sin or to live on in sin, but must come to a change of behavior and attitude toward our sin.  Repentance is that:  changing one's mind!  Repentance involves a matter of the volition, the emotions, and the intellect--all parts of us are affected by grace, for it's all a matter of the gift of God has penetrated our hearts and changed our minds toward our sin--He changed us from the inside out!

The only qualification for salvation is to realize one's lack of credentials!  Salvation is to the lowest bidders!  We must acknowledge our unworthiness and humble ourselves.  If we insist on our righteousness we will never be declared righteous!  Note that God doesn't make us righteous, but just declares or considers us righteous due to vicarious justification, redemption, reconciliation, and redemption.  God accepts vicarious obedience and Christ obeyed the requirements of the law of Moses perfectly on our behalf.  The yoke of the Law had become overbearing and Jesus came to bring an easy yoke of following God's will: for instance, the Pharisees had added thirty-nine forbidden activities considered as work for the Sabbath which made it a burden and not a celebration of the Lord.  What a relief to accept Christ's vicarious obedience on our behalf!

As believers, we don't have the right to live in the flesh, but the power to live in the Spirit.  Our persistent sinning doesn't show our freedom but demonstrates our slavery.  We must learn to overcome the sin that easily besets us (cf. Heb. 12:1) and not to be slaves of sin, but slaves of righteousness, in fact, we are more than overcomers!  (Cf. Rom. 8:37).  We don't want any sin to dominate us and to be our master (cf. Psalm 119:133; 1 Cor. 6:12; 10:23).  We don't want any certain sin to have dominion over us (cf. Psa. 119:133; 19:13; 18:23).  The psalmist says in Psa. 119:133, HCSB, "... Do not let any sin dominate me."  We must let go of the sin that so easily besets us or trips us up! (Cf. Heb. 12:1).  For we are slaves to whatever overcomes us (cf. Rom. 6:16).

We can never be too aware of our sins, for Samuel Rutherford said that the more aware of our sins we are, the less sin.  William Jay of Bath said, "I am a great sinner, and I have a great Savior!'  Also, as we grow in Christ we become more conscious of sin and of God's displeasure!  And who can forget Peter's humility in saying, "Depart from me O Lord, for I am a sinful man" (cf. Luke 5:8).  Then there's the sinners' prayer in Luke 18:13, emphasis mine, saying:  "God be merciful to me, THE sinner!"  Point in fact:  if you don't realize your need for forgiveness and realize your depravity and sinfulness before the Godhead, Jesus has nothing to say to you and the good news isn't relative to you but only condemnation for disobeying the gospel and not fearing God.   Soli Deo Gloria!

Awaiting The Final Verdict

"This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil" (John 3:19, NIV).
"They stumble because they disobey the word, as they were destined to do" (1 Pet. 2:9, NIV).
"For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Thess. 5:9, NIV).

The verdict is that man is guilty as sin (AS CHARGED!) but doesn't even acknowledge his own sin--he's not aware of his predicament and dilemma before an angry God, who cannot tolerate any sin in His presence and is only postponing judgment--for justice delayed isn't judgment denied. Men love darkness rather than light and therefore won't come to the light, lest their misdemeanors are exposed. The final verdict has already been rendered in God's court and cannot be reversed. "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" (cf. Gen. 18:25).. 

We all stand condemned apart from the mercy of God. This is God's estimation of man, not our own. We are all guilty as charged and need to see how bad we are to recognize our need for salvation, and we cannot realize our depravity till we've attempted good or repentance--it's a catch-22. Only the grace of God opens our eyes to our plight, and we are as bad off as possibly could be, though not as bad as can be--God restrains some evil in the world out of mercy (cf. Psalm 76:10).

Now, a jury doesn't need all the evidence to render a verdict, but only needs to go in the direction of the evidence, i.e., the preponderance of the evidence. Likewise, we don't need all the answers to believe and repent or to have believing penitence or penitent faith. But here's the rub: you must want to believe and be willing to do God's will and repent before you are rendered capable of faith as God kindles or awakens faith in you. In a court of law, the evidence isn't always conclusive or final, but only an argument for or against a case. In other words, there is evidence pro and con! One must weigh the evidence and decide according to one's conscience and convictions. There's no such thing as perfect objectivity, and so the court system must err on the side of innocence, not guilt out of mercy.  But God is objective and knows all the evidence!  

They say that if the evidence is against a case (and it's stacked against us), plead the law; if the law is against the case, plead the evidence! Sometimes you have to plead the case for a change of venue if all else fails, plead guilty and work out a plea bargain! In our case, there are no pleas bargains possible except as charged. Christians believe that God is a God of justice and that no one will escape it in the end--in eternity if not in this world. There is such a thing as justice and just law because God is a God of justice and cares a lot about right and wrong.

We must never lose faith in the system and realize that God is always in control and that criminals and outlaws will someday meet their comeuppance. Our system of justice depends upon jurors taking their oath seriously and being fair and unbiased, hearing both sides without turning a deaf ear. We all will either face the Bema of Christ (Judgment Seat) or the Great White Throne Judgment of condemnation. Our justification isn't legal fiction but forensic and just in God's eyes.

God is able to save the worst of sinners and we can escape judgment by believing in His Son as Lord and Savior (cf. John 5:24). God is unjust to no one! He chooses to save some by having mercy and to bypass others who receive judgment and justice by virtue of His holiness demanding retribution. Mercy and grace are not forms of injustice, but forms of nonjustice. God reserves the right to have mercy on whomever He wills (cf. Rom. 9:15). God is under no obligation to save anyone at all! If He were obliged to save us for any reason, it would be justice, not mercy! 

To be saved, no one is entreated to believe despite the evidence nor to commit intellectual suicide--there are ample and sound reasons to believe based on reasonable circumstantial and historical evidence--but it takes a leap of faith. There is never enough evidence for the skeptic who doesn't want to believe and no one can disbelieve out of lack of evidence. There is just enough light to see for the willing and enough darkness to keep the unwilling from believing.  Jesus said that if a person is willing to do His will he shall know whether it's of God.

Finally, if the skeptic asks the person of faith to come up with evidence, he should be asked what evidence he sees that there isn't a God. God's existence is self-attested and He doesn't need to prove Himself. There's more evidence in the affirmative than the negative for you cannot prove a universal negative according to the laws of logic; in other words, both believer and skeptic are people of faith, it just depends upon what the presupposition is. 

If the believer must come up with proof, then the infidel must too. There's no smoking-gun evidence either way that proves beyond a shadow of a doubt--one must exercise faith on both sides. God doesn't need to give more evidence to convince the hardened heart but says that no one has an excuse for not believing the self-evident. There's plenty of proof, one must have his heart in the right place and not have moral issues--for intellectual issues are a sham and masquerade and cover-up for moral rebellion and an unrepentant heart.

CAVEAT: GOD'S VERDICT IS FINAL AND PERMANENT WITH NO APPEAL POSSIBLE, WHAT YOUR FATE IS DEPENDS UPON YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH JESUS CHRIST. Soli Deo Gloria!

The Utter Damnability Of Sin

"You who are of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong..." (Hab. 1:13, ESV).
"... Everyone did what was right in his own eyes" (Judges 17:6, ESV).
"All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way..." (Isa. 53:6, ESV).
"[T]he only part of Christian theology that can really be proved [is original sin]."--G. K. Chesterton, Christian apologist
"What's wrong with the world?" "I am. Yours truly, G. K. Chesterton."  
"We have done those things we ought not to have done and we have left undone those things we ought to have done."--The Book of Common Prayer (Anglican). 

God doesn't just frown upon sin or disapprove of it, He cannot stand the sight of it and it has no place in His presence (much like matter versus antimatter)--He cannot even countenance evil per Hab. 1:13.  Sin isn't a bad enough word to describe our virus of rebellion; it's the ultimate killjoy word that many preachers refuse to mention even in passing since it has offensive power, even to the elect.  It's the job description of the Holy Spirit alone to convict of sin (cf. John 16:13), but we must resort to the power of the Word of God to do the work.  We only need to be exposed to the light to see our darkness:  "the law is given to convince us that we fail to keep it," according to D. James Kennedy.

Sin has been characterized many ways to bring the point home that it's our legacy and birthright that we cannot escape--in fact, we are not sinners because we sin, but we sin by virtue of already being in sin!  Yes, we go astray and lie even from the womb according to Psalm 58:3.  To illustrate the essence of sin, one should see it as man's ultimate Declaration of Independence from the authority and government or sovereignty of God over one's life--to be the "captain of your soul and master of your fate" like in the humanist poem Invictus by William Ernest Henley.  It could be called an act of autonomy or self-rule over God-rule.   In this sense, sin is rebellion and being volitionally defiant.  We all miss achieving the perfect standard or "missing the mark" (hamartia in Greek) which was set by Jesus' perfect sin-free life of righteous obedience to the Mosaic law.

Many people feel that they don't commit many sins, but they don't realize that what we fail to accomplish or do in the Lord's name as we ought are sins of omission. "I coulda, woulda, shoulda!"  The Westminster Catechism (ca. 1646) defines sin as "any want of conformity unto or transgression of, the Law of God."  It has also been precisely defined as "any thought, word, action, omission, or desire contrary to the law of God" by Charlie Riggs of the BGEA. Clearly, all wrongdoing is sin!  What is ironic is that the closer our walk with Christ, the more clearly we sense our sin and get convicted--Samuel Rutherford said to"pray for a lively sense of sin, the greater the sense, the less sin."

Jesus revolutionized the concept of sin, since the Pharisees had merely externalized it and portrayed it only as certain behavior that can be seen, but Jesus read their hearts and said that out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks, and evil proceeds in Mark 7. Proverbs 23:7 reiterates:  "As a man thinks in his heart, so is he."  Dr. Karl Menninger, MD, said that sin is the "refusal of the love of others" [namely, God's]" in his landmark book Whatever Became of Sin?  Even psychiatrists are putting it back into the equation as persons being responsible for their own choices and beginning to use the term again according to Billy Graham.  Sin is self-defeating and destructive as God warned Cain in Gen. 4:7 (NKJV):  "...And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door.   And its desire is for you, but you should rule over it" ["sin wants to destroy you, but don't let it"].

There is no way to defeat sin apart from God's grace, we are slaves to it before salvation!  The paradox is that God really wants what's best for us, and even the rules concerning sexual immorality are only for our good and to watch over our soul and it's purity and health.  Sin is just not God's plan for man, but something He permits or allows, and will ultimately judge and do away with by sending it all to hell.  The point is that if we couldn't sin we would be robots and couldn't obey God of our own free will or choice.  We either choose for or against God with our behavior and thought life.  After salvation, we don't have the right to live in sin, but have the power to defeat it, the power to live in the Spirit.

We cannot blame anyone else for our personal sins, and we certainly cannot judge Adam and Eve for the Fall and believe we would've done anything different--we all repeat their sin.  Their sin was the prototype of all sin and if we analyze it we can see as they:  spurned His grace; contradicted His truth; rejected His authority; disputed His wisdom; repudiated His justice; even resisted His grace (unknown source)!   In short, they didn't take God's Word at face value or take Him at His Word, but were, in effect, unbelievers--Eve first doubted God's Word, then questioned it, she believed Satan's rationalization, then disbelieved God's Word, then finally disobeyed it outright of her own volition in rebellion--and Adam didn't intervene or help her, but was cowardly and irresponsible--both sins.

We all have eaten of the Proverbial Apple and have duplicated Adam's sin, and become defiled by a sin nature and stand in solidarity with Adam before our salvation! Note that the first couple didn't choose evil, they chose self over God--they didn't know what evil was yet.  (Idolatry is always putting self or something in God's place or where it belongs in God's plan or order.)  Adam and Eve thought God was holding out on them, with the help of the serpent's guile and deception.  Note that many scientists blame man's problems on the environment and society, especially psychologists, but the first sin was completed in perfect surroundings--the garden of Eden. We are just like our first parents seeking our own good, delight, and wisdom--the essence of sin is selfishness.  We must look inward and blame ourselves for our shortcomings and failures, not play the blame game and point fingers--we must assume responsibility for our own sins--"the soul that sinneth shall die" (cf. Ezek. 18:4).

You could say that we are great sinners and totally depraved--not utterly depraved, since God restrains evil--though we are not as bad as we possibly could be, we are as bad off as possible.  Every element of our nature falls short and is tainted with sin, just like being a little pregnant, we cannot be a little sinful or depraved.  If sin were yellow, we'd be all yellow!  Our wills, hearts, bodies, and even intellect are stained by sin and only the blood of Jesus can cleanse us and make us clean enough to enter God's presence. It has been said by William Jay of Bath:  "I am a great sinner, but I have a great Savior." This is very humbling but also encouraging--no one is too far gone or too bad to be saved, but bad off enough to need salvation!

The catch-22 is, therefore, that we must see how bad we are to be good or repent, but we don't know how bad we are till we've tried to be good.  The terrible double whammy of sin is that it not only estranges and alienates us from God and others, but it enslaves and traps us and has power over us and the only freedom is to be set by Christ (cf. John 8:36).  Salvation is not only forgiveness of our sin but the power to overcome it and eventually deliverance from its presence.   We are not basically or inherently good, period, nor are we ever good enough to be saved; we are bad enough to need salvation!

There's just no escaping our birthright which is really a virus or disease that devours us and destroys us in the end apart from grace.  Sin becomes neutralized in effect for us when we make up pretty names for it and refuse to call a spade a spade--this is the mere escaping reality and not owning up to our sin as God sees it.   It is by grace that we get convicted of our sin, as Paul called himself the "chief of sinners" (cf. 1 Tim. 1:15) and John Bunyan wrote Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners. This should be encouraging because this means there's hope for everyone and no one is beyond the reach of God's grace!

The real, cold reality of sin is that we don't break God's laws, they break us, but we break God's heart in our sinning.  Just like you cannot get away with violating the laws of nature without consequence, it's likewise with God's divine laws of morality defining sin.   We can praise God that Jesus is the Answer to the sin problem:  as our Prophet, He frees us of our ignorance of it; as our Priest, He is the offering and releases us from the guilt of it; and as our King, He frees us from the power of it.

In closing, let me mention that Christians are still sinners in that they sin (cf. Gal. 2:17), but we are called "saints" because in God's eyes Christians are justified, as God is both just and the justifier of the unjust by virtue of His grace and mercy.  In His mercy we don't get what we deserve; in His grace, we get what we don't deserve!  It is a sad commentary on mankind that he grows callous to his sins and has the tendency to justify them whatever way possible to silence the conscience.  Caveat:  we must refrain from making up our own rules or standards of right and wrong as if we judge God; He judges us and is the sole moral center of the universe!    Soli Deo Gloria!

The Guilt Complex

"[B]y means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron" (1 Tim. 4:2, NASB).
"God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks to us in our consciences, but shouts to us in our pains; it's His megaphone to rouse a deaf world."--C. S. Lewis

Dr. Sigmund Freud relegated all guilt to suffering some form of "guilt complex" to be healed when he came into vogue.  He denied its reality.  People do suffer for doing wrong and condemn themselves, even if society doesn't.  You cannot convince a person who feels guilty that it is okay and he just has a complex.  It is good to have feelings of guilt and to feel bad because we become cognizant of wrongdoing--it is even therapeutic. Yes, guilt can be good for you and the development of your conscience.    Guilt is not a psychological disorder, but a real phenomenon and there is only one cure for it:  confession and restitution or reconciliation.  Wrongs must be made right and one must believe he is forgiven justly

Jesus does this by having the authority to cleanse us from all unrighteousness and to forgive us of all our sins.  A man may forgive you for what you trespassed against him, but Jesus can forgive all sins against everyone.  Guilt is no disorder to be cured nor a psychological phenomenon to be explained away but must be dealt with for a person to live in the real world of right and wrong.  It is entirely possible to feel guilty because they are guilty!  Just like we act human because there's such a thing as human nature.  Animals are not conscious nor responsible for wrong and will not be judged, but man will face Judgment Day (cf. Heb. 9:27) and having guilt only shows him he's got something to deal with before eternity.

The only way to live guilt-free is to have a relationship with Jesus and to have all your sins forgiven past, present, and future.  Moral relativism denies any absolute standards of right and wrong or universal truth, and people should make up their own values as they go along, basically according to whim.  Everyone has a conscience, and it can become muffled or ignored, but it's still there.  Even in prison, there's a prison code and convicts have a warped sense of right and wrong.  When we violate our own standards or even those we aspire to, we feel guilty and sense something wrong, no matter what terminology we use.  There is psychological guilt that is mean and cruel, but also God-given guilt that we must deal with.  It is not maladjustment, and no matter how you try to convince someone it's unreal, he knows it is and suffers as a result.  You cannot just explain away guilt psychologically!

Some guilt is unnecessary, of course, but that doesn't preclude the existence of genuine guilt.  Christianity is the only faith that deals decisively with this issue and solves it; for nothing but the blood of Jesus can wash away our stain and flaw of guilt.  We must not only be forgiven but have some cognizance of why and how it's accomplished righteously.  Only God can ultimately forgive one's sins.  We instinctively know that justice must be done, and God didn't sacrifice or compromise his justice in justifying us by His mercy and grace through the blood of His own Son.

The reason people deny guilt as real and only a psychological problem, or even illness, is that they deny absolute standards of right and wrong and our responsibility to live up to the universal moral order, and more specifically they adhere to the belief that nothing is our fault, but the blame should be placed on the evils of society--for we are all innocent and even victims. Our salvation is threefold according to the offices of Christ:  as our Prophet, Christ frees us from the ignorance of sin; as our Priest, from the guilt of sin; as our King, from the dominion of sin.

In the final analysis, a man can say he has forgiven you for the trespasses against him, but only God can forgive all trespasses and can solve the guilt problem and issue definitively and set a person free from it, mainly because God is both just and the justifier in the cross of Christ.  Remember:  there's nothing wrong with our nature or personality if we feel guilty as if it's a complex or flaw, but it's God-given to awaken our conscience and has therapeutic value to warn us and keep us on track and in line with God's will.     Soli Deo Gloria!

The Verdict: Guilty As Sin...

This doctrine is referred to as the doctrine of "total depravity" by Calvinists and is the first point in the acrostic known as TULIP.

In Latin you say mea culpa or I am to blame: put away the pointing of the finger and the blame game!   We cannot just blame Adam for our sins because, though we are culpable with Adam who stands as the head of our race, we all individually verified and confirm our status in the divine verdict and sinned, because we are born sinners. Psalm 51:4 says, "In sin did my mother conceive me." The theological maxim says: "We are not sinners because we sin, rather we sin because we are sinners." Billy Graham says, "we cannot escape our birthright." Original sin is the name given to the result of the first sin, not to the first sin per se. It is not environmental or societal that we sin but intrinsic to our very nature.  "We didn't cease to be human we ceased to be good," says R. C. Sproul.

 It is commonplace to assume that man is basically good (as humanists believe) but man is basically evil. And this nature permeates his makeup through and through. It is like being pregnant; you cannot be only a little pregnant. If man were basically good, why is sin so prevalent and so universal; wouldn't we see some sinless personages? If it's environmental, how did it get that way? The rub is that we are basically, intrinsically, inherently evil and no part of us escapes the corruption of sin and doesn't have a fallen nature. Our complete soul: intellect, affections, and volition. They say, "nobody's perfect" and "to err is human;" and this is a right diagnosis.

Sin is not peripheral or tangential to our nature but we are totally flawed (note that we are totally depraved, meaning every aspect of us is flawed, but not utterly depraved, meaning as bad as we can be)  by a sin nature, through and through.  We are not as bad as we can be, but as bad off as can be.  There is no sliding scale or grading on the curve even though the run-of-the-mill sinner looks like a saint compared to the likes of Nero or Hitler who are seen as paradigms of evil. Even though some never lose faith in the basic goodness of man, it is not man's estimation of man, but God's estimation of man that counts. We are radically corrupt and totally corrupt, but not utterly corrupt; we are as bad off as we can be but not as bad as we can be. We are degenerated and are degrading to the imago Dei that we have as icons of God. When we expose the dark side (like the moon--and everyone has a dark side) we see that God's diagnosis is correct and we are all found wanting on God's scale of justice.

There is a "catch-22": we don't know how bad we are till we have tried to be good, and we must try to be good to know how bad we are. We all have "feet of clay," says Chuck Swindoll (weak spots as well as our forte, or strong suit). We have gone from creation to corruption, from perfection to rejection. We cannot clean up our acts because Jesus sees through the veneer. Sin permeates the core of our soul and as Jeremiah says, "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked." We cannot do anything apart from Christ's power (John 15:5).

Those who are in flesh cannot please God (Rom. 8:8). "All our righteousness is as filthy rags (Isa. 64:6). We must be wooed by the Holy Spirit, we don't come to Christ all on our own--the Spirit draws us!  "No man can come to Me unless the Father grants it..." (John 6:44). "You were dead in trespasses and sin..." (Eph. 2:1). What can a dead man do to please God?  Soli Deo Gloria!

Whatever Became Of Sin?...

The man of few words President Calvin Coolidge was asked by his wife what the preacher preached about: "Sin" Then she asked him what he said: "I think he was against it." I'm not out to get anybody nor do I want a soapbox and I don't have an ax to grind; I simply think sin is not mentioned enough in the church today.

I heard that a renowned preacher doesn't preach on the "divisive" issue of "sin" allegedly because it is such a "killjoy" term. Today we hardly ever hear a preacher denounce sin or preach repentance. Sin doesn't exist in their jargon. Sin is a "taboo" word to some preachers who only want to preach what their church wants to hear. Eminent psychiatrist Dr. Karl Menninger, M.D. wrote a book called Whatever Became of Sin? as it is ignored in the therapy and since it is the root of all problems, it should be encountered. Famous philosopher Albert Camus wrote, "The absurd is sin without God." That means that if there is no God, there is no sin!

Actually, we are all sinners since sin is universal (we say "to err is human" and "nobody's perfect." Original sin is the result of that first sin in the so-called "perfect environment" of the garden of Eden. We must all see ourselves as sinners, even the worst of sinners to be saved: John Bunyan wrote, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners and Paul said that "Christ came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am chief." Even Isaiah said, "Woe is me, I am undone...."

Samuel Rutherford said, "The greater sense of sin the less sin." The more sanctified we become the more aware of our shortcomings we become. It is the job of the preacher to take a stand and denounce sin and to intercede corporately for the church. To become Christians we must "renounce" sin and repent of all known sin. We cannot escape our birthright, says Billy Graham, and have a sin nature and even though we are saints, says Martin Luther, we are at the same time sinners (cf. Gal. 12:17).  Sin is the disease and the cause of all problems.

Sin is lawlessness (1 John 3:4); transgression of the Law; iniquity or deviating from right; trespassing or egoism (putting self first); unbelief (Rom. 14:23--"Whatever is not of faith is sin.") All unrighteousness and wrongdoing is sin (1 John 5:17; Gal. 6:1). Any thought, word, deed, act, omission or desire contrary to the Law of God is a sin. Any want of conformity to or transgression of the moral law is a sin. Sins cannot be labeled "mortal and venial" like Romanists insist, because all sins are mortal in the sense that they separate us from God and no sin is mortal in that it can cut off your salvation. According to Psalm 19:12 there is "unknown sin:" We are responsible for what we know but that doesn't mean we aren't sinning unbeknownst to us. It is only because we have a mind and a will that we are capable of sin; animals cannot be sinners or immoral.

A ""run-of-the-mill sinner looks like a saint compared to Adolf Hitler but can still go to hell--it doesn't matter how deep the water is that we drown in. There are sins of omission like failing to love our brethren; this is falling short of the glory of God or missing the mark and failing to achieve the aim of hitting the diving target. Sins of commission are when God forbids something like lust and we go ahead and do it, willingly or unwillingly, presumptuously or ignorantly.

All sin is against God (David prays, "Against you and you only have I sinned," in Psalm 51:4). Sin can be against our neighbor also according to 1 Kings 8:46. When we sin against God we violate His holiness, when we sin against our fellow man we violate their humanity. When we sin we are not demonstrating our freedom but proving our slavery if we do something unprofitable--"All things are permissible, but not all things are profitable, all things are permissible but I will not be brought under the power of any." (Cf. 1 Cor. 6:12; 10:23). Not all sins are as heinous, or egregious but some are actually an abomination to the Lord and detestable in His sight. Just calling sin "weakness, faults, mistakes, quirks, peccadilloes, etc. is like labeling poison "Essence of Peppermint" and making it more dangerous.

James 4:17 says, "If you don't do what you know is right you have sinned." The only cure from antinomianism or legalism is a knowledge of the Scriptures: "For by the Law is the knowledge of sin (Indeed it is the straightedge of the Law that shows us how crooked we really are.)" We are all culpable before God and to ourselves and to our fellow man and God doesn't punish us for one another's sins (Ezek. 18:4 says, "The soul that sins shall die.") We can be glad that God doesn't deal with us according to our sins or punish us according to our iniquities (Psalm 103:10).

Finally, no matter how we have sinned God is greater and bigger than our failures: "Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow, though they be red as crimson, they shall be as wool" (Isa. 1:18).   NB:  Karl Menninger defined sin as the refusal of the love of others [and God].  Soli Deo Gloria!