Sin A Disease, Its Symptoms and Its Cure

One does not necessarily have to live very long to discover that there is something wrong with people. Some unfortunate children discover it all too soon, when parents, whom they had a right to expect to be always kind and loving, act unreasonably, lose their tempers and mistreat them. They will later discover that this ‘something wrong’ is not confined to their parents and family: in differing forms, and in greater or lesser degree, there is something wrong with everybody.History shows that this ‘something wrong’ has been endemic in international relationships in all ages without exception; and still today, in spite of huge, beneficial advancements in every kind of science and technology, it reveals itself in monstrously irrational behavior. If only the nations could trust each other and cooperate instead of competing in the development of the earth’s resources, they could turn the world into a paradise. Deserts could be made fruitful; poverty, famine, and epidemics eliminated; and everybody’s welfare and lifespan increased. But no, nations do not, and cannot, trust each other; and in consequence oceans of money, time, and energy are spent on ever more sophisticated weapons of destruction.

But it is not only nations that behave irrationally. We all do. You do, I do. Sooner or later, in spite of all our resolutions and good intentions, we have to admit, as Paul put it centuries ago, ‘For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing’ (Rom 7:19).

What then is wrong with us? What is this universal disease from which we all suffer? The ancient Greek tragedians, Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, studied its symptoms and tried to probe its causes. So did the ancient philosophers, and so do modern ones. And so have liter.ary giants from every continent. It is certain that we shall never truly understand ourselves or the world we live in unless we face this disease realistically. The Bible confidently and joyously insists that we can find continuing and increasing deliverance from it, and it calls this deliverance salvation. But we shall not grasp what salva.tion means, or how it works unless we first understand the biblical term for the disease.

That term is ‘sin’. To help us understand it, let us use the analogy of physical disease. Medical personnel must distinguish between the symptoms of the disease itself and the root cause of the disease. For if one is going to achieve a cure, it is no good just suppressing the symptoms without getting rid of the disease. And there is no hope of that unless one can attack the root-cause and eliminate it.

Take jaundice, for example, which, strictly speaking, is not a disease but an outward symptom of some internal disorder, such as gallstones, or a cancer of the pancreas, etc. Clearly, it would be no use trying to get rid of jaundice, if one did not get at the underlying cause.

Specific symptoms of sin

The New Testament gives us various lists of the symptoms of sin, and normally adds a warning about the gravity of these symptoms. Here is one list:

Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. (Gal 5:19–21)

Here is another, which gives a gruesome description of the symptoms that can occur when the disease of sin is in an advanced stage: as it is written: ‘None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.’

‘Their throat is an open grave; they use their tongues to deceive.’

‘The venom of asps is under their lips.’

‘Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.’

‘Their feet are swift to shed blood; in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have not known.’

‘There is no fear of God before their eyes.’ (Rom 3:10–18)

None of these lists implies, of course, that all the symp.toms are to be found in equal proportions in everybody. On the other hand, the New Testament insists that everybody shows some symptoms, for the disease is universal.

General symptoms of sin

Then there are what may be called more general symptoms. One of these is a moral weakness. ‘For while we were still weak. .’ (Rom 5:6).

As an example, we may take Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, who was responsible for the crucifixion of Jesus Christ (Matt 27:11–26; Luke 23:1–25; John 18:28–19:16). He was the last man you would have suspected of being weak. He was a high-ranking soldier, the officer in command of the Roman army in Judaea; and he was also responsible for law and order in the country.

Outwardly, Pilate was like a great beam of wood that on the surface looks solid and strong, but inside it has been eaten away by wood-worm; and when you put pressure on it, it collapses.

When he talked with Jesus in private and became aware of the reality of God and of the enormous sin it would be if he crucified the innocent Son of God, he decided he must do what he knew to be right and release Jesus (John 19:8–12). But when he went outside, the crowd shouted menacingly and their leaders blackmailed him, threatening to slander him to the Roman emperor. And Pilate caved in. Though he knew that what he was about to do was a criminal betrayal of justice, fear destroyed his resistance and out of fear he sentenced Jesus to be crucified.

This leads us to ask: have we never told a lie out of fear of what the consequences would be if we told the truth? Have we never done something that we knew to be wrong, because the group to which we belonged insisted on doing it, and we were afraid to stand against the group?

Another general symptom of sin is ungodliness:

Understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine, in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted. (1 Tim 1:9–11)

The original Greek word here translated ‘ungodly’ means ‘people who have no respect or reverence’. The one for whom they have no respect or reverence is, in the first place, God. But it does not stop there. Man is made in the image of God; and when people lose respect and rever.ence for the Creator, they begin to devalue his creature, man. They lose respect for the sanctity of the human body—their own and other people’s. This spawns the large and ugly brood of sexual sins, abuse of alcohol and drugs which injure the physical health and enfeeble the mind. They lose respect for the sanctity of truth. Hence all kinds of lies, deceptions, and broken promises. In the end, they lose respect for the sanctity of life. Hence the endless crimes of violence.

Alienation and Enmity against God is another symptom: ‘the mind of the flesh is enmity against God’ (Rom 8:7); ‘and you, being in time past alienated and enemies in your mind in your evil works’ (Col 1:21 ).

Large-scale examples of this particular symptom have been all too evident throughout the past century and right up to the present day. The governments in many countries have used all their power in an attempt to systematically blot out all belief in God and Christ. But enmity against God is not confined to outright atheists. Sometimes, even outwardly religious people can at heart be enemies of God. The Christian apostle, Paul, was always very religious; but he was a bitter enemy of Jesus Christ before he was converted (1 Tim 1:12–17).

The fact is that there is a rebel against God in the heart of every one of us. When God commands us in the Bible to do something or not to do something, his very command often stirs up resentment inside us and makes us want to do the very opposite. The Apostle Paul cites an example from his own experience (Rom 7:5, 7–9). For some years he lived unaware of God’s commandment ‘You shall not covet’. But then God brought this command home to his heart; and Paul found that this very commandment stirred up all kinds of coveting in his heart that, struggle as he might, he could not control—and what is more, deep down within him, did not altogether want to control.

Of course, this basic enmity against God does not necessarily, or often, express itself as open hostility to God. More often it takes the form of indifference.

Now if someone says, ‘I’m just not interested in music or art’, we may think it is a pity; but we do not get upset about it, for it is only a matter of taste. But if a woman says ‘I’m just not interested in my husband’, it is tragic; for it is clear evidence that she is alienated from her hus.band. Love has been destroyed. And if someone says, ‘I’m just not interested in God’, this is supremely tragic. We owe our very existence to God. Not to be interested in him is an unmistakable symptom that, somewhere along the line, serious alienation from God has taken place.

These, then, are some of the symptoms. But the underlying disease involves a desire to be independent of God our Creator. According to the Bible (Gen 3), the very first sin which mankind committed was not something crude and lurid like murder or immorality. It occurred when Adam and Eve were tempted by the devil to grasp at the independence of God so as to decide by themselves what was good and what was evil. They imagined that they could safely be their own god. So they took the forbidden fruit. It led at once to alienation from God and a sense of guilt and shame which made them want to run away and hide from God, whom they now felt to be against them. We have all followed them down that path of disobedience and independence. But to live like that is to live an untruth, an unreality. We did not create ourselves. We are creatures of God. To live alienated and independent of him is contrary to the fundamental law of our existence.

And so the New Testament says that sin is lawlessness:

Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. (1 John 3:4) Now we know what dangers we would run if we dis.regarded the Creator’s physical laws, like, for example, the laws of electricity. Suppose a man buys an electric light but makes no attempt to read or follow the manufactur.er’s instructions. He wires it up as he himself thinks best. As a result, he electrocutes himself. We should scarcely pity him: we should call him a fool for neglecting the maker’s instructions and taking no notice of the laws of electricity. Similarly, fundamental neglect of, and disobedience to, the Creator’s moral and spiritual laws must lead to moral and spiritual disaster. It is the root cause of all sin’s many symptoms.

The remarkable thing is that, according to the Bible, there is a cure. ‘The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners’ (1 Tim 1:15). ‘For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.’ (John 3:17). The following chapters, therefore, will study the terms which the New Testament uses to describe this salvation and how it works.

But there are two things we should notice at once. Many people think that the way to be saved is to do our best to cut out the symptoms of sin in our lives. That is a good enough thing in itself to do, but it cannot save us. You may cut every apple off an apple tree, but the tree is still an apple tree. That is its inward nature. So even if we could suppress every symptom of sin, we should still have a sinful nature within us. And that, says the New Testament, is not our fault. We were born that way. We inherited a fallen sinful nature from our first parent, Adam. But in a similar way we can, if we will receive from Christ his unfallen, holy life, the nature of which is to live a life pleasing to God. ‘For through one man’s [Adam’s] disobedience the many were made sinners, so through the obedience of the one [Christ] shall the many be made righteous’ (Rom 5:19 own trans.).

And the second thing to notice is this: God loves us while we are still sinners. This is the secret why God’s sal.vation is so practical and actually works. We do not have to improve ourselves before God is prepared to accept us and begin his great work of salvation within us. He loves us and is prepared to accept us as we are. This is the burden of the argument in Romans 5:6–11, a passage any person who is serious about the problem of sin should think through rigorously.

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