I was once a Sinner - and I still Am!

Yep, me too.

As an aside, too often on the board, people take statements out of context, apply their own twist to those statements, and the meaning ends up being something completely different from the original post. Too bad.

 

For perspective;
A careful reading and study and understanding of Romans 7-8 would reveal the solution to the dilema.
In essence Paul is telling us that; as new creatures in Christ, we no longer serve sin. We are made FREE from sin. The evil that we do is no longer 'I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me'.
I, that is, the renewed man, no longer sins for the Spirit of God dwells within me. The sin which I now do is that principle of sin which dwells in my MEMBERS. That is my flesh. No man in the flesh can please God. Only by 'mortifying' the works of the flesh and being led by the Spirit can we hope to make the claim that we are no longer 'sinners' but NOW we are saints of God. Present tense.
That assertion that we are NOW sinners, yet at the same time saints, flies in the face of God's revelation as to WHO we are in Christ. We are NOW and forever, saints of God.
For you also know that no sinner has eternal life.
"For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the ddeds of the BODY, ye shall live." (emphasis in caps are mine)
Jim

 

i do not see a need to apologize to you, my post remain fair. however i do not hold any ill feelings toward you . in fact much of you postings i can agree with, your views on Gods sovereignty and mine are similar, but using condescending methods to paint a picture of some Christians as not abiding in your methods for some type of sensitivity training on how to respond to those in certain lifestyle choices is not fair, and to imply that some christians are in error simply because they do not develop or read sites that affirm your position with psychological excuses. you are very effective of making cases that are unfair especially when a person wants to clear up a biblical point that you refer to them as baiting. i use a lot of restraint to over look many posters that i disagree with, just to avoid serious conflict.

 

Very well put! Thank you.

 

We are in the words of Martin Luther simul iustus et peccator -- at the same time just and sinner.

It is not orthodoxy to say we are one and not the other. To say that is to take on dualism. That's the problem with the statement that we are, as a state of being, saint ONLY, and not sinner also.

The designation "saint," is a LEGAL standing, that has not yet been made complete. As long as a person is in this life, he has a second principle at work in him, "sarx," or "flesh," from which "sin" comes. For that reason, he continues as a sinner also. We lose the designation "sinner" only as a legal STANDING. We do not lose that designation as a practical STATE (or status, the term can vary).

Just as Jesus was the God-man, so the sinner is the saint-sinner. Unlike Jesus, who is forever the God-man, the saint-sinner will one day be "saint" only.

It's funny, the one of the persons that complained about this in the other thread told JohnV to take "soteriology." Well, folks, this is what Christian soteriology teaches and has always been considered orthodoxy across the evangelical spectrum.

 

"Yes, I am."
"No, I'm not."
"Yes, I am."
"No, I'm not."
"Yes, I am."
"No, I'm not."
"Yes, I am."
"No, I'm not."

The original question was, "...is the title "sinner" appropriate for me?".

The answer is, "No." The appropriate title is Saint. Is this always reflected in behavior? Of course not. Saints sometimes sin and sinners sometimes "saint". As a descriptive term the word sinner is quite frequently approprioate for me (waaaaay more often than it should be). It is like "saved" and "lost" each can act like the other but, you are either one or the other. It isn't what you do but who you are.

 

Thank you Lady Eagle.
Some folks here often misinterpret my brashness and boldness to be somehow unchristian. I guess my years of preaching in prison, as well as LIVING there for some years, comes out on these boards as being unchristian and tends to turn the less tough skinned off.
I am of the school which believes that you tell it like it is. Let your communication be with grace seasoned with salt. Unless I am mistaken, isn't salt abrasive? Doesn't salt sting when applied to raw flesh? Yet too much salt does irrate (oops! irritate).
On the other hand, too much grace ultimately leads to compromise. (as in approval for the sake of showing kindness when the situation merits otherwise).
My apologies.
Jim

 

Jim, salt (as used in the biblical alanoyl) is supposed to add flavor, not abrasiveness (that would be an example of using too much salt).

Artimaeus, I agree that the title of a Christian is a saint. But we're not talking titles here. We're talking whether a person who is saved is still a sinner. I say yes, because the sinful nature goes hand-in-hand with the flesh. And we're flesh until we die. Once we die, we're truly no longer sinners, yet we keep our saint nature.

 

Thank you Johnv;
And to think, all this time I have been adding salt to my french fries just to smooth out the edges!
Jim

 

Whoa now, when it comes to fries, all bets are off. The more salt, the merrier!!!

 

Nobody has said you are unChristian.

I am merely doing that which an objecting party said needs to be done. I am sorry that my systematic theology from both college (and some from seminary too) do not fully reflect your preference as a title for the Christian to adopt.

I did not say that "saint" is inappropriate as a title. I said that orthodoxy says that the most appropriate title is saint-sinner.

We refer to Jesus as God the Son or the Son of God. However He was simultaneously the Son of Man. He was the God-man, without being dualistic (eg. two separate persons). He was dualistic in the sense of having two distinct natures, fully God-fully man.

The Incarnation is the model on which the saint-sinner designation is built. Orthodoxy would say that to deny the "sinner" designation is a slight to the Incarnation from a certain perspective, because it is that Incarnation on which this doctrine stands or falls.

Jesus was ONE person with TWO natures. We are ONE person with TWO natures. He was both God and man. In the same way the Christian is both saint and sinner.

It is not inappropriate to take on the title sinner, as long as one does not deprecate the title saint. It is not inappropriate to take on the title saint as long as one does not deprecate the title sinner.

Was Jesus God? Yes. Was Jesus man? Yes. Are we saints? Yes. Are we sinners? Yes. Is this unScriptural, no.

Just as Jesus was the God-man, so the sinner is the saint-sinner. Unlike Jesus, who is forever the God-man, the saint-sinner will one day be "saint" only. If we were saints only, we would have no capacity to sin. This is manifestly true, as Paul also writes about the war in his own members between that which wishes to do right and that which desires to do wrong and how so often that got the best of him.

Then he says, "Thanks be to God, for there is now no condemnation in Christ Jesus," which later culminates in Romans 8 in his discourse about nothing being able to separate us from the love of Christ.

Unlike the unbeliever who is a slave to sin and continues to sin and IN sin, the believer is set free from the law of sin and death, declared not-guilty (expiation) and the righteousness of Christ is imputed to him in the new birth. This is done of the basis of Christ's propitiation (atoning sacrifice) (1 Jn. 2:2). These are LEGAL standing...thus "no condemnation."

What makes the difference is that unbelievers sin practically (the continue to sin), and they also continue in sin (as a matter of legal standing as well as nature). The believer is not two persons or two separate minds, he is one person with one mind with two principles in it. He is, in that sense both saint and sinner at the same time. We are new creations, saints. However that new creation has within it at work, two principles or mindsets (not two separate minds), the fleshly mind/man and the spiritual mind/man. Thus we are both saint and sinner simultaneously. We do not continue IN sin, but we continue TO sin. If we sin, we are sinners; likewise we sin because we are sinners.

We are not holy, we are being made holy. Saints ALoNE would be holy ALONE. In the same way, we are not holy, so we are not saints. However, in the same way the righteousness of Christ has been imputed to us, we are righteous. If however, we do unrighteous things, we show that unrighteousness is at work in us. If we were righteous ALONE that could not be the case. However, righteous DOES show itself at work in us. Therefore, it must be that we are both righteous and unrightous simultaneously.

Here is what James P. Boyce founder of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary wrote:

"But, not only regeneration, but justification also, must precede sanctification. Yet certainly not for the same reasons; for regeneration is, like sanctification, a change in nature, and character; and justification a change only in relation to the law. There is, therefore, no such natural connection of sanctification with justification as there is with regeneration. Nor is there anything meritorious in the position of a justified person."

In other words, justification is a change of standing ONLY with regard to the law. Regeneration is a change of nature. It is that which enables the unregenerate person to have saving faith. Justification does not enable sanctification. Regeneration enables a person to love and pursue holiness, but it does not MAKE a person holy or loving.

On sanctification he writes:

"It is a personal sanctification. It is accomplished in each individual personally, and not in that of a common representative as is the righteousness which justifies.

"It is a real sanctification, not merely one that is imputed, as is righteousness. Holiness is not merely "accounted to men," so that they are treated as though holy, but they are made holy. Holiness becomes the characteristic of their natures. It is habitually exercised in their lives. It will eventually be possessed in perfection. It is real and in no sense only virtual."

In other words, it is a real process not an abstract standing in relation to the law. We are not holy as a matter of standing. We are being made holy as a matter of process. We are saints, but we are also sinners. Unlike sinners that are unregenerate, we are sinners who have been regenerated. We are on one hand saints as a matter of imputation, we are, on the other sinners as a matter of practical living. Unlike the sinner for whom it is not possible not to sin, we have within us that possibility. (If we are truly saved, that possibility will become a reality in an ongoing mannner).

"Christians are not presented in the New Testament as completely pure and holy, but, on the contrary, the very best of them acknowledge the existence of sinful tendencies, and pronounce any idea of freedom from the presence of sin to be a delusion. The faults of good men, such as Peter, James and John, and Thomas, and Paul and Barnabas (Acts 15:37-40) are especially mentioned, and John who declares that "whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not" (1 John 5:18) is the very apostle who, in a previous part of that very same epistle, teaches that "if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." 1 John 1:8. Paul constantly speaks of himself as still struggling against the power of sin, as not counting himself to have attained, as buffeting his body and bringing it into bondage lest he should be rejected, and thus he gives us, in his descriptions of his own experience, a pattern of what has been almost universally acknowledged as that of every other Christian."


We are saints, and we are referred to in such a manner in the New Testament. However, we are also sinners, and we are referred to in such a manner in the New Testament. We are "just and sinner simultaneously." We are not "either / or."

It is not unScriptural to say these things. It is what has been handed down to us through Scripture, through the Reformation, and now through our own teachers in this day. To appeal to tradition is not bad. We can see far on the shoulders of such men as Luther, Edwards, Boice, Boyce, and Broadus. Let us consider what they have said.

 

Oh, but Johnv, you said:

"Jim, salt (as used in the biblical alanoyl) is supposed to add flavor, not abrasiveness (that would be an example of using too much salt)."

We disagree once again. Abrasiveness can be a good thing like when we put salt on the ice to create an abrasive surface so we will not slip and fall, LOL.

To the sinner, ANY amount of salt might seem abrasive.

Hmmm...nice topic for a thread.

My bone to pick with you is that YOU are the one who started this whole "sinner" thing.

You made the statement that all the people on the BB are sinners. And that is where I and others disagree, as noted above. However, if you had made the statement that all the people on the BB sin, I would have agreed with you. You see.

 

Rather than making it personal, LadyEagle, why not let's consider what Boyce and Luther have said.


Are we saints ONLY? Are we sinners ONLY?

Are we "either/or" or "both / and?"

 

Why consider Luther? He hated Jews. And baptized infants.

 

This statement is just to general to be affirmed of denied IMO.

It needs to be qualified: The implication is that “ I was once a sinner, now I am saved and I am still a sinner”.

John 8:34
Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin.

1 John 3:9
Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.

A child of God (born of the Spirit) does not “commit” sin.
The participle use of “commit sin” means a state of being in bondage to sin.
Sin for the Christian arises from the old man or the flesh and not the spirit within him/her born of God.

But he/she as a person may have “sin” or “sins” (different than) “commiting” sin.

1 John 1:8
If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.

This has a remedy for the child of God

If we confess (present tense) our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

So once I was in bondage to sin, now that I am saved I am free from this bondage though I still sin.

My opinion.

HankD

 

That post speaks for itself, I should think.

Are all paedobaptists not to be considered? That excises the grand majority of Christian Protestants.

Luther had his faults, but He also was the man God used to start the Protestant Reformation. I am unwilling to set aside everything he wrote in order to suit my own theological preferences.

To say we should not consider what someone has said on the basis of their faults is to commit the genetic fallacy of argumentation. It also qualifies as "poisoning the well." Please refrain from attacking the character of others, particularly men of God who are not here to defend themselves. That's just tacky. I'm sure if we went on a fact finding mission in our own lives, we would find plenty of faults.

Please let's stick to the topic. Are we "either/or" or "both/and?"

 

Oh, blah, blah. Read Luther all you want to. This is a Baptist Board. Already stated my case and so have others. Let's stick to Scripture and not man's interpretations, shall we?

 

This is not a Baptist issue either. It's an issue of interpretation (without regard to denominational affiliation).

I've stuck to scripture when I said that a saved person is still a sinner, though he is a saint.

No need to get snotty.

 

I don't think she was snotty at all. Impatient, maybe. Not snotty.
I do, however, agree with her.
Luther, Boyce, Boice, or Captain Kangaroo. They are NOT authoritative.
The Scriptures are on the other hand.
So let's stick to them and discuss the issue on the merits of Scripture, not what some long ago dead guy says. I really don't give a hoot what some feller in some removed from reality seminary or college or school for fattening heads said. I think much learning has made some full of themselves.
Oops! There I go getting impatient. I so belly belly solly.

By the way; though this MAY be an issue for other denoms as well as baptists, still this IS a Baptist board.
Jim

 

No snot, just a "well poisoner." Another personal attack on me, another implied assassination of my character, another blah, blah, blah instead of sticking to the issues. I admit. I was baited. I never should have answered when the question was posed to me "Rather than making it personal, LadyEagle, why not let's consider what Boyce and Luther have said."

I will avoid Gene and his personal criticisms of me like the bubonic plague from now on. Obviously it is impossible to have any sort of discussion without receiving personal attacks just because I don't believe in the agenda he wants to push. That being said, over and out.