I understand that we are all born with a sinful nature because of Adam but there is one thing that nags me in the back of my mind which is the amount of power Adam had to cause the entire human race to fall. But God has his reason which I may never know.
Adam doesn't 'cause' us to sin. He didn't 'invent' sin. The opportunity to sin was always there. Adam just 'actualized' it. He made it a historic fact in a sense. Dr. Geisler said that no matter who was the first man, they would've done the same. Sin isn't a 'force' that Adam brought into existence, it's the necessary result of not following the will of God.
Charles Howell I have been taught that what Adam did affected all his descendants nature thus we are all born inherently evil and will sin. That has always sounded unreasonable to me and doesn't seem to line up with scripture. Clearly when Adam rebelled he opened the floodgate and let evil in to disrupt God's perfect creation. In order for each person to be held accountable for their sin they have to have the ability to decide to do it or not in the first place. I believe this is how babies can be innocent. I still have to wonder why every single human sins if they have a choice not to. If we are that bent on sinning I have to wonder how are we every going to be completely sanctified? I guess that is a mystery.
***** Sin is not a sickness or a disease. It is falling short of keeping God's law. What sort of sins do infants commit? Please explain to me how they make the conscious moral decision to disobey God?
***** Not that I am trying to argue but I don't understand how we can be held morally responsible for something that we have no control over. How can we be born evil with sin already being held against us if we have not committed it? That just doesn't make any sense. Plus, the bible says that the father's sins can't be held against the son or vica verse (Ezekiel 18:20) so we know that we couldn't have inherited Adam's guilt so you can't be correct on that. I am not stating Pelagianism because clearly it's flawed because we all have the tendency to give into our selfish nature at some point for some reason so we all sin and once we do that we are in bondage and the bible is clear that we can't escape that bondage without God's help. I just don't why everyone sins. I guess it just is what it is. We will learn more in eternity because we will have plenty of time to understand things better.
***** You did a marvelous job explaining! Wow. Thank you for taking the time to write it all out. I especially like the way that you pointed out that we are all so reliant on God's grace. I like that we can reflect on these things together. For me, that's one of the things I love most about being a part of the body of believers. I understand how Adam messed things up and that someone would have done so eventually if he had not. I see in scripture that we inherited death but I believe this is talking about physical death, not spiritual death because that can only come by breaking God's law and I don't believe we can do that until we are able to make a moral choice which takes the ability to reason and infants are not able to do that. There is nothing in scripture that suggests that are born evil. It says that every one sins which takes a voluntary action. I scoured the scriptures to try to find anything that might suggest that we are born with sin/spiritually dead and I can't find anything. From what I understand, the idea of original sin didn't come about in the church until much later. I believe the reason there is a problem with Pelagianism is that he claimed that we don't need a savior which is not scriptural because the bible is very clear that we all do need one and that there is only one that can do the job which is Jesus Christ. I'm with you when you say we know that God is not the author of sin. There is no way around this if one believes in a God that is in total control of everything because we can't have a God that is in total control and at the same times gives someone else control, even if it's only limited control.
Let us examime the bible, how may sins did Adam commit, according to my bible One, Psalm 51, is David's peitential Psalm not the whole human race, He does not say all men and women were born in sin and shaped in iniquity , but I was born in sin and shapter in iniquity, Paul says in Romans chapter 7v9, I was alive alive without the Law once, but when the commandment came sin revived and I died, in Ephesians chapter 2v3, He says dead in plural , tresspasses and in sins. No Christian disputes that all have sinned , the whole bible witness to this fact, and this fact means that all men and womaen are culpable for the crimes, and can be righteieously judged ifor them, but babies are nor born sinners and destined for the lake of fire for Adam's sin, this doctrine is a monterous lie
Geisler has published good material and not so good ones such as his book "Chosen but Free" which grossly misrepresents Reformed Theology. If you want to read that book read it along with James R White's book "The Potter's Freedom"
I loved "Chosen but Free". I found it to be very accurate to the belief of those who call themselves Calvinists. Actually, Dr.Geisler's statements are the same exact arguments that other Christian Apologist makes in their books. Dr.Flowers who was a die-hard Calvinist makes the same arguments against Calvinist that Geisler does in "A Potters Choice." It seems whenever someone makes the arguments that expose the non-biblical teachings of Calvinism, the Reformists will always say that you are misrepresenting the reformed doctrines. Again "Chosen but Free" was a very accurate and detailed view of both the Calvinist and the Arminian doctrine.
Depends on what's important to you. You would hang on every word if your life dependent on it. You don't appreciate it because you don't understand the application and its importance. Hope you learn as you seek God's truth.
