I received the following email response to my last post (posted with author’s permission):

Isn’t sin only defined by God?  We can only ‘sin’ against God, right?   Can we sin against one another?  In that context, then sin IS sin.  And to God, there is only one difference in all sin.  It seems to me that in Mathew, Jesus is talking about the greatest sin of all and the only one from which one cannot be redeemed…not accepting Him as Christ and Lord.

Yes, as Christ followers, I do think we will be judged for our failures to be ‘good’ (James 4:19), but these sins are heart issues.  Somehow, God looks upon heart issues differently than head issues.  (the head chooses not to be a Christ follower – the heart is unable to fulfill the completeness of being a Christ follower).  The heart issues somehow go back to the Garden.  Our inherent sin is against God and only God.  When we are made complete in our salvation, we will be able to live as we want to live now, but are unable to.

As humans, we are called to be ‘fruit inspectors’.  Lack of fruit from you is not a sin against me.

Hello again, folks.  This is my first non-video post, and it’s in direct response to an email I received regarding my Feb 1 post on unknown sin.  (Oh, and forgive my extensive absence.  There’s plenty more TOBG to come soon.)

When I first read the email below, I was concerned that I had not been clear on a few points.  In reviewing my original post, I believe I was not unsound, but it may have been possible to take away an unclear image.  Also, there is the very real possibility that you may simply disagree with my conclusions.  This is totally cool with me.  I hope you enjoy what I write, but never take it as face-value gospel.  I am but a fallen and fallible man, saved by the grace of God through Christ.  Now, to respond:

Isn’t sin only defined by God?

Well, maybe (fair warning: I’m going around a BIG bend before I actually answer this question).  I have split the hair of defining sin and sins as two different things.  Sin is the concept of ‘conduct unbecoming’, and every sin falls under sin by definition (hence: sin is sin).  The word sins identifies that there are various different acts.  I may commit adultry, but I may not steal.  The sheer fact that we can logically understand the difference says that sins are not all the same.  Otherwise we would just have the ONE commandment “Thou shalt not sin” as opposed to a small laundry list of commandments delineating different varied sins.

Now, in all fairness, when pertaining to the Law as defined in the Torah, James (whom we believe to be the brother of Jesus) had this to say:

James 2:10 – For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.

This actually reinforces the sin is sin concept.  Still, if you read starting from Leviticus 4 (which starts with unintentional sin — my original topic), you will read a litany of “If someone does X, then he is guilty and must do Y.”  If sin is sin in every way possible, then no matter what X is, Y should always be the same.  Yet in the very Law of God as written in the Torah, different transgressions require a different type of atonement. 

My point is well defended.  Sin may be sin, but sins are not sins. Or better put: not all sins are equal in every way.

Now, is sin only defined by God?  I’m not so sure.  It is very possible that Jesus, himself, provides the directive that the church has the power to define sin on some matters.  I genuinely believe that the point I’m about to defend directly relates to the eternal wisdom of Jesus, who knew that the church would eventually encounter situations that the contemporary authors of his time were not even capable of conceiving.

Proof?  Here you go.  First of all, Paul, starting in Romans 14:14, outlines that some things that are not sin in God’s eyes can be sin based solely upon human perception.  It’s right there in the Word, especially in Romans 14:22-23.

Another interesting reference is when Jesus gives Peter the keys to the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 16:17-20), and again to the disciples at large (Matt. 18:18).  He clearly states that “whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”  Now, I’ve heard numerous explanations to this verse, and a quick Google of it will provide you with many interpretations.  The most profound one to me, though, comes from Professor Richard Beck of Abilene Christian University.  You must read the whole post, called Binding, Loosing, and the Human Experience to gain a complete context, but here is a nice inflammatory excerpt:

My point is that, in each time and place, the goal of the church is to achieve a moral reading of Scripture. We should not simply READ scripture. We must, rather, aim for a CERTAIN KIND OF READING, a MORAL reading in light of the human experience of suffering and pain.

And I believe Jesus justifies this attempt. In the gospel of Matthew, Jesus gives the Keys of the Kingdom to the church, to humanity, to “bind and loose.” That is, the church must discern, in unique times and places, what is moral and what is not. In light of human experience, the church must “bind” currently permitted behavior that is now experienced as “unjust.” Further, she must “loosen” old restrictions deemed to be unjust. We have seen this “binding and loosing” already. The church now “binds” slavery and has begun to “loose” women. And what is critical is that these bindings and loosings on Earth are bound and loosed “in Heaven.”

In short, the traffic of “divine commands” is not a One-Way street: From Heaven to Earth. Jesus clearly states that the traffic is Two-Way. That commands on Earth will be obeyed in Heaven as well.

To conclude, Heaven and Earth are in a most profound conversation about what is just and good.

And sometimes it is Heaven that changes.

We can only ‘sin’ against God, right?   Can we sin against one another?

I think this question is clearly and concisely answered by Jesus, himself (Matthew 18:15-17):

If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.

We can quite clearly sin against one another.  This is also supported by Torah law (i.e., Exodus 22) as it discusses atonement and compensation for transgressions between men.  Now, to be fair, I don’t think you can sin against a brother and yet not sin against God at the same time.  This, however, would be a topic for another post.

To be fair, though, I would like to also post further comment by my correspondent in regard to sin that is a supremely relevant part of breaking down the Word:

Perhaps (and I suspect this is truer than we may think) it is largely a translation issue.  I am pretty sure that there is only one word in the Greek for ‘sin’.  Given that, sin could be like those English words we misuse…example; love.  I love peanut butter.  I love the Beatles.  I love Jesus.  Admittedly, I don’t understand it, but my gut is that sin as referred to by Jesus and our ability to ‘sin’ against one another could and should be translated differently.  Perhaps as we read in Mathew 6:12 (Lord’s Prayer) the word should be ‘debt’ or ‘transgressions’. 

I have no problem with believing that sin as an act against a brother (a horizontal sin, say) is in an entirely different class of sin as a sin against God (ye olde vertical sin), and can even be treated differently.  This, however, also gets tied to my conversation of whether you can ever sin against one without the other.

The phrase ‘lack of fruit’, though, is quite an open-ended phrase that could encompass any number of acts or omissions.  Thus, I then do believe it is possible, somehow, that a ‘lack of fruit’ from me might possibly end up with being a sin against a brother.  Especially if my ‘lack of fruit’ leads him to believe I am at fault and he feels the need to show this to me.

MY POINT IS THUS

I do not in any way intend to invalidate the sin is sin concept, or any other basic understanding of self-examination.  I think every element presented in the email conversation above has some validity as we discuss our journey in this life.  I also believe though, that to say ’sin is sin’ is not the end of the discussion on sin, but the beginning, and that the idea of ‘unknown’ or ‘unintentional’ sin against God is reflective of our permanent and perpetual need to seek the face of God and apply what we learn in our self-examination.

Peace.