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| Volume 20 Number 9 September 2018 | Page 5 |
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| Volume 20 Number 9 September 2018 | Page 5 |
T. Pierce Brown
This morning as I was passing through the living room, I heard a few minutes of a talk show in which the guest taught that man has a natural inclination to sin. In my judgment, there are thousands in the church who believe the same thing, but they would be startled to know that they believe in John Calvin’s theory, rather than what the Bible teaches. One of my dearest Bible teachers of more than 50 years ago said, “Surely, if it can be put into human speech, here is a man handicapped with a radical defect in nature, yea, an inherent evil tendency in his flesh.” He taught that the “law of sin which dwelleth in my members” is “a power, which is impregnably entrenched in human nature.”
He quoted several passages, such as Ephesians 2:3, which says, “and were by nature the children of wrath, even as the rest.” I pointed out to him what I think he already knew--that “phusis” (translated “nature”) means, “a mode of feeling and acting which by long habit has become nature” (Thayer 660). It has nothing at all to do with how one was born or what one’s inherent qualities are.
However, he was so filled with the idea that man has a “fallen nature” and just “naturally” inclined to evil that it seemed to him every passage we would read dealing with man’s depravity and sinfulness led him to conclude that it taught the hereditary depravity of man. Romans 5:12 says, “Therefore, as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin; so death passed unto all men, for that all sinned.” To him and thousands of others, it apparently means, as I recall him saying it, “Adam, as federal head of the human race, passed the deadly virus of sin on to his posterity.” “Whatever change Adam’s nature sustained in his fall was transmitted to Seth.”
Paul said in 1 Corinthians 15:22, “For as in Adam, all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.” That, he inferred, meant that all of Adam’s descendants have “a fallen nature,” which just “naturally inclines” him to do evil. Do you believe that man is “naturally inclined” to do evil? If so, was he born that way, or did he develop that “natural inclination” in some fashion?
I have denied for more than half a century that man was born with a “natural inclination” to do evil, and I have been asking a question to those who take that position for which I have received no satisfactory answer. That is: Can you show me from the Bible or even from your own experience any proof that a child is born with any greater “inherent tendency” to do wrong than Adam was before the fall?
My beloved teacher said that a baby is inherently selfish. He cries when he wants something that he does not have, and he is not bothered that it does not belong to him, or that he disturbs others in the process. To him, this was an indication of his “inherent sinful nature.” But I asked him, “Did Adam and Eve want the forbidden fruit and demonstrate the same qualities that you call ‘inherent selfishness’ before the fall? Did they have the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes before the fall?” He admitted that they did. Yet, if Adam and Eve wanted something they did not have, desired that which was forbidden to them and it was sinful to want what they were not supposed to have, they were created sinful and actually sinned before they took the fruit.
It is my judgment that my Bible teacher, though a teacher of the Bible for 60 years and a student of David Lipscomb himself, made the mistake that millions of others have made. He failed to adequately distinguish between the desire to gratify self that God placed in mankind, which is not wrong, and “selfishness,” which may be defined as “exclusive regard for one’s own interest with a consciousness that it may either deprive another of what is rightfully his or disobey God.” It may be that self-interest is a “natural thing” and altruism is a “spiritual” one, but self-interest is not sinful. It is a part of man’s nature. Adam did not get it after the fall, but he was created that way.
Notice carefully: Adam and Eve had the desire to gratify self before the fall! God made them that way, but when that desire became selfishness and they yielded to the temptation of Satan, they sinned. My point is: You and I become sinners exactly the same way they did! My conviction is that the Bible teaches that we are born with exactly the same nature with which Adam and Eve were created. We developed the “fallen nature” in exactly the same way they did—by responding to the devil’s temptation, not by inheritance.
Solomon said in Ecclesiastes 7:29, “Behold, this only have I found: that God made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions.” As far as I have been able to determine, no theologian or any of my Bible teachers who believed the theory that man inherited his sinful nature from Adam have been able to sensibly answer these two questions: 1. If a person can inherit his “fallen nature” from his parents, can he have parents who have become “partakers of the Divine nature” (2 Peter 1:4) and inherit that? If not, why not? 2. God, the Father of our spirits, gave the spirit and formed the spirit in man. Do we inherit the nature of our Father or Adam’s nature when we are born?
It is my judgment that many more of us than are aware of it have swallowed a lot of denominational “junk food” along with the Bread of Life. If you can understand why an alcoholic can get drunk when he did not mean to, because it is “just his nature to do that” without assuming that he got his alcoholic nature from Adam, you can probably understand my viewpoint.
If any brother thinks I have mishandled God’s teaching on the “inherent evil tendency” with which man is supposedly born, I would appreciate him taking the trouble to enlighten me. As you try to do that, answer such questions as, “Just because mankind was presumably created with a sex drive, does that mean that he was born with the natural tendency to commit adultery? Because mankind was born with a natural tendency to eat, does that mean he was born with a natural tendency to be a glutton? What natural fleshly desire is sinful or indicates a sinful nature?”
Chuck Taylor
Micaiah the prophet spoke his famous words in 1 Kings 22:14, “As the Lord lives, whatever the Lord says to me, that will I speak.” There is always a temptation to speak what the crowd wants spoken. Fear of physical persecution is always present; however, we have been commanded by the Almighty to say those things that are written in His word.
It is true that stepping on toes can exact a price from those who proclaim the Word, but this is the price of being God’s man. Recently, I spoke of Jeremiah and his challenge as he performed the duties of God’s messenger. In Jeremiah 26:2-3, it says, “Thus says the Lord: Stand in the court of the Lord’s house, and speak to all the cities of Judah, which come to worship in the Lord’s house, all the words that I command you to speak to them. Do not diminish a word. Perhaps everyone will listen and turn from his evil way, that I may relent concerning the calamity which I purpose to bring on them because of the evil of their doings.” God shows optimism that the people might listen and repent. He would gladly relent from the punishment that their evil deeds have brought upon them. Unfortunately, they would not turn from their evil ways before God.
This is the duty of God’s man, to warn them that their wrongs have consequences. In 2 Timothy 4:3-4, Paul told Timothy, “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables.” That explains the condition of many churches today, including the Lord’s church, but the man of God must stand and preach the truth of His will.
We must determine to preach God’s message whether the result will be good or ill. To not warn those in error does not change the danger of missing Heaven for those who speak the misguided teachings from their own thoughts. When the wind of error blows, will you stand firm where God wants you to stand? Think about it.