Scripture will not bend with the times.
Sin was once a weighty word because it pointed to something greater than merely the breaking of rules. It was personal and vertical. It signified something that has been lost on the modern conscience, namely, the breaking of covenant — to the willful defiance of a holy God. To speak of sin was to speak of guilt, wrath, judgement, and mercy. Eternity was in view, and one’s relation to the One offended was of primary importance.
But in the modern world, sin has been redefined. Or more accurately, as David Wells has identified, it has been contracted. Sin is no longer a rupture in relationship to God, but has been shrunk down, emptied out, and been made small enough to live with. Today, sin is merely a lapse of judgment. It is a failure to live up to your best self, or perhaps a disorder to manage, or a mistake you made because of how your parents raised you. The old categories of law, transgression, holiness, fear; have been replaced with the soft language of psychology and therapeutic culture. Sin is thought of as a rupture in relationship in terms of the self.
This shift has not stayed outside of the Church, but has quietly walked right through the side doors into the sanctuary. Dressed in Christian language, it looks the part, having adorned itself in Sunday’s best. The Church has grown skilled at treating symptoms of the exchange without naming the exchange itself. We speak of brokenness, but not rebellion. Of wounds, but not willful wandering. We offer comfort for pain, but no clarity on why that pain exists. We have therapy groups for trauma but few pulpits that preach repentance.
In many places, the Church has become a field hospital with no battlefield theology. We acknowledge the bleeding, but never ask who fired the first shot or whether we pulled the trigger ourselves. So we gather the hurting, the exhausted, and the anxious, telling them God sees them. And of course, He does, however, if we stop there, we leave them in the ruins of their self-made altars, gently handing them a blanket when they need a call to rebuild the temple.
The result of this is a subtle and deadly drift. We still use the word sin, but we handle it gently, cautiously, and often vaguely. We invite people to healing, but hesitate to call them to repentance. We sing about grace and how amazing it is, but rarely mention the judgment from which that grace rescues. In doing so, we risk removing the very context that makes grace good. The danger is not only that we misunderstand sin, but that we misrepresent the gospel. If sin is no longer sin (in the biblical sense), grace is no longer amazing, its just helpful. The cross becomes less about God’s wrath poured out on a substitute and more about a vague display of love. Christ didn’t die to save us from eternal punishment, but to show us how valuable we really are. See?
Scripture will not bend with the times. Sin is still lawlessness (1 John 3:4). It is still treason against heaven, It still earns death (Rom 6:23) and still requires blood (Heb 9:22). The gospel begins with bad news because reality begins with a holy God. Until we recover the weight of sin, we will not recover the wonder of mercy. And until we preach sin as the Bible defines it, we cannot claim to preach the gospel at all.
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Gibson, D. Ruined Sinners to Reclaim: Sin and Depravity in Historical, Biblical, Theological, and Pastoral Perspective, 1st ed.; The Doctrines of Grace Series; Crossway: Wheaton, 2024. pp 808
