Cover of The Garden (Definitions)
The doctrine of original sin is a bit mean, isn’t it? If you’re not familiar with it, it’s the doctrine that says that Adam’s sin in the Garden meant that the entire human race has been tainted with sin.
Seems a bit unfair really, as many non-Christians have pointed out (and some Christians have attempted to deny). It just doesn’t seem fair that I’d be judged as guilty before I’ve done anything!
Well, perhaps our good friend Charles Spurgeon can help us out:
We fell, by no act of our own, in the first Adam; and we rise, without any merit of our own, in the second Adam.
Ah yes, that’s why. If our fall was entirely our own fault, then it would sort of make sense that we might be able to work our way out of it, but that’s not how Christianity works!
Thank God!
The Christian’s meaning of life on earth and eternal destiny is secure because of the completed work of Jesus, and only because of the completed work of Jesus; anything that I do to add to it actually takes away from it!
So original sin is an important doctrine because it points to the true problem: there is nothing that you or I can do on our own to get security in this life or the next.
Interesting! Relates well with the ideas expressed by Jullian of Norwich. Which are interpretations of her visions recorded in Divine Love.
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