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Discussion Forum : Scriptures and Doctrine : Can a lost sinner stop sinning?

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 Re:

It's true, Jesus taught that all sinful actions come out of a sinful heart.

The heart is the root of the issue.

So a sinner must recieve a new heart if he is to be holy, not only on the outside of the cup, but the inside of the cup as well!

And the only way a person gets a new heart, is when they come to Jesus.

A new heart which comes at the new birth will make a person a new creature and will cause a man to walk in newness of life!

 2006/8/23 17:36
GraceAlone
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Joined: 2006/8/23
Posts: 232
Orlando, Florida

 Re: Can a lost sinner stop sinning?

Can a sinner stop sinning? A lost sinner cannot stop sinning. Everything a sinner does is tainted with sin (IS 64:6). You can do no righteousness apart from God. Therefore, if you're lost you can't stop sinning. If a thief stops robbing apart from regeneration he is sinning when he stops. He stops for sinful reasons, his motives are sinful.


Does God command all men everywhere to repent when he knows that no sinner, anywhere is capable of repenting? Thats why salvation is by grace alone through faith alone by Christ alone. We cannot have saving faith apart from a supernatural work of the Holy Spirit. He commands us to repent and believe yet, he provides repentance and faith. If a sinner TRULY wants to repent its because God's given that sinner the desire.


Does God send men to hell for failure to do the impossible? God sends men to hell because of thier sin. Sin which they love and have chosen over Him. No one who has TRULY sought after God will be cast out. You're sin doesn't make you a sinner... you are a sinner therefore you sin. If the devil sinned and was cast from heaven what makes you think we'll get away? By the way, pitying the poor sinner is proof of an uninformed mind. That sinner deserves to go to hell. God doesn't owe sinners anything. You don't deserve to go to heaven. It is by God's mercy that we don't get what we deserve.


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Kristy

 2006/8/23 17:39Profile









 Re:

Quote:
Does God send men to hell for failure to do the impossible? God sends men to hell because of thier sin. Sin which they love and have chosen over Him.



Yes, a sinner deserves hell because they have chosen sin.

But was the sinner capable of not choosing sin?

Or did they simply do what they had no choice but to do?

Can they choose to submit to God, or can they only choose to submit to sin?

Ofcoarse, I would say they did have a choice, and can submit to God, but they choose sin, and therefore deserve hell eternal.

 2006/8/23 17:46
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 Re:

Quote:
But was the sinner capable of not choosing sin?


No because he is depraved and born into sin, that is clear teaching of scripture. "Or did they simply do what they had no choice but to do?" [b]yes[/b] we all have gone astray and he has laid on HIM the trangressions of us all. People could choose holiness and righteousness but that would not suffice at the jugement seat that is why Jesus died and shed His blood.

His dying was not a "help" for us to add our righteousness and good choices to it, but it is EVERYTHING! without it we are lost and in darkness. In the old testament blood sacrifice and men trying to live as best as they could sufficed but after the death of Christ all are given the free gift of eternal life, the tree of life opened freely. The Flaming swords of the Law being put away and free acess through faith and repentance to this new and living way.


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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon

 2006/8/23 17:55Profile









 Re:

De 30:19 - "I call heaven and earth to record this day against you, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing: therefore choose life"

 2006/8/23 18:03
RevKerrigan
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Joined: 2006/4/13
Posts: 58
South Central Kentucky

 Re:

I think Greg hit the nail on the head at what I am trying to get at. When I say that a lost sinner can't stop sinning, I mean he can't stop sinning. He sins because he is a sinner and we shouldn't expect anything else from him. He is utterly depraved and has a wicked, wicked heart. I don't have to teach my one year old daughter to touch something that I have told her not to touch a million times. Even after I have disciplined her for it and threatened more discipline if she continues in it...right as she is about to walk away, she reaches her little hand back and touches it anyway. She knows what is coming and knows it is wrong, but she does it anyway. Why? Because she has a rebellious heart. She was born that way and I can't change that. My wife and I have been talking about this quite a bit lately. The purpose of me and my wife teaching our kids God's Word and His Commandments is not so they will strive to walk perfectly in them. It is so they can see that they can't walk perfectly in them. No matter how hard they try, they won't be able to do what God desires of them. It is THEN, that they will see their need for the Savior and cling to the Blood Stained Cross for Mercy. Isn't that the whole reason for God's Law (Galatians 3:24). And the Ten Commandments is not the only thing Paul is referring to in Galatians 3:24. He is referring to anything that God has said TO DO or NOT TO DO. Those are God's commandments, God's Law. When I go out and preach, I couldn't, in good conscience, tell the people about their sin, call them to repent and fail to speak to them about the source of the power that they must tap into in order to overcome sin in their life! In must be Faith in Christ and abiding in Him! Otherwise, they might try to straighten up their life (and might be able to stop stealing, lying, etc.), but will end up only straightening out on the outside. They will be outwardly reformed to a certain degree, but lacking in inward TRANSFORMATION! They will be like Pharisess. White washed tombs, but with dead man's bones inside. I wonder what it would have been like if instead of Ezekiel commanding the dead bones to come alive like God told him to, if told them to act like they were alive. My guess is they would still sit around like dead bones. BUT, if they come alive first, they will NATURALLY behave like live men, because THEY REALLY ARE! This is what is missing in MANY of the Open Air Preachers that I see today! They speak so much of sin and repentance (And I believe it does need to be spoken of), but the forget to talk about becoming Born Again, what that means, how it happens and what the results are. They fail to say something like this, "Don't try to go home and clean up your life though. Repent of your sins and come to Christ in Faith. HE will make you a new Creature! Then you will walk in newness of life because HE HAS CHANGED YOU!" Unfortunately, I fear, that because repentance and sin is preached on SOOOOO Much, without a balance of preaching on the resurrection power of Jesus raising someone to newness of life, people go away thinking there is nothing they can do to change their situation. ANd they are right!! There is nothing THEY can do! They must come to Christ and allow Him to do it for them! Even after one becomes a Christian, Christ must live the Christian life for them. That is the ONLY way one can walk victoriously through this life...is by submitting to Christ and allowing Him to live the Christian life through them. I think this lack of preaching on this is one of the reasons why people get so angry with some preachers when they preach open air. It makes them feel like the preacher is belittling them. Like he is better then them because he is walking in Holiness and they are not. But if it was just explained to them that they can walk in victory over sin through the power of the Spirit, maybe they would take their mustard seed of faith, repent and believe it. Then they would see for themselves and be Born Again.

I know this is long, but as far as the definition of sin is concerned, I think many open air preachers have a very shallow definition. They stick to 1 Cor. 6:9-10, Galatians 5:19-21,etc. The definition of sin is found in these verses: 1 John 3:4, Romans 14:23, James 4:17, Romans 3:23. Romans 3:23 says it all though. Sin is missing the mark. It is falling short of the Glory of God. Who is the Glory of God...Jesus in the Flesh is the Glory of God. He was perfect in EVERY WAY! He is the mark we fall short of! If we haven't arrived...if we aren't exactly like Jesus in every way...then we still miss the mark ourselves! God Bless...


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Kerrigan Skelly

 2006/8/23 18:04Profile
Christisking
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Joined: 2005/7/20
Posts: 671
Los Angeles, California

 Re:

Jesse,

I am glad to see you are changing your tune. You previously wrote:

Quote:
Yes a sinner is capable of stopping his sin. That is why God "commands all men everywhere to repent."

God only commands the possible. He doesn't require apples from peach trees. He doesn't cut down and burn peach trees for not bearing apples.

and

But yes, a sinner does not have to sin.



This is the type of attitude many street preachers have that I spoke of previously. This type of attitude leads to self-righteous condemnation and accusing sinners for being sinners and thus being co-workers of Satan the great accuser. These preachers condemn sinners for their dress, lifestyles, music, entertainment etc. and tell them that must repent and stop sinning. They condemn apples trees for acting like apple trees and producing apples.

Do we use the law or sins mentioned in Scripture to point out the fact that(as Greg so apply put it) we have a terrible heart condition that we can't fix - that we need a heart transplant - YES ABSOLUTELY. The sin shows us or diagnoses the problem - original sin or our heart condition. To tell sinners that rap music or provocative dress (for example)is a sin and that they need to repent and stop sinning is just condemning and useless.This type of self-righteous condemnation preaching just pushes people away from Jesus and hardens their hearts.

I am glad to see you change your tune and realize that - no a sinner cannot stop sinning on his own - sinners need a heart transplant or they will just continue to sin because they have a sinful nature.


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Patrick Ersig

 2006/8/23 18:09Profile









 Re:

A sinner can stop sinning, by coming to Jesus.

Apart from Christ, a sinner can only partially stop sinning (because being against Christ and not loving God is a sin). I know people in AA and NA who have given up drugs and alcohol. But a sinner can never recieve a new heart and become a new person without Jesus.

But because sinners do not have to sin, but because they choose to sin, God sends them to hell. They choose to lie, steal, cheat, reject Christ, not be born again etc etc.

God does not burn apple trees for not producing peaches. Nor does he burn peach trees for not producing apples.

God only expects from us what is possible, and what is possible, is obedience towards God.

God will only ask us to do what He Himself gives us the ability to do, by His grace.

So the only way a sinner can be set free from all his sin, (which includes the sin of not believing and repenting) is by becoming a Christian.

 2006/8/23 18:20
ChrisJD
Member



Joined: 2006/2/11
Posts: 2895
Philadelphia PA

 Re: our works or His workmanship

Hi Compton, hope you are doing well.

Important point here, a sort of line of demarcation if you will

Quote:
Paul talked about putting on the 'new man'. Why put on this new man if the old man could get the job done?



To continue that line of thought in terms of the source of our new life and the question of man's ability to turn himself, I think of this verse


[b][color=000000]For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.[/color][/b]

and this, from the Psalms

[b] Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.[/b]

Though this latter verse may not appear to apply to us, I think it does in a very real sense; in the same way that God was the maker of the Nation of Israel has He not created us anew in Christ?

[b]But the Lord hath taken you, and brought you forth out of the iron furnace, even out of Egypt, to be unto him a people of inheritance, as ye are this day.[/b]

What power did they have of themselves to leave Egypt?

What power then does the thing formed have of itself? to make itself or to determine in what way it shall be formed?

In the case of a Christian, is it [b]all[/b] not supernatural through and through? And if [i]super[/i]natural then [b]not at all[/b] natural. Their salvation was wrought outwardly, upon the visible, outward man, ours inwardly upon the hidden man of the heart.

What did Jonah cry from the belly of the fish, but that

Quote:
Salvation is of the Lord.



While it may be a nice sort of fantasy to imagine Jonah making a fire in the fishes belly in order to induce it to cough him up we should not imagine that any burning zeal of our own could ever compell the power of sin and death to relinquish its hold upon us.

Yours for Christ,

Christopher


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Christopher Joel Dandrow

 2006/8/23 18:56Profile
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 Re:


"But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice: for I am not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance." -Matthew 9:13


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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon

 2006/8/23 19:05Profile





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