Question 16 of the Westminster Shorter Catechism asks, “Did all mankind fall in Adam’s first disobedience?”

The answer given is, “Since the covenant was made not only for Adam but also for his natural descendants, all mankind sinned in him and fell with him in his first disobedience.”

The fact that we are inherently fallen offends our 21st Century sensibilities. Actually, it offended man’s sensibilities in every age. Along these lines, Malcolm Muggeridge wrote:

“The depravity of man is at once the most empirically verifiable reality but at the same time the most intellectually resisted fact.”

Even a superficial reading of the news provides ample evidence that there is something wrong with man. Stories of war, crime, assault, abuse, neglect and selfishness can be found on every page. We see all around us the effects of the fall of man.

And lest we should be hypocritical in our thinking on this, any reflection at all will provide a man with ample evidence that there is something wrong in his own heart. I suggest that the unending production of self-help books reveals our acknowledgement that we are broken.

The problem with self-help books is that they too often provide means of addressing the symptoms rather than addressing the disease.

It is of no ultimate use to me to control myself to appear that I am concerned about my fellow’s well being when in fact, I am not in the lease concerned about him. It is of no ultimate use to suppress my anger and appear peaceful, when I would really rather have lightening come out of the sky and punish the one who made me angry. By addressing the symptoms, I can perhaps go some way toward improving how I am perceived but unless I address the source, I am one slip-up away from major disaster.

Jesus tells us that it is out of the abundance of the heart that a man speaks. Evil stuff comes out of our mouths because there is evil in our hearts. Unless our hearts are changed, very little about us will be improved, despite our best efforts.

The Christian response is to point out our need for regeneration. We need to have our hearts changed by God. In the book of Ezekiel, God tells us:

“I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.” (Ezekiel 36:25–26, ESV)

In the New Testament, Paul tells us:

“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved—” (Ephesians 2:1–5, ESV)

Aside from a work of God in our lives, we have little hope. As we proceed through the remainder of the Catechism questions, additional information on what God has done to provide correction will be revealed. Until then, let me point to the two words highlighted in bold above . . . But God . . .

Question 14 of the Westminster Shorter Catechism asks, “What is sin?”

The answer given is, “Sin is disobeying or not conforming to God’s law in any way.” This is another one where I prefer the older version which answers, “Sin is any want of conformity unto, or transgression of, the law of God.”

There are two categories here, one is passive and one is active.

Passive sin is not doing what we know to be right. Active sin is choosing to do (or desire to do) what we know to be wrong.

It seems to me that even those who would not acknowledge the idea of sin still have feelings that they should be better than they are. Almost any sentence that begins with the words, “I ought . . .” would give evidence in support of this assertion.

The important question is what is the standard for determining right and wrong? The catechism affirms that the correct standard for sin is the law of God. In 2016 this is unpalatable to many people.

But Jesus also affirmed the law of God as the standard when he said, “Do not think that I came to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I did not come to abolish but to fulfill.” (Matthew 5:17, NASB)

In thinking about our social context, I don’t see that it does a lot of good to go around telling people they are sinners. How many people do you see responding positively to a street preacher that is telling people that they are sinners going to hell? Apart from the grace of Christ, we are all sinners, so while it may be true, it is hardly helpful to do this.

It is really up to the Holy Spirit to convict each of us concerning our own sin. Our job is to point people to Jesus who is the cure.