Hamartiology: Overview

0:02 Looking at our world from a theological perspective. This is the Theology Central podcast making Theology Central. So, how good did you do in school when it came to spelling? Were you ever in a spelling bee? Did you ever? I mean did you did you take spelling tests? I mean, how did you do? Did you fare well? Did you did you do really really bad? Did you have to come home and show your parents, you know, the paper? And it was like for the spelling test today, your child, you know, created new words and the way he spelled these words, these words that we sent home to you for the last six months, having telling you to go over with your kid, with your child. Obviously you didn't and your child misspelled all of these so badly that we thought maybe he was speaking a different language and maybe he was from a different country. Okay, how did you do? Did you do? Did you do? Okay? I think only I think I only competed in one spelling bee?

1:02 I think maybe two? Maybe two? What? And trust me, I did not choose to be in those spelling bees. It was one of those things, Hey, we need this many people to participate. Go and you're like, whoa what how no? Whoa no? No? No, no, no, no no. And it's like, you know, as soon as I walked up on the stage, you are eliminated. We already know you can't spell anything, okay, because yeah, I'm not a great speller. No I'm not. I mean I mean to me, I mean, who needs to know how to spell? Right? You just type into Google and it said did you mean right? Did you mean you type it into an ai app? I think you meant this? Hey, I will say I think you meant this, and you're like, oh, yes, yes, that's what I meant. That's what I meant. The sun got in my eyes. There was some reason. So how do you do in spelling? Are you a good speller?

1:55 You know? Okay? Great? Now the question is really this, How did a spelling error lead me to talking about the doctrine of sin? How did a spelling eer error? I can't even speak correctly? How did a spelling error lead me to talk about the doctrine of sin? Where you're going to find out right after I say good afternoon everyone. It is Saturday, February eighth, twenty twenty five. It is currently two fifty six pm Central Time, and I am coming to you live from the Theology Central Studio located right here in Abilene, Texas, and from this very studio. Oh, I make so many spelling mistakes, so many I'll be typing. I'll be typing out the title for a podcast episode, spelling error. I'll be typing out a description for a podcast episode, spelling er constantly. There are spelling errors. If you were to look at my notes for for church or for a sermon, or for a podcast episode, they're probably littered with spelling errors, clearly with grammatical errors and punctuation errors. So I know, I mean, it's one of those things you have to acknowledge your weakness, right, I mean, I would. I would love to say my spelling is perfect, my grammar is perfect. I mean, you know, but that's it's just not the case. Those are areas

3:25 where could I be better? Yes, could I improve? Yes? Have I been disciplined to work on it? No? But I am more than willing to acknowledge the reality of that. But it was a spelling error today that's led me to this broadcast, not to talk about the spelling error, but to really talk about well. The spelling error was about a word that refers to the doctrine of sin, and I'm like, okay, that I can talk about. So this is how it all happened. Are you ready now? One of the things I love about what I'm trying to do in twenty twenty five. I haven't been perfect at it, but I'm trying to maintain this idea. That's why I keep underneath the microphone this empty notebook, right, this empty notebook, because I want each day to kind of open the notebook and say, well, for today, February the eighth, you're going to cover this. I want the day to kind of guide the podcast. I want the day to direct it whatever happens. So sometimes I like to tell you what happened well to get me to where we are right now. So are you ready? So I was sitting here and I was doing a little prep for tomorrow, working on some different things, idolatry and Babylon during the time of Judas captivity, the religious practices of ancient Babylon, doing a little bit of work on that.

4:47 I was doing a lot of work on the word faith and all the doctrines surrounding faith and how it's been understood throughout church history, how it's been defined in church history, doing a little bit of work in Isaiah forty. There was just like multiple things I was working on. And then I'm like, okay, well, let me take a break here. Do I broadcast today? Do I broadcast today? So as I'm sitting here thinking about broadcasting, well, I open up sermon audio and I just start looking around, looking around, like, oh, there's some live webcast on, So I click on a live webcast. This one kind of made me laugh because basically I tuned in right at the time. It's a conference. I think it's called the Faith Forward Conference or something like that. It's some kind of conference, special meeting that's going on today. There's another Bible conference going on i think right now on during in the live webcast. I'm always looking for those because I always find those interesting to see what the focus is. Well, this one, I don't know exactly what they were talking about.

5:42 And I'm paraphrasing loosely here. It was something along these lines. You say you're seeking the Kingdom of God, you say you love God while you sit there watching your forty five inch television, watching a movie or the game. And then he kind of and then and I'm started laughing. I'm like, forty five inch television. Who in the world is using a forty five inch television in twenty twenty five? I mean, does anybody use a television forty five inches? Really? I mean, I mean I wouldn't. I would think there would be much larger. So, I know, somewhat sarcastic, but it was just funny, Like I guess if you watch something on a forty five inch television, then that just proved I guess you're not supposed to have a television.

6:27 You're not supposed to watch anything. I don't know, So, I mean, I know that's very typical in preaching to kind of put forth in basically, like it's kind of put fourth in preaching. Basically, you shouldn't do anything but read your Bible, listen to him, go to church, and that's it. And it would be okay. I guess if if everyone truly lived that. But a lot of times you hear that put forth in, no one practices it at all, not in many cases, even the pastors who put forth that idea, I'm not saying in that particular case, they put fourth an idea almost like a monastic way of living. And then when you really look behind the scenes, you're kind of like, well, you may not do that, but you do this and this and this and this and this. It's kind of the same thing. So but yeah, I found that interesting. So I watched that. I'm like, okay, well, I don't want to get all caught up in that, so I'm not gonna not gonna pay any attention. So then I kept looking around, looking around, and then I came across a series, right, I came across the series.

7:28 In fact, the first one I saw, I think was called, oh, it was called Landmarks of Baptist Doctrine. Landmarks of Baptist Doctrine was the full title Landmarks of Baptist Doctrine. And then are you ready? I want you to write down this word Landmarks of Baptist Doctrine. That caught my attention because obviously a Baptist, right, So then I'm like, okay, all right, that is this going to go through historical development a Baptist doctrine? Is it going you need to go through the basic, you know, elements of Baptist theology. Like I'm just kind of curious where it's going to go. It caught my attention. Landmarks of Baptist doctrine. But it was the next word landmarks of Baptist doctrine. Now spell this out or I'll write this down. I'll spell it out.

8:23 H A r m A r t I O l o g y. H A r m A r t I O l o g y h A r m A r t I O l o g y. And I'm like, comark histology, what mar har mar etology? And I'm kind of like, wait a minute, that sounds familiar.

9:07 I'm like, I know I took a class, but I don't. I don't. Look there's something off about it. I'm I'm like, that's kind of weird. I grabbed a piece of paper and I started to write down the word. It was actually an envelope here, and I just I just had a pencil and an envelope here, and I started writing and I made it h A and I stopped, and I'm like, wait, wait h A r No, No, something's wrong, something, something is wrong here, something is wrong here. So I went to AI and I typed in. I started, I typed in the word spelled that way h A r M A r T I l O g Y. I think is how it's spelled. And AI's like, I assume you meant and Ai spelled it a different way h A m A r t i O l o g y.

10:04 Not h A r M but h A m A r t i O l o g y. And I'm like, okay, her martiology hamti okay. And then I'm like, wait a minute. Okay. The other one was hamartiology hamartiology, and I'm like, okay, which one is? Wait? Is this the same thing or are they teaching something different? I was a little confused. So I started watching the the the first message in their series, and they were saying it like hamr theology hamartiology, and I'm like, or harmontology, I think is the way they we're trying to say it. And I was like, well, wait a minute, what is this? So I kept listening, like, oh, they're talking about the doctrine of sin or the study of sin. And I'm like, oh, wait a minute, that I think Ai is right. It's h A m A r t I O l o g y. H A m A r t I O l o g y.

11:15 And I'm like, okay, let me let me make sure. So then I went and looked it up because I was I was a little confused. If I'm being honest, I was a little confused, right, because I was like, what did I How did I get this so wrong? I'm like, I know I or what not so much how I got it wrong. I was more upset that I was a little bit confused. So then I went and I looked it up in a couple of dictionaries. Martiology, the mantiology, the mantiology one more time, mantiology, her martiology, her martiology. I'm like, okay, her martiology, what is her martiology? The doctrine of sin. Her martiology is the doctrine of sin.

11:56 So I'm like, okay, it's hermartiology. It's not it's it's not the way they had it again. They're spelling was h A R M A t IO l O g y. And they spelled it for every message in this series, which is Landmarks of Baptist Doctrine ten parts. And not only that, they have another series where they spelled it again, this time called again they spelled it h A R M A t I l O g y and the effects. And this one they have three messages and they spell it that way and all of them. So I was again, I was I was a little perplexed because there was at least a moment of time where I thought, oh, wait, maybe this is something different, Maybe this is some theology or doctrine that I'm not familiar with. But when I started listening to them like, no, this is the doctrine of sin. They even referred to it as the doctrine of sin again the way it should be spelled as h A M A r tiology. It's this word her maatiology, her martiology, so AI. When I gave it to it, it says, I assume you met hermartiology, which is the theological study of sin. It comes from the Greek word her martia, her martia meaning sin or missing the mark.

13:23 I'm like, okay, that's what That's what I want to understand, her martiology. So I thought, well, I'm going to use this spelling error, not to point out who made the spelling error in the name of the church or anything like that. I'm not going to do anything like that. I did send them an email just saying, hey, guys, I'm I misspell everything, but I just want you to know everything. The title of your series, all the messages in your series, I think they've been misspelled. I think, now, maybe there's some other way to spell it that I'm not aware of, so I could be one hundred percent wrong. But I was a little bit confused because I'm thinking, well, I think I took this course in one of the schools I went to, but I don't remember. Like it looks similar, but it's not. So we're gonna take a little bit of time to look at hamartotology her martoli.

14:10 If I can even say the word right now. See now I'm looking at both spellings, and I'm getting it all confused, this word martyrology. If I can't look at both spellings, I gotta move. I gotta move away from both spellings. Okay, I try to say it both ways. Now, if martiology explores questions like this, if you're taking a course on harmartiology, you're gonna be looking at questions like the origin of sin, the nature of sin, the effects of sin on humanity and creation, the relationship between sin and salvation, and the final judgment, and sin's ultimate consequences. Now, her martiology plays a key role in systematic theology. Her martiology is almost essential in relation to other doctrines, like the doctrines of man or anthropology, that's the study of humanity, soteriology, the study of salvation, eschatology, the study of end time.

15:10 Understanding her martiology is key and understanding all of these. Now, you could argue, now this is always the debate. This is always the debate. Right, do we use her martiology? Do we use the word or do we just say doctrine of sin? Do we say anthropology or do we just say the study of humanity? Do we say soteriology or do we just say study of salvation? Do we say eschatology? Or do we just say the study of end times? Now I'm sometimes torn between this right because on one hand, I think knowing the technical terms are important for this reason. If you know the technical terms, then no matter what you read, if you're reading a journal from a seminar, if you're reading a systematic theology, you know the words. You're familiar with the words because you were taught them in church and you started learning these words early on earlier. This shouldn't be just for the adults. It should be for the kids, it should be for high school students, it should be for everyone.

16:16 So that's the benefit. If you know the theological terms, then whenever you hear them mentioned or see them read, you know exactly what they're referring to. You immediately know hermar theology, doctrine of sin, so teiology, study of salvation, anthropology, you know the terms. So I think in some ways it's very beneficial and can be very helpful. At the same time, sometimes I'm not saying that this is always the case. We can begin to say, we can begin to speak saying the words just to give us a greater sense of knowledge, a sense of pride, to a sense of look at me, I know the word. You don't know the word. We throw out the word almost to give us a greater sense of authority or importance.

17:12 So I struggle with it, like there was a time when I was younger, like, oh, I'm going to know the terms, and I'm going to use the term, use the term, use the term, use the term, use the term. But there probably was a little bit of that. I want to come across as being knowledgeable and authoritative. So it was it more about me or was it more about helping people learn the term? Was I was I trying to exalt me? Or was I trying to give say that your motivations are always easy to be questioned, right, It's very easy. It's very easy to have mixed motives, right, your motive. Our motives are not always pure. So her martiology is the doctrine of sin. So so Ai said that her martiology is basically is a is common to misspell it. It's it's pretty common, and it says this.

18:05 It's a common especially within theological terms that are transliterated from Greek. And so I was like, okay, I think that that's probably the case. Again, her martiology comes from the Greek word her martia harm martia and all right, and that means to miss the mark, all right. So so the bottom line is trying to figure all of that out, like, okay, is this her martiology is this? I can't remember the way they said it, and I even listened to them say it, and I think they tried to say it the way they had it written out. They didn't say hamartiology they were they said it the other way, And I was like, okay, I'm again. There was a brief minute I thought they were speaking of something else, but I believe this is what they were referring to. I may find out different, but if you go look at all the lessons. It sounds like that they were trying to talk about the doctrine of sin, so I thought, this is what we would do. I know this took almost twenty minutes to get here, but that's okay. Let's do an overview of harmarteology the doctrine of sin. Let's do an overview so that you will at least know what this is. And it's more important just to know the doctrine of sin. Now, I'm just gonna say this right from the start. If you study the doctrine of sin or hermartiology, if you study it actually even knowing how to say harmartiology correctly her martia the Greek, whether you know how to say it correctly or incorrectly, whether you spell it correctly or whether you spell it incorrectly, here's the most important thing to note

19:37 when it comes to the doctrine of sin. No one agrees on it throughout Church history. That's the takeaway from this, right. The takeaway is, forget the spelling. Nobody can agree on what is the proper understanding of her martiology throughout Church history. No one can agree. But let's do an overview and let's try to break some of this down. Her martiology is the branch of Christian theology that studies sin, its nature, its origin, its effects, and its consequences. It is crucial.

20:23 Her martiology is crucial to soteriology the doctrine of salvation, because one's understanding of sin directly impacts your view on grace, atonement, and redemption. See sometimes people over here arguing about soteriology. There will be all these debates about soteriology and the doctrine of salvation and arguing about this and arguing about this. Sometimes I want to throw, like you know, a red challenge flag in using a football analogous. Since tomorrow's the Super Bowl, I want to throw in the red flag and say stop, everyone stop, Let's go to the replay, Let's go to the video. Because what we need to forget arguing about this. We need to argue what happened way down the field. We got to talk about her martiology because what you believe about that, that's going to Because what you believe about her martiology, then your souteiology has to be consistent with your study on this. So a lot of times, if you believe this about sin, where then you're going to have to believe this about salvation, or you're gonna end up with an inconsistent theology. So a lot of the debates is like, well, instead of us debating soteeriology right, going back and forth, we can, we need to go back and make sure we have an agreement on harmartiology. Right, do we really agree right? Hamartiology.

21:46 I keep wanting it to say the way they had it and putting the h A R there. But hamartiology, I got to say it correctly. That's what we see looking at both words. I told you it was even confusing me. All right, So let's look at this the biblical foundations for hamartiology or biblical foundations for the doctrine of sin. First, the definition of sin, well, most would go to Genesis four seven. If we're going to start in the in the Old Testament, I'm got to go to Genesis four seven, where we're gonna read this. Genesis four seven. Genesis four seven. You're gonna read this. If thou doest well, good, this is God speaking under Caine.

22:28 If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? And if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. Sin lieth at the door. Sin lieth at the door. Well, if you look up that Hebrew word, the Hebrew word is are you ready? And it's gonna be like two or three different ways of saying this, But here we go. Strong's age twenty four O three hatta ah hatta h cat tof cat to Okay, you want to hear that one more time. There's no way I can say it the same way. Hat ta ah hat ta ah cat to cats hat to ah. Now, I can't even do that guttural kind of sound. I'm no good at doing that hat to ah uh. And it means that if you look it up in the it's used two and six or two hundred ninety six times in the King James ho tia, and it's it means if you look up and say the strongs. Strong's definition is an offense, sometimes habitual sinfulness. It's penalty, occasion, sacrifice, expiation uh concretely, an offender, punishment of sin, purifying for sin. Sin deals with sin in all kinds of different ways, all right, the uh ha tia. The outline of biblical usage is

23:59 sin and sinful sense and offering sin, condition of sin, guilt of sin, punishment of sin, sin offering purification from sins of ceremonial uncleanliness, everything dealing with sin. It's right there, all right, but it's an offense. There's really kind of where the if we're gonna start with the kind of the the Hermartia Hamartiology, Hamartiology say, I can't say it the other way. We have to kind of start with the definition of sin. And if you start right there with that Hebrew word right hatia, you basically many would say, well, it's sin. It's an offense. So some would say, basically the simple meaning is to miss the mark or to rebel.

24:43 They I believe it's also used in Psal fifty one. I believe it's in Psalm fifty one. Let me go here, Psalm fifty one, p. Fifty one. I believe it's verse four. Well, maybe slightly different here against the the only have I sinned? I think it's going to be a little bit different, a little bit a different form here. Oh no, it looks well, it's a little bit different. Here we go. Maybe Strong's age twenty three ninety eight. Hatah hahatah hotah.

25:23 Now this one hatah means to miss, to miss by inference, to forfeit, lack, lead, astray. I mean, there's a whole host of things here in the strongest definition the outline of biblical usage. To send, to miss the way, go wrong, and kur guilt, for fit, purify from munk clean list, to miss the goal or path of right and duty, to incur guilt, to bear loss, to make a sin offering, to miss the mark, to induce sin, to cause a sin, to bring guilt. It's the idea. To miss the mark, it's to rebel, it's to offend. You miss the mark. What is the mark God's holiness? You rebel? Who your rebel against, against Odd's word, God's law, God standard. You miss the marks. That's that's the idea. Right, So that's where it starts in the Old Testament. Is really right there?

26:13 The definition of sin in the Old Testament, Hattia, I can't make all the correct guttural sounds. There means to miss the mark, to rebel, to offend. It is sin right Genesis four seven and Psalm fifty one to four. Now, if we jump to the New Testament, if we jump to the New Testament, we could go to First John. First John Believed Chapter three, and we look at verse four, First John, chapter three, verse four. Whosoever committeth sin transgress. Notice this transgresseth. Also the law for sin is the transgression of the law, anything, any transgression of the law. Well, you miss the mark, you transgress it, you overstep the mark.

27:05 You either miss the mark or you overstep the mark. You transgress the law. The law demands perfection, and you can transgress. You can miss the mark. You can transgress the mark and thought and word, indeed, and desire and feeling and emotion and internally externally, you can miss the mark. Now, the Greek word there in First John three four, let's look it up. We looked up the Hebrew word. Now, let's go to the Greek word here. Let's go back. Let's go to first John, First John, chapter three, verse four. All right, that transgresseth. This interesting, but it says here sin, here's sin. Here we go. Strong's g two sixty six amartya amartilla, amrtilla, he martia her martilla is used one hundred and seventy four times, and it means Harmartia means a sin an offense, very similar to the Hebrew word.

28:10 Very similar to the Hebrew word. It is to be without share in, to miss the mark, to err, to be mistaken, to miss wonder from the path of unrighteousness, to wonder from the law of God, to violate God's law right, So you can in a sense if you think about it, and I'm not saying this carries out perfectly in the language, but if you kind of take the idea to transgress and to miss Okay, here's the standard, I don't quite get there, and to transgress this, I'm just gonna step right over it, like I'm just going over the line. That's kind of the way I look at it. I'm not saying that carries out perfectly and the from a linguistic standput from the language standpoint, but you get the idea. When we that God has a standard, God has a mark, and we miss it, we transgress it, we overstep it, we fit, we fall short, we offend, we rebel against it, we sin. That's kind of where we start with with with the entire That's kind of where we began the Biblical foundations is defining what sin is. Again, if you want to study hamartiology and you want to know the doctorate of sin, you start with the foundation of it and the definition of sin is to miss the mark, to rebel missing the mark, and and it almost kind of expands in the New Testament of lawlessness a more like missing the mark almost gives me the idea like, oh, I'm trying, but I don't get there, And transgressing our lawlessness is almost like I don't care,

29:41 I'm doing whatever I want. Like, I think both ideas. So because sometimes we kind of like I want, Yeah, we can get into a lot of discs. I don't want to turn this into a forty five minute discussion. Maybe we'll come back and look at that concept, because I think both parts are important. All right, So there's the definition of sin. If we're going to talk about her mark theology, we have to be able to define sin to some level. And again I always say defied. If you want to understand sin, sin is where is where we fall short in any way, shape or form to God's law. Any lack of conformity to God's perfect law, any lack of conformity in thought, in word, indeed, in action, in desire and feeling and emotion. That is sin. Any lack of conformity. Be You've got to hit the mark perfect every single time internally and externally and we fall short.

30:39 You've got to understand what sin really is. I think that's the problem. I think so many debates about soteriology, so many, so many of my disagreements with Christianity at large is because of really this whole subject of hamartiology. If I believe if Christians really understood hamarteology, they wouldn't be talking about, well, you can do it, and you can do this, and you can do this, and you can do this, and you can do this. And I'm like, no, you don't understand how martiology, because if you really did, you would understand how corrupt and sinful we are before salvation and even after salvation. Therefore, even in salvation, sin is going to be present constantly. Right, So we could get into a whole discussion here. So there's the definition of sin. If we're going to start with, well, hamartiology, we need a biblical foundation for harmartiology, and it starts with the definition of sin. Secondly, it starts with the categories of sin. This one is going to get a little controversial, but let's work through it. Okay. The first category we will refer to as original sin. This is the sinful nature inherited from Adam. This is foundational. Do you believe that all humans have inherited a sinful nature, and that sinful nature is totally sinful, not just slightly sinful, not just a little broken. It is completely broken, It is completely messed up. Some refer to this as original sin.

32:13 You can refer to this as depravity. It's the idea that all humans are born are conceived in sin. We are sinners by nature. Look, if you understand this part of omarteology, then you're going to go with this mathematical formula. Right. We do not become sinners by sinning, but we sin because we are sinners. We do not become sinners by sinning. We sin because we are sinners. We sin because that's what we are. That's our natural default position is sin.

32:53 We sin and thought word indeed, and things we do and things we don't do because of what we are. We, to quote the famous song, were born that way. Okay, I know Lady Gaga was making a different point there, and we could have a debate about it, but we we are born that way. We are born this way. What should you expect from all human beings? What should be the expectation is sinful behavior, sinful thoughts, sinful desires, and that sinful heart. Desires and thoughts and actions have been present since the fall when Cain. And that's why I when people were like, I wish we could go back to a time when things were so much, so wonderful, I'm like, what are you talking about? You want to go back to the good old days? I don't know.

33:44 When a brother killed his brother, And it wasn't because of Netflix. It wasn't because of rock and roll, It wasn't because of video games, it wasn't because of something they were taught in school. It was because Cain was born with a sinful nature. And if you go through Genesis, what do you see. I mean, I don't know when a father's like, hey, guys, guys, guys, stop stop stop. I will give you my daughters and you can do whatever you want to them. Well, I don't know. He didn't need Netflix to do that, he didn't need pornography to do that. It came from his sinful nature that he thought about sacrificing his own daughters. Hey, hey, do whatever you want. Oh and then oh wait what happened?

34:27 Oh his daughter's getting drunk and they have physical relations I mean, we could go on and on and all the horrible things that happened in just the Book of Genesis that happens before television, that happens before radio, that happens before rock and roll, that happens before pornography, that happens before all the things we like to blame. We're like, oh, Lord, problems is this and this and no. The problem is we are original sinners from birth because we have a sinful nature. All sinful action comes from sinful nature. Christians run around on to scream about the external cause. It's not the external cause. It's the internal cause. Many Christian parents like, oh, that kid's a bad influence on my kid.

35:10 That kid is a bad influence. I don't want that to influence my kid. I don't want that. How about your kid influencing the world because your kid is a sinner. We always want to blame everything else. The problem is inside of us. So the first category is original sin. It's almost like Christians don't really believe in original sin. They believe in it theoretically, but not the practical implications of it. The sinful nature we inherit from Adam imputed sin. The first category is original sin, imputed sin. This is the judicial aspect of sin passed to all humanity Adam.

35:52 Sin is in a sense accredited to us. So we're all guilty in Adam. We are guilty because we have original sin, full nature, and we are guilty in atom. Now you may not like that idea of imputation, like, well, why would atoms guilty imputed to me? Well, okay, that sets up the whole idea of imputation. But we are guilty in atom. Then you have personal sins, the actual sins committed by individuals. We have actual sin. Now that actual sin can be in thought, it can be a word, it can be in desire. But where does the actual sin flow from? We want to think the actual sin flows from an external motivate. Now the actual sin flows from the internal corruption. So original sin, imputed sin, personal sin, and then number four some place these in two categories, sins of commission and sins of o mission. Sins of commission and sins of o mission acts done against God's will and failure to do what is right. A sin of commission is where you are doing something against God's will.

37:12 A sin of o mission is where you fail to do what is this is the right thing to do, and you don't do it. So the categories of sin are original sin, imputed sin, personal sin, sense of commission and omission. And now everyone's gonna get mad when I mentioned this one. But this one has to be mentioned. This one has to be mentioned. And I know this is the Catholic system, but non Catholics have the same, the same concept mortal and venial sin. Mortal sins are said to destroy grace, while venial sins do not. Well, Christians may not say they destroy grace and don't destroy grace. But if you listen to some lordship, well, if you commit this in and this end, there's no way you can be saved. You hear Christians say that all the time.

37:53 There's no way a safe person could ever commit that sin, meaning that you know, that's like the mortal one. You commit that one, it's not that you lose it, it just proves you never got it. Well, I mean it's the same thing. Well, I can never commit that sin, or then I'm not saved. We put them in categories. Someone could commit fifty sins and barely even if anybody just kind of why yeah, yawn, there's no church discipline. There's no controversy, there's no scandal. They commit one, oh and everybody, Oh my goodness, that's it. It's the end of the world. Get the hammer, get the nails, crucify him. We're having a stoning at midnight because he committed that one. Well, what about the forty seven other ones they committed? Well, and everyone commits those. We have our own list of mortal and venial sins. I guarantee you you'll see some things never an issue in church, No, one's ever church discipline. No.

38:48 And then you see other things. It's like, that's the end. And we already know which category always everyone always, you know, that's the end. Anything of sexual nature that you know, the mountain is pushed down upon them. Fifty other sins are okay, those are the categories of sin. So if we're going to study harmartiology, see, when I'm not looking at the other word, I can do it pretty good harmart theology. When I'm looking at the other one, I'm like, wait, way, which way is there? Correct way? Harmartiology the Biblical foundations for hermartiology. Number one is the definition of sin. We've looked at that. Number two, the categories of sin, original, imputed, personal omission, commission and omission, mortal and venial. And then I guess we could go third, the effects of sin, the effects of sin, spiritual death all right, separation from God, all right, spiritual death, physical death. Now, spiritual death would be talked about Inephesians two one, physical death, Romans six twenty three. It's the curse of sin. We all die.

40:03 Why do we all physically die because of sin? Because of sin? Now? Because this body is still corrupted with sin. To me, when people are basically act like Christians that the old nature has been basically gone, I'm like, no, we still die because we're still corrupted with sin. We're still in a body corrupted with sin. But spiritual death, a separation from God, physical death, and eternal death, which is the second death. This is the final judgment of the unredeemed sinners. Where we go to Revelation chapter twenty what verse fourteen for that. Now, those are the three basic effects of sin. What I would like to put here. I don't know how I would put a fourth one here, but I would state the fourth effect of sin is that we maintain a sinful nature and we will continue to sin. We will continue to miss mark, miss the mark.

40:55 We will continue to transgress the law throughout our entire human existence, whether you're saved are not saved. If you don't understand that, then your entire understanding of hamartiology is completely wrong. It's completely flawed. You have to understand that one of the effects of sin is that we are going to sin our entire life and thought. We are in a perpetual state of sin because we're supposed to meet the mark, which is be holy as God is holy. You're never that, So you're in a perpetual state of sin. To deny otherwise you're insane. So those are some of the foundational principles of hermartiology, definitely. So we talked about the definition, categories, and effects. Now how about now let's look at hamartiology and different theological systems. Now, I know this is frustrating. This is where I that's where I want to start screaming, why is it this way? But it's this way. People's understanding of harmartiology typically is not influenced by their study of scripture. It's influenced by the thiological system that they have been handed. So let's look at hamarteology and different theological systems. Let's look at it from the Augustinian and Reformed view. Augustinian and Reformed view and the Augustinian and Reform view. They understand harmartiology, or

42:26 the doctrine of sin is this total depravity. Humanity is completely affected by sin completely, every single part of us is affected and infected by sin. That is the Augustinian Reformed view. And I strongly, strongly agree with this, and I agree that this total depravity remains in us after salvation. This is where I get myself in trouble with many, because I'm like, no, when you become saved, you've been set free from the penalty. I haven't been set free from the power. Because if I've been set free from the power of sin, then I should be able to be perfect. And if something is keeping me from perfection, then I'm not free from its power. Okay by definition, but I do believe that we've been infected and affected by and every area of our life by total depravity.

43:17 The Augustinian and Reform view would also hold to the federal headship of Adam, meaning Adam's sin is imputed to all of us. We are all born guilty in Adam if you were born and you never committed one sin, you would still be guilty because of imputed the imputed sin of Adam sin Adam. Sin Adam's disobedience has been imputed to your account. It's called the federal headship of Adam. Now, if you believe in total depravity and you believe it affects every single area of us, well then this leads to and the Augustinian and Reform view the necessity of sovereign grace. Look, if I'm totally depraved, then there's no way I'm ever going to choose God. Come to God.

44:12 I'm not, so we need sovereign grace. The only divine election can bring salvation. God is going to have to do it because I am totally depraved. Now, what I learned in my non Augustinian, non Reform schools and churches that I attended to is they would try to argue that, well, we're totally depraved, but man's will is not impacted by the sinful nature. The will is like insulated and protected. Well, then you're not totally depraved. You can't say you believe in total depravity and at the same time say the will is not impacted by total depravity. And if the will is impacted by totally total depravity, then you're going to have to have God to do something because the will will never move towards God because it's impacted by depravity.

45:02 So within the Augustinian Reformed view, you have total depravity, you have federal headship, you have necessity of sovereign grace, grace, and you have the bondage of the will. You can read the famous book by Luther Bondage of the Will. Humanity cannot choose God without regeneration. I have to be regenerated or made a lie before I can choose God. Now this gets into order salute us in the order of salvation. We won't get into all of that, but that is when it comes to harmarteology. Within the Augustinian reform view, those are some of the key elements total depravity. This means humanity is completely affected and infected by sin.

45:43 The federal headship of Adam Adam, Sin is imputed to you, the necessity of sovereign grace. As a result, we're so helpless. God's going to have to sovereignly elect choose and our will is bound. God has to regenerate us before we can believe before we can move towards God. Right, that's the Augustinian view. How about the Armenian view? All right, within the Armenian view, they would believe in deprivation, not total depravity. All right, sin affects all but does not make humans incapable of responding to God. So the Armenian view, if they're going to be true, well, were sinners. There's some depravity there. There's some deprivation there, but it's not total.

46:36 It does not completely make us incapable of responding to God because the will say they got to protect the will, the will is not impacted. Well, just think about the logical ramifications. If the will is not impacted by total depravity, then we could simply will to be perfect and could do it, and we would not need God, we would not need scripture, we would not need the Holy Spirit, we would not need regeneration. We are if our will is kept not impacted by depravity, then a person could simply will themselves to be perfect. The minute you have the will being impacted by depravity, well then the will will never choose God. Therefore, then you have to have sovereign election. Either you believe in total depravity or you don't.

47:30 Now in the our many in you you have deprivation not to total depravity, and you have what's prevenient grace, preveniant grace. God gives all people the ability to choose salvation. This is the idea. God gives everyone the ability to choose. Everyone has the ability to choose. Well, if you already have, If God's given everyone the freedom to choose salvation, then does that mean we could also just choose perfection, prevenient grace? And then number three conditional election. Salvation depends on human free will. So this is the idea. God elects you based on you electing God. See, God chooses you based on you choosing him. So God looks to see, oh, he's gonna choose me. Because he chooses me, I choose him.

48:19 There's so many issues with that just from a logical standpoint, But okay, that's the Armenian view. Deprivation not total depravity, preveniant prevenient grace, and conditional election completely radically different than the Augustinian and Reform view. Meaning the Augustinian reform view and the Armenian view are completely different, almost opposite, and their understanding of homartiology. The doctrine of sin to have completely. So if you get an Armenian and a Calvinist or a reform person and then they're arguing, stop the argument. If you don't agree on total depravity, if you don't agree on the impact, the effects, the infection of sin, you're never going to agree on salvation. There's no point even having the argument. Just you're wasting your time. If we can't agree on her martiology, there's no point in debating soteriology. There's no point either. Totally depraved impacts everything.

49:22 And for the Armenians, my issue with him is Okay, well then if we have this ability and have this freedom, well then just be perfect. Well I can't be perfect? Why not? The will then isn't free. If you can't be perfect, it means you cannot freely choose to be perfect. That means there's something holding you back. What is that? Oh yeah, that's called depravity. H interesting, So it does affect the will? Or doesn't it and affect the will? How about the Catholic view Thomistic or traditional Catholicism. Thomistic means Thomas Aquinas right. The Catholic view, well, this is the idea of their view. Is of if you want to talk about hermarteology. The Catholic view is this number one, original sin transmitted by birth, removed by baptism. So they believe in original sin that we all receive it, but it's removed by baptism. If you take that little baby boom, original sin is washed away and then they are infused, infused with righteousness. In the Catholic view, concupiscence, the tendency to sin, remains after baptism, but is not itself sin.

50:37 So concupiscence remains after your baptize, and original sin is washed away. Concupiscence remains, and this is your tendency to sin, but it's not sin itself, but the tendency is still there. And that's really weird. You're infused with righteousness, but the tendency of sin is still there. At least Catholicism has to try to explain why we continue to sin. Then mortal and venial sin. Mortal sins require confession and penance, right, venial sins don't they just weaken? Salvation is maintained through works and sacraments. So in the Catholic view, original sin is there washed the way baptism, but the desire, that feeling of wanting to sin. It still remains. You could commit a mortal or veneal sin. Mortal sin, you need confession and penance, and you need the sacraments, and you need the grace that comes from that to help maintain you and to move you on to salvation. And how about Eastern Orthodox and the Eastern Orthodox view, sin is seen more as a sickness rather than legal guilt. It is less judicial, I think than Western traditions. I think that would be fair to say. And the Eastern Orthodox, you're just you're kind of sick. You're not totally depraved.

51:56 You just kind of sick. You maybe have a bent towards not totally infected. You're just sick. You're not spiritually dead. You're just sick. And it's not seen as such like a judicial kind of guilt. The fall introduces corruption. In the Eastern Orthodox view, humans are not totally depraved. You're just weakened. See we're weak. That's completely different than total depravity totally. I mean, these are like, these views are so contradictory to one another. It's maddening to think we can't even agree on this. Within Christianity. We cannot even agree on the doctrine of sin, and then within Eastern orthodox I think it's called theosis. Theosis theosis, I think is how it's pronounced and healing. Salvation is about restoring divine image and overcoming sin. Salvation is about restoring the divine image and overcoming sin. Well, and a more reformed view, salvation is about imputed righteousness by faith. The righteousness of Christ is imputed to my account. Adam's guilt is imputed to me. My guilt is imputed to Christ, and Christ's righteousness is imputed to me. Now, the Lutheran view total depravity similar to reform view, but maintains sacramental regeneration. This

53:29 is where I'm so much in agreement with Lutheranism until right there. I don't believe that you want take a baby, put water on it and say, boom, regenerated, it's he's now a child of God. I don't believe putting water on a baby does that. I just don't. I just don't. At one that just seems to destroy salvation by grace alone through faith. The baby doesn't believe. Now, I say, they go to John the bad Well, John the Baptist heard and leapt in the womb. So a baby can, a baby can or a baby does, and it just and then they'll say, well, no, the god parents believe for the child. Well, if the god parents can believe for the child, then can't we just believe for everyone else? The whole thing becomes really and I was a Lutherans and nobody say that I don't understand Lutheranism. I was going to become a Lutheran pastor, so yeah, I think I'm pretty familiar with it all right. Now, this one is very important within the Lutheran view, believers remain sinful while being justified. Now I completely agree with that we are justified, we're still sinners. We still sin. I am, how am I justified by an imputed righteousness, But I still sin, And that continuing sin does not call into question my justification because my justification is not dependent on what I do or don't do. It's dependent on what Christ did. Now, there, I really much agree with Lutherans on that. And then I love Lutheranism's law and Gospel distinction.

54:55 They're really the only ones who even maintain it in a meaningful way anymore. I wish more Lutheran churches would just spend more time preaching on law gospel distinction because everyone else needs to hear it. The law exposes in the Gospel saves. The law says what you should do, It shows you what you don't do, and it shows you that actions are never going to be enough. And then the Gospel say, hey, hey, Christ did it for you. That's the Lutheran view. So we're looking at all the different views of martiology within the different theological systems. Please note all of these differences. Her martiology within the Augustinian and Reform view. We look at harmartiology within our Minian view, or martiology within the Catholic view of martiology within the Eastern Orthodox view of martiology within the Lutheran view. How about hamartiology within the Wesleyan holiness view, depravity but with a higher role for grace. Preveniant grace enables faith. So you have depravity, but then you get this prevenient, prevenient grace which then enables you to believe. And then within the Wesleyan view, this is where it gets really confused, the possibility of entire sanctification. Some within the Wesleyan holiness view believes in the freedom from willful sin. You can reach a point where you never willfully sin again. Now the minute you believe that and you no longer believe that sinful nature remains, you have to believe in the

56:26 eradication of the old nature. And many Christians kind of call for even within outside of the Wesleyan holiness view, you even get into some lordship, it's almost like you believe in boom, the old is completely gone. And how many Christians say that all the time. When you become a Christian, you become a new creature, the old past way, all things have become new. And they believe that in a practical way versus what it means a positional transformation, not a practical transformation. Most Christians, they may not believe in an entire sanctification, but they talk like they do that basically we are completely transforming. We basically should be per well, that's not immediately when I hear someone talk like that, I could either argue with them, or I could say we don't agree on homarteology. We don't have an agreement on homartiology. There's no point in having this conversation.

57:13 You don't believe in total depravity, and the way that I believe in total depravity. You gotta say yes, I do. No, you don't, okay, because if you did, you would know it's very much still present and we're still going to continue to sin. Now, how about within the Pentecostal charismatic world, sin can be overcome through spirit baptism. Some believe spirit filled believers have more power over sin. I think if you go to the Assemblies of God website, look at their doctrinal statement about the baptism of the Holy Spirit, and I think it specifically states that basically, if you're baptized in the Holy Spirit evidenced by speaking in tongues dun dun, duh, you have power over sin. And I've worked with so many Charismatics who've had the baptism of the Holy Spirit and have spoken tongues who've committed every known sin that you can imagine. And guess what. I'm not saying that they're more sinful than I am, but they're at least as sinful as I am. Okay, I'm not saying that I'm better than them. I'm saying that they are basically as bad as I am, meaning that they have no more power than I have or no less than I have. A right, demonic influence and sin.

58:24 Within the Pentecostal charismatic views, some see spiritual warfare as a key part of overcoming sin. They like to blame the devil for sin, the devil, the devil, the devil, instead of saying sin starts from inside, sin starts from outside, and if it is inside, it's because of a demon instead of just your sinful nature. Now, what are some of the key debates and homarteology. Well, some of the key debates and martiology are these. Number one, inherited guilt versus inherited corruption? Are humans guilty because of Adam? Are just corrupt? Now? I believe in inherited guilt and inherited corruption. I believe in Adam. We are guilty and we are corrupted, not just one or the other. We get both. Number two, total depravity versus partial depravity? Is humanity completely unable to seek God? And I say, yes, we are totally depraved, We're not partially depraved. And that total depravity remains with us from birth until death. That depravity is there and it manifests itself constantly. So the key debates in hamartiology is inherited guilt versus inherited corruption, total depravity versus partial depravity.

59:43 Number three, the role of free will. Can humans choose God apart from divine grace? Well, guess what you can choose God apart from divine grace If you don't believe in total depravity. If you believe in total depravity, then it's illogical. And I got so fed up. And of my independent fundamental Baptist churches that were there, we say we believe in total depravity, but we do not believe in Calvinism because everyone is free to choose. The will is free. And I'm like, well, if the will is free, then you don't believe in total de bravity. Man alive, It's not that complicated. Just say you don't believe in total de bravity. Just say it. Be more honest with your Armenian heritage. Sinless perfection. Can believers reach a state where they no longer sin? I say, absolutely, not not even close, because the standard to be would be be holy as God is holy. You've never done that, you never will do that. So you're in a perpetual status sin.

1:00:42 I'm in a perpetual status sin. No matter how many things you want to look at and say, look at me, look at me. I've been transformed. You're in a perpetual status in nature versus nurture. Is sin purely a spiritual reality? Or does environment contribute Well, we can look to environment and how it may contribute sin, But let me tell you it starts from inside. External only has power because there's an internal thing. Like the external thing sends out the radio signal, you've got to have the transmitter to pick it up. And the transmitter is your sinful nature that picks up and it tunes in perfectly to every sinful thing the world offers. See, if you ever want to talk about how Satan operates, he doesn't have to do much. He just has to have a world system that just offers up everything that our receiver is ready to pick up, which is your sinful nature. We can blame the world, but it starts from inside of us.

1:01:40 And even if you remove everything in the world, we ourselves will come up with the very sin that you say Hollywood is corrupting everyone. Hollywood is only reflecting the corruption that is inside of us. Remove Hollywood, the same corruption would be there. Go to Genesis. How do you get rape, incest? You get all those horrible things that happened why? Because of it starts inside. They did not need Hollywood, they didn't need music. It's inside of us. Those are the key debates on hamartiology. Inherited guilt versus inherited corruption, total depravity versus partial to pravity, the roll of free will, sinless perfection, nature versus nurture, And here is a conclusion. According to Ai, harmartiology is foundational to Christian theology because it defines why salvation is necessary and how God addresses sin. Different traditions emphasizes various aspects of sin's nature, consequences, and remedies, but all affirm that sin is humanity's greatest problem and that Christ is the ultimate solution.

1:02:43 I don't know if they all agree that sin is our greatest problem. Well maybe they do. They just tend to put the sin outside of us. So that is harmarteology. Herm Maartiology is spelled ham aar ti O l o g y AMarch theology. The people who misspelled it, No, I'm not making My only reason I pointed out is it got me to question, wait, do I even know this word? And then you notice I even odd of trouble saying it right? Okay, so I'm not pointing it out to bring any embarrassment or shame. That's why I'm not mentioning the name. If they correct it, then probably what I'll do is then maybe because I want everyone to go listen to the series, but I don't want anyone to think I'm pointing it out or like making fun or mocking, because I'm not. Like I said, I was confused for a minute. I even like I said, I got the piece of paper right here, I can show you. I have the letters h A, because I started to write it out and I was like, I'm like, wait a minute, is this something different or is this the doctrine of sin? So then I listened and I'm like, oh wait, that's the doctrine of sin. And I'm like, okay, well, this is they're going to present to me on a silver platter the opportunity to do an overview on hamarteology.

1:04:02 And that's what we just did. Harmartiology is the doctrine of sin. We have looked at it, the Biblical foundations for harmartiology, the definition of sin, the categories of sin, the effects of sin, harmartiology, and different theological systems. We looked at the Augustinian view, the Armenian view, the Catholic view, the Eastern Orthodox view, the Lutheran view, the Wesleyan view, the Pentecostal charismatic view. We looked at key debates and harmartiology, inherited guilt versus inherited corruption, total depravity versus partial depravity, the role of free will, sinless perfection, the nature versus nurture. And then we concluded, and AI was very helpful in all of that. All right, see what happens when I have an empty notebook. Now, I am very interested in hearing some of the things they say about HAMMARTIOLI. Yeah, I really am. I really am. I want to hear what they have to say. And I just want to make it clear because I don't want anyone to misunderstand I'm not making fun. I am not mocking. I'm not making fun at all. I misspell things far more than probably they could even imagine. I make mistakes all the time, and the titles of my podcast I constantly, constantly. You'll look at my descriptions, they're not grammatically correct. Sometimes the punctuation either is there or not there. So by no means, I'm just grateful that I stumbled upon it and it made me go, huh what, And then I'm like, oh, homarteology.

1:05:37 The doctors said, well, then let's do an overview of it. Let's use that spelling error that I perceive to be one. Maybe there's two ways to spell it and not. I mean I could be wrong by no means? Do I think I'm being dogmatically asserting that I'm right? And I'm like, well, then we can talk about it. And then what happened? Because I had both ways of spelling it, I kept mispronouncing it. I kept miss pronouncing it all right, Yeah, I don't even Yeah, I'm going back looking the way they write it, And once again my mind almost wants to because I kept trying to learn how to say it their way, because I'm like, yeah, I've been doing this wrong for my whole life, right, so harm arteology.

1:06:18 Now again you can argue, why do we have to know these big words? I think it's important though, right it is. Our motives can be wrong for wanting them, but knowing them is good, right because whenever we see them, we know what they are. We need to be we need to be philologically educated so that any discussion we can make. Oh, I know what you're talking about. I know what you're talking about. I know, so that you're not misled or lied to. And when someone throws out the word, you don't immediately find yourself going ooh, I'm so impressed they know more than me. You'll be like, okay, well I know the word too, and you're not. I think sometimes using word, I'm not saying that this is the case, and the people I was listening to, I'm not saying this is the case. I'm seeing some cases people throw out the terms, and I think it gives them a greater sense of authority, and people have a tendency to just go along with what they say because it sounds so right. All right, I'm leaning back here and going to plug in my iPad. I'm always wiping out my battery. Okay, I think we did good. I think we did good. All right. I know that was kind of impromptu way off of all the other things we need to talk about, but I mean, hey, doing a little overview in the doctrine of sin. How can that go wrong on a Saturday afternoon. Thanks for listening. Now, think about the correct understanding of sin and how it impacts every other area of your theology. God bless