henning@acsu.buffalo.edu (Karl isochronal Henning) (03/20/91)
>THE REASON FOR SIN > You may be wondering why every person is a sinner. The Bible >says, "By one man sin entered into the world." (Romans 5:12) >That one man was Adam. Hadn't Eve sinned first? Did "sin" not "enter into the world" until Adam ate of the fruit, too? I know, I know -- Paul was being /figurative/ ... >We are all his descendents, and just as a >physical likeness is passed from generation to generation, so the >sinful human nature is passed down. Well, suppose we all /did/ descend genealogically from the same pair of ur-parents; does this not weaken your argument, as we would then have every reason to expect (from our apparent anthropological diversity) that humankind are equally diverse on the point of "human nature"? We can't all inherit "Adam"'s likeness; why must we all inherit any such "nature"? Likeness changes -- yea, evolves -- across the generations; might not human nature likewise? >THE RESULT OF SIN Drumroll, please :-) > Every sinner (unless he accepts the ONE true remedy) will spend >eternity separated from God, in a literal, burning hell. Please >do not doubt the following verses from God's word: "The soul >that sinneth, it shall die." (Ezekiel 18:4) "Sin, when it is >finished, bringeth forth death." (James 1:15) "The wages of sin >is death," (Romans 6:23) "And whosoever was not found written in >the book of life was cast into the lake of fire." >(Revelation 20:15) I observe that in the verses cited, the penalty of "sin" is not hell, but death; and that the "lake of fire" is not explicitly equated with hell. Perhaps the John who composed these Revelations was being ... figurative? I fear you have not made a very strong case for a "literal, burning hell". kph -- "The shrewder mobs of America, who dislike having two minds upon a subject, both determine and act upon it drunk; by which means a world of cold and tedious speculation is dispensed with." -- Washington Irving