THE KING’S BUSINESS
269
“Hamartia.” This word literally means to miss the mark and is the most frequently used word to speak of sin in the New Testament. Jesus used it principally in speaking of the central purpose of His mission. It is the word used, for example, in Luke 5 :24. “The Son of man hath authority on earth to for give sins.” Sin was a moral failure with which Jesus had power to deal. Because of it men missed the mark. In other words, they failed to realize the purpose for which they were cre ated. Here, again, we see that in stead of Christ thinking of sin as something that helped men by way of drawing out the best that is in them He clearly taught that it was a posi tive hindrance that led men to miss the mark. Christ used a third word which shows that men are responsible for this failure. The word is “Anomia” and is usually translated iniquity, but it literally means without law. It de scribes the attitude of the man who refuses to obey law. It is the word which Paul used in his letter to the Thessalonians in describing “the mys tery of lawlessness.” This word sug gests the nature and source of this arrest in human life which causes it to miss the mark. Man refuses to obey the law of God which is the law of development in his own life as a result the life is injured and it misses the mark or goal for which it was in tended. Man chooses to disobey God. This is rebellion, and man is respon sible for his choice. Therefore, man is responsible for his failure to reach the mark. This is unquestionably the teaching of Jesus regarding man’s failure through sin. He always spoke of it and dealt with it as something for which men were responsible. Gathering together the suggestions
which we get from these words and Christ’s use of them we conclude: First,' that Jesus always looked upon sin as antagonistic to God and His purposes, and contrary to the best in terests of man and the world. In His view it is always destructive, and never constructive. Second, He look ed upon it as an act of rebellion against God and His laws, and therefore, in the very nature of things, not essential to the purposes of God. Third, man is responsible for this act of rebellion and must in order to be saved be brought into submission to God. In order to realize this life he must be saved from sin. In this case it is non sense to speak of sin as essential to the realization of life. It is not necessary to give a very profound study to the book of Acts in order to discover that this concep tion of sin was at the very heart of the preaching of the Apostolic Church. They preached that Jesus was cruci fied to save men from their sins. Therefore they challenged men to for sake their sins and to submit to God in Christ. We shall now come to the question of how this conception stands the test of the facts of modern life. In the first place we have no hesi tancy in saying that sin as we meet it in modern life is still a destructive ele ment in individual and social life. We have no cases of sin evolving into something good. Wherever it is found it is found to be disintegrating in its influence. In the second place men are quite conscious of the fact that it is because of sin that we are failing to realize. our individual and socal ideals. As a matter of experience we know that sin is not helping us to be what we ought to be. On the contrary we are quite sure that it is what is standing between us and what we know to be right and true. Many of the most profound thinkers of our day are beginning to
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