#913 Freedom to Not Sin
November 10, 2024Greetings and blessings from Canada, Dr. Craig. Recently I had a conversation with an atheist who claimed that sin is not a freewill choice. He quoted Romans 3:23 which says “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” and then went on to say that if every human being ever born in the normal way to normal parents has sinned, then sin is more like eating, breathing, or sleeping: It’s something we MUST do in accordance with the human nature we were created with. This then is the fault of the creator, not the created. He then went on to say that the only way to defeat this argument is to give examples of people who have made a free choice not to sin and been successful. Even if the number of such people was vanishingly small, that would be enough to prove that we have a choice to sin or not. But that would then defeat the claim that Christ was unique in having led a sin-free life, which is not an option for us Christians. Therefore, sin is baked into our heavenly DNA, as he put it. God made us that way, in other words. I must admit, I had never heard this argument before, and did not know how to respond. Your help would be greatly appreciated.
Respectfully Yours,
Murray
Canada
Dr. craig’s response
A
While I wouldn’t expect an atheist to be familiar with Christian doctrines of original sin and total depravity, I’m rather worried that you as a Christian, Murray, should be similarly uninformed theologically.
It is standard Christian doctrine that no person (who does not die in infancy) has the ability to avoid sinning. The Scriptures say that we are slaves of sin (Romans 6.16-18) and therefore unable to avoid sin completely. We may freely choose which sins to commit, but we cannot avoid sinning altogether.
But it doesn’t follow that therefore sin is “something we MUST do in accordance with the human nature we were created with.” Standard Christian doctrine is that human beings were created by God morally innocent and free to avoid sin. But humans freely fell into sin, and as a result we inherit a corrupted nature that has lost its capacity to avoid sin. Therefore Christian doctrine rejects the inference that “God made us that way” and “sin is baked into our heavenly DNA.” Rather sin is baked into our corrupted human nature. Since your friend is apparently attacking the internal consistency of Christian doctrine, he cannot ignore the doctrine of the hereditary corruption of human nature that most Christians adhere to.
Ironically, I myself do not hold to the traditional doctrine of original sin. So I provide an explanation for the universality of human sinning that does not appeal to an inherited corruption (see Question of the Week #878). On my view infants are born sinless and morally uncorrupted but become corrupted as they grow up.
In any case, the question we face, enslaved in sin, is what to do about it. The good news of the Gospel is that God offers forgiveness of sins and moral cleansing for those who turn to him in repentance and faith. By His Holy Spirit, God seeks to convict us of sin and draw us to salvation from sin. It is not inevitable that we resist the Holy Spirit and spurn God’s efforts to save us. Thus, there is a way out.
What solution does your atheist friend have to offer to the problem of endemic sin?
- William Lane Craig