First off, you may ask what is sin exactly?

Literally speaking, sin is a transgression against divine law. (anything that is against gods laws/commandments.) Sin is any action, any thought, or word that is considered immoral, harmful, selfish, ect. The word ‘sin’ alone appears over 400 times in the bible! The origins of the word ‘sin’ is actually a term that is used in archery to explain when you miss the bullseye after shooting the arrow; you’r not hitting the mark that you were aiming at. In other words, to understand sin we need to understand what we are aiming at which is glorifying God. Anything that is considered a sin is what you would consider depicting an inaccurate view of who god really is.

Where did sin come from? Where did it start in the bible?

Sin all starts in the first book of the bible: Genesis 3 :God makes humans (the word human is actually ‘Adam’ in Hebrew, in which the first man was named after) and makes them in His image which has to do with their role and purpose in Gods world so they are made to be reflections of God’s character out into the world. Their purpose was to take care of the world and be fruitful. God gives these humans a garden; The Garden of Eden(which is a place where they begin starting to build this new world).

The humans have a choice about how they are going to go about building this world (the tree of the knowledge of good and evil). God has defined to them what is good and not good, he gives humans the freedom of choice; if they have the choice to either trust gods definitions of good and evil or define it for themselves. (To rebel against god is to embrace death because you’re turning away from the giver of life himself.)

Later, a snake -just known as a creature that god has made; a creature in rebellion against god and wants to lead the humans into rebellion and their death- This snake tells Adam and Eve a different story about the tree and says that ceasing the knowledge of good and evil doesn’t lead to death, it instead leads to becoming like god themselves (although they were already made in the image of God), instead of trusting God, they follow the serpent (snake) and take the fruit from the tree and eat of it; they take from the tree of knowledge of good and evil and instantly feels the wrath of God. Because of this, humanity begins to fall.

The first downfall is human relations, the man and the woman both see how vulnerable they are (they were both naked at first in the garden of Eden) so they made garments and hide their bodies from one another, they can’t trust each other. The second, downfall is the intimacy between god and the humans are destroyed, the man and the woman hide from god and when god finds them they blame each other about who rebelled against god first.

Eve was the first to take the fruit, but it was also Adams fault because as a man, it was his job to protect her from doing so and he didn’t. God then informs Adam and eve (this is going to be the curse on mankind) that their life will be filled with grief and pain leading to their death. (Genesis 1–4) This was the first case of sinning against God.

• Most of us don’t consider ourselves harmful or a criminal for the fact being the laws of this world would tell us that we are not. If we haven’t murdered anyone, stolen, vandalized, ect…why would we be considered a criminal? We are spiritual criminals. We think we are good people and better than others because we don’t commit the worst kinds of sin. All sin leads to the same place, hell.

• A common question I get asked is, “do Christians sin?” YES!! of course they do, all human being sin. The difference is that Christians are sinners saved by grace, and stay in the word of God for repentance. In the bible it says ALL people sin. (Romans 3:23, 1 John 1:8) We are all born sinners, there is no way to escape that, instead we have ‘repentance’.

With all of that being said, the greatest commandment in the law is “to love the lord with all your heart and all your soul and with all your mind.” Followed by loving your neighbor as yourself. All of the laws are based on love. THIS is what our life should aim for. If we already knew how to love each other, he wouldn’t need to tell us this. All of his commands are showing love to him, ourselves and others. This is what helps us not to sin! Don’t focus just on how to stop sinning. Focus on your relationship with God. You’re breaking the relationship with God, you’re not just breaking a commandment or law. God’s law reveals his character.

Isaiah 43:7. 1 John 1:8–10. Genesis 20:6