Are people basically good?

[Robert]

2 hours ago, David Geelan said:

What about when someone does something good? When a Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, Zorostrian or atheist shows self-sacrificing love to help a stranger?

How do you know it's self-sacrificing love?  Can you read the motive?  Christ can and according to Him good works are impossible without Him.  Everything produced outside Christ is polluted with self.

Now, I am not saying that God doesn't accept men were they are at and work through them.

[Robert]

1 hour ago, JoeMo said:

I disagree. " For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— ⁷ because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.  ..."  (Rom. 6:6-8)

Yes, our old Adamic life died "in Christ" about 2000 years ago on Calvary.  You as an individual didn't even exist.  But, if you want to apply this to you then to be fair to the context then you must also insist that you are "free from sin", i.e., you are beyond sinning.

[Robert]

4 hours ago, Samie said:

Ezekiel 18:20  The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son.

Yes, that means that sin and guilt cannot be transferred.  The one who sins must die.  Nevertheless, "all have sinned" therefore all must die.  And we did "in Christ Jesus".  When One died, all died.

[Robert]

13 minutes ago, Robert said:

Now, I am not saying that God doesn't accept men were they are at and work through them.

Wherever there is an impulse of love (agape) and sympathy, wherever the heart reaches out to bless and uplift others, there is revealed the working of God's Holy Spirit. In the depths of heathenism, men who have had no knowledge of the written law of God, who have never even heard the name of Christ, have been kind to His servants, protecting them at the risk of their own lives. Their acts show the working of a divine power. The Holy Spirit has implanted the grace of Christ in the heart of the savage, quickening his sympathies contrary to his nature, contrary to his education. The "Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world" (John 1:9), is shining in his soul; and this light, if heeded, will guide his feet to the kingdom of God. [COL p. 386]

[Robert]

Also keep what Paul said of those who didn't have a knowledge of the law:

Rom 2:14 For when Gentiles who do not have the Law do instinctively the things of the Law, these, not having the Law, are a law to themselves, 15 in that they show the work of the Law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness and their thoughts alternately accusing or else defending them, 16 on the day when, according to my gospel, God will judge the secrets of men (his motives) through Christ Jesus.

 

[Bravus]

A moral system that simply defines any moral goodness in anyone not of one's own religion as fake is fundamentally broken.

[Robert]

1 hour ago, David Geelan said:

A moral system that simply defines any moral goodness in anyone not of one's own religion as fake is fundamentally broken.

I don't believe anyone has done this....

[Aliensanctuary]

Because all flesh is weak and is ruled by a tyrant, Self, mankind must struggle to unlearn selfish practices that harm others and cause a separation from our Creator. Once we are baptized in the River of Life, the selfishness of our human natures will be deleted and replaced with the selflessness that Christ demonstrated. Only then can we become one with YHVH and his creation.

If we don't struggle against our propensity to transgress the laws of YHVH, and instead lay ourselves down on a bed of ease, we will likely fail the test at the end of time and lose out on the Kingdom. Unfortunately, we have too many distractions that lure us off the path to the Kingdom. 

Without parents teaching their children the importance of practicing the 10 C's, civilization will slowly, but inexorably, slide into a great, black-hole cesspool,  so full of abominations. Without the guidance of the Laws of the LORD, civilization will eventually destroy itself, driven mad by the demons of war.

[Samie]

On 11/05/2016 at 8:52 PM, Samie said:

People are born In Christ, hence, they are basically good.

On 11/05/2016 at 3:24 AM, Robert said:

Romans 3:11 “There is none righteous, not even one; ...12 There is none who does good, There is not even one.”

Matt 19:17 "there is none good but one, that is, God:"

 

What you cited are AFTER birth scenarios after people reach the age of accountability. The issue is whether people are basically good at birth. Even Jesus used the little children as examples of those who would inherit the kingdom of heaven.

[Samie]

That people are born spiritually dead in sin has led to erroneous domino effects. For the Arminians, it led them to ask the dead to believe. For the Calvinists, it led them to do away with free will. For some others, it led them to consider only Christians can make it to heaven. And what more, God is portrayed as a Father who just folded His hands and did nothing but simply watched His children drown, why?  Because He did nothing to forestall the change of Adam's nature but instead simply watched as it morphed from good to bad causing all his descendants to be born spiritually dead in sin. That unless people first  believe they cannot be In Christ, presents salvation as one of works.

That people are born In Christ and therefore spiritually alive is beyond question. Other than biblically founded, it portrays God in a better light in that He did His best to forestall the change of Adam's nature from good to bad even if would cost Him His only begotten Son. All people, born before or after the cross, are placed in equal footing before God in that all were empowered and hence all are accountable. That it was God Who caused people to be born In Christ presents salvation as all by grace. Yet man's free will is not compromised, for only overcomers will not be blotted out from the book of life.

[JoeMo]

 

13 hours ago, Robert said:

15 hours ago, JoeMo said:

I disagree. " For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— ⁷ because anyone who has died has been set free from sin.  ..."  (Rom. 6:6-8)

13 hours ago, Robert said:

Yes, our old Adamic life died "in Christ" about 2000 years ago on Calvary.  You as an individual didn't even exist.  But, if you want to apply this to you then to be fair to the context then you must also insist that you are "free from sin", i.e., you are beyond sinning.

On the one hand, the verse does not say I am free from sin; it says I have been SET free from [ the slavery of] sin.  The BAD news is, I infer from this that when I sin, now; it is MY choice to sin, not because of the enslavement of satan.  Honestly, I view being set free from the slavery of sin as good news; but - knowing that I still sin (admittedly willingly sometimes) - the legalist side of me gets a little concerned sometimes.

[joeb]

Are human beings naturally good?  No.  The Bible tells us that our hearts are deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.  I accept that face value. 

As someone who spent years in addictive addiction I know a good deal about how deceitful our hearts are.  The addict lives in denial of who he is.  He lies to himself and everyone else about who he is.  The only way to recover from addiction is to deal honestly with yourself.  Many people are unable/unwilling to do this.  I know because I watched people who became friends of mine in NA fall back into active addiction and the one thing they had in common was lying to themselves about who they were.  They had no desire to honestly look deeply into themselves and then make the changes required of them to stay clean.  It was so much easier to just lie to themselves and others than to put forth the effort it takes to face up to themselves and then to others by making all the wrongs they had done to others right as far as humanly possible.  

I struggled with this big time.  It's so much more pleasant (or at least it seems so at the time) to take the easy way out.  I had to face up to things about myself that were anything but pleasant.  It was humiliating to acknowledge what I had become, who I was at that time.  It was even more humiliating to go to the people I had wronged and do all I could to make those things right.   But, it was necessary.  It's the only workable path to leaving addiction behind.

Now, since we are all sinful, born into sin, and can't seem to leave it alone other than through the power of God, if we want to overcome sin we must admit that we are addicted to sin.  We have to admit our powerlessness over it and that sin is at the very core of who we are as individuals. Its pernicious behaviors and results affect every aspect of our lives, even if/when we don't want to admit it.  Just like the drug addict's heart lies to him about his condition, every sinful human being's heart will lie to him/her about the depth of the hold sin has upon them.  .  

All we are capable of on our own is tinged with sin, which is nothing but the holding self supreme in all things.  Sin is selfishness.  Now, we can look at the actions of an individual who sacrifices for others and say, Wow, what a good person, but we cannot see into their hearts to see their real motivation.  All we can really know about it is that the Bible is correct in its assessment of the human heart.  So, we must acknowledge that even the person who sacrifices greatly (the person apart from Christ) does it to get something they value highly that even though they may not be aware of it themselves(the heart is deceitful above all things) their altruism is done to get something they highly value.  In other words, it isn't really altruistic.  It just appears that way from the outside. 

As to Robert's continued rant that nothing should be done for self, he is ignoring the fact that if a person doesn't feed, clothe, house himself, educate himself according to the gifts God has given him, that person is absolutely useless to the rest of society.  If he starves himself, lives under a bridge, dresses in rags, neglects to educate himself as much as possible, and doesn't earn to the ability God gave him, he can contribute nothing toward the welfare of others.  He lives only for himself if he contributes nothing toward the welfare of others, so his first duty is towards himself.  God requires that he become all that God created him to be.  He cannot fulfill the role God created him to fill if he doesn't take care of himself first, and if he does not fulfill the role God created him to fill he is sinning against God.  He has making God look bad.  He is smearing God's character.   He is  robbing God of the talents that God gave him.

[Robert]

9 hours ago, JoeMo said:

The verse does not say I am free from sin; it says I have been SET free from [ the slavery of] sin.... infer from this that when I sin, now; it is MY choice to sin....

Why would you choose to sin if you have been set free?  No, you sin because you have a sin nature and therefore you have not been freed from "indwelling sin".

Rom 7:20  But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.

[Robert]

3 hours ago, joeb said:

As to Robert's continued rant that nothing should be done for self, he is ignoring the fact that if a person doesn't feed, clothe, house himself, educate himself according to the gifts God has given him, that person is absolutely useless to the rest of society. 

So then, Christ was useless to society?

"As they (Christ & the disciples) were going along the road, someone said to Him, 'I will follow You wherever You go.'  And Jesus said to him, 'The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head." Luke 9:57,58

Apparently there was no self-seeking in Christ's life.  What does that say about your so called gifts? Gifts from God are not to be used for selfish purposes (see James 4:3)

Also, why did Christ tell the Rich Young Ruler "If you wish to be perfect (blameless), go sell your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me." Matt 19:21 

 

[Robert]

3 hours ago, joeb said:

....his first duty is towards himself.  .... He cannot fulfill the role God created him to fill if he doesn't take care of himself first....

Lucifer agrees wholeheartedly.  After all, he felt agape was too restrictive.  Hence he introduced the principle of "self. 

 

[Robert]

When Satan rebelled against God in heaven [Revelation 12:7-9], he was really rebelling against the God’s agape love the spirit of His law [Matthew 22:36-40; Romans 13:10; Galatians 5:13-14].  The idea that “love (agape) seeketh not her own” (i.e., self) [1 Corinthians 13:5] was too restrictive to Lucifer.  Consequently he objected to it and introduced the principle of self-love or eros [Ezekiel 28:15; Isaiah 14:12-14].  Therefore, ever since his fall, the enemy of God and man (Satan) has hated the concept of agape.  (JS)

[Robert]

Using man as his tool, Satan has developed a kingdom (the Bible refers to it as “the kingdom of this world”) that is based entirely on the principle of self and which is in complete opposition and contradiction to the “kingdom of heaven.”  Everything, therefore, that goes to make up this worldly system (kosmos) — nationalism, tribalism, politics, education, commerce, recreation, sports, social clubs, technology, etc. — is founded upon the principle of love of self, even though at times this principle may not be obvious.  According to 1 John 2:16, “all that is in the world” (i.e., without exception) is based or founded upon lust (i.e., love of self). [JS]

[Robert]

3 hours ago, joeb said:

his first duty is towards himself.

Does your theology agree with Christ's teachings?

Luke 12:22  Then Jesus said to his disciples: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. 23 For life is more than food, and the body more than clothes.

24 Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them.  And how much more valuable you are than birds! 25 Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to your life? 26 Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?

27 “Consider how the wild flowers grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. 28 If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you—you of little faith! 

29 And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. 30 For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. 31 But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well.

32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. 33 Sell your possessions and give to the poor.   Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will never fail, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. 34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

[Robert]

7 minutes ago, Robert said:

27 How much more will he clothe you—you of little faith! ...33 Sell your possessions and give to the poor.   

Do we have an example where this happened in the Bible and what was the result of living to serve instead of first taking care of self?

 Acts 4:32 All the believers were one in heart and mind (i.e., there was unity). No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had.....(the result?) 4 ...there were no poverty among them. 

[Robert]

4 hours ago, joeb said:

his first duty is towards himself.  

"Let no man seek his own, but every man another's wealth." 1 Cor 10:24

My point?  Agape is not self-seeking.  We are not born with agape, period.  We are born with self-love or a u-turn agape.  It's agape, bent back to self. Hence without Christ mankind is bankrupt of doing genuine good works. 

[Samie]

1 hour ago, Robert said:

Why would you choose to sin if you have been set free?  No, you sin because you have a sin nature and therefore you have not been freed from "indwelling sin".

Following your logic, Adam fell into sin because Adam was created with sin nature. No; that's unscriptural, to me: Adam came out perfect from God's hands: in the image of God and in the likeness of his Maker. So why did he sin? Because he chose to.

Like Adam from the hands of God, we all were born In Christ, free moral agents. It is our choice whether to be overcome of evil or overcome evil with good. Overcomers will not be blotted out from the book of life and will be seated with Christ - Who Himself is an overcomer -  in His throne. Rev 3:5, 21.

[Robert]

9 hours ago, Samie said:

Following your logic, Adam fell into sin because Adam was created with sin nature. No; that's unscriptural, to me: Adam came out perfect from God's hands: in the image of God and in the likeness of his Maker. So why did he sin? Because he chose to.

The Scriptures do not tell how Adam could sin.  However Adam was not tempted because temptation comes from within (see Mark 7:21).  Therefore it must remain a mystery because the Bible doesn't explain how a sinless being, made in the image of God, could sin.

Ellen White: 

It is impossible to explain the origin of sin so as to give a reason for its existence. Yet enough may be understood concerning both the origin and the final disposition of sin to make fully manifest the justice and benevolence of God in all His dealings with evil. Nothing is more plainly taught in Scripture than that God was in no wise responsible for the entrance of sin; that there was no arbitrary withdrawal of divine grace, no deficiency in the divine government, that gave occasion for the uprising of rebellion. Sin is an intruder, for whose presence no reason can be given. It is mysterious, unaccountable; to excuse it is to defend it. Could excuse for it be found, or cause be shown for its existence, it would cease to be sin. Our only definition of sin is that given in the word of God; it is "the transgression of the law;" it is the outworking of a principle at war with the great law of love which is the foundation of the divine government. {GC 492, 493}

[Robert]

9 hours ago, Samie said:

...we all were born In Christ, free moral agents. It is our choice whether to be overcome of evil or overcome evil with good. Overcomers will not be blotted out from the book of life and will be seated with Christ - Who Himself is an overcomer -  in His throne. Rev 3:5, 21.

This is a subtle form of legalism...

1] We are born slaves to our love of self.  Ps 51:5 & Eph 2:3

2] Overcoming refers to our faith, not our works of the law.  "This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith." 1 John 5:4

[Samie]

1 hour ago, Robert said:

The Scriptures do not tell how Adam could sin.

That's beside the point.

Fact is Adam sinned and that despite NOT having a sin nature, disproving your statement that people sin because of sin nature. You are attributing sin nature to Adam's fall, as if God did NOTHING to forestall the impending change.

You correctly proclaim that God is agape but you portray Him otherwise by insisting that Adam's nature morphed from good to bad and God simply folded His hands and did nothing to forestall the change. No sir. As planned before time began, God intervened that day and reinstated Adam to his original nature before the Fall, an act that cost Him His only begotten Son, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. That act caused Adam's descendants to be born NOT spiritually dead in sin but spiritually alive In Christ.

[Samie]

1 hour ago, Robert said:

This is a subtle form of legalism...

No sir. Overcoming cannot be legalism because people are born already In Christ. One does not overcome to be In Christ. He is already In Christ. Unlike what you teach:

You teach that to be In Christ, one has to believe first. That is legalism although you deny it.