What's the Matter With People
Tom Shrader opens a six-week Advent series by working through Romans, James, and Ephesians to answer ten foundational questions about sin—what it is, how it entered the world through Adam, how it affects every person, and what its eternal consequences are. He argues that a low view of God produces a distorted view of self, causing people to see themselves as victims rather than as sinners in need of grace. The session concludes with Romans 6:23, presenting Christ's atoning work as the only solution to the human sin problem and inviting listeners to respond in repentance and faith.
“The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus, our Lord.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: The Greatest Gift
Recorded: 2009 at East Valley Bible Church
Duration: 40 min
Themes: sin, human nature, repentance, grace, advent, salvation, guilt, forgiveness, new believer, skeptic, struggling with shame, feeling like a victim, spiritually lost, young adult, seeker, questioning faith
Scripture: James 4:17, Romans 5:12, Romans 3:23, Romans 6:6, Romans 6:23, Romans 2:5, James 2:10, Ephesians 2:1, Romans 1:18-20, Romans 2:1
Theological Themes: hamartiology, original sin, total depravity, atonement, romans 6:23, fall of man, imputation, soteriology
Full Transcript
Introduction
If you have Bibles, you can open them to James chapter 4. If you don't have a Bible, raise your hand and the guys will give you a copy to use this morning. If you're somebody who didn't bring a Bible, you're going to need one to follow along. Get your hand up — don't be embarrassed by it. If you got a Bible from us, be aware that the publisher started numbering in Genesis 1 at page 1, and when he got to the New Testament, he started renumbering. So go toward the back third of the book, and it's page 179. We're looking at James chapter 4, verse 17.
Here's what we're going to do today. We're going to expose a need and talk about what's the matter with people. Next week, we'll talk about what's so special about Jesus — we've got this big thing, Jesus' birth, the reason for the season, what's the point. The third week, we're going to talk about His death and what's going on there. The fourth week, we're going to talk about how you can know God — not about Him, but how you can actually know God. Then we'll spend two weeks on applying that to our lives: if that's true, what difference does it make to me?
The reason you need a Bible is that we're going to talk about fundamental questions about man and mankind. The focus is on: Who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? What's wrong with me? What's wrong with the world? And rather than figure out what Rush thinks, or Hannity thinks, or Oprah thinks, let's find out what the Bible says.
A High View of God, A True View of Man
We had just completed a study in 1 and 2 Samuel. In that study, I said to you almost every week that though we're studying human characters — Samuel, Saul, David, Joab, all these people — the real character study in the book, like in the whole Bible, is God Himself. We talked a lot about God's sovereignty, and that's really important. If you don't get that straight, a whole bunch of other things are going to be messed up.
A. W. Tozer, half a century or more ago, wrote this: "The church has surrendered her once lofty concept of God, and has substituted for it one so low, so ignoble, as to be utterly unworthy of thinking or worshiping men. This she has done, not deliberately, but little by little, and without her knowledge, and her very unawareness only makes the situation all the more tragic. This low view of God, entertained almost universally among Christians, is the cause of a hundred lesser evils everywhere among us. A whole new philosophy of the Christian life has resulted from this one basic error in our religious thinking."
Tozer also said that the problem with our theology is that it does not ascend high enough — meaning we don't have a grand enough view of God — or descend low enough, so that we have an inaccurate view of man. We tend to think a little better of ourselves than we really are. The minute you get a big view of God, you see yourself proportionally for what you really are.
The Starbucks Cup and What We Have in Common
Every year the people at Starbucks give me a gift. Every year they develop a new cup for the season. This year it's little trees with ornaments that have sayings on them. One says, "I wish for a snowy day" — are you crazy? Another says, "I wish for extra cream" — okay, that one I understand. But then I saw one that I thought might disappoint me, because they always give me illustrations. It said: "I wish everyone could see how much we have in common."
So let's think about that. What is it that we have in common? Two eyes? Not everybody. Two legs? Two arms? No — we have one thing in common. One thing that every single person shares. That's where we're going today.
Ten Questions: What's the Matter With People?
The big question for today is: what's the matter with people? We're going to work through ten questions. The first question is this — what does God call it when we break His rules?
You have the answer right there in James chapter 4, verse 17: "Anyone who knows the right thing to do and doesn't do it, to him it is called" — sin. When you get a big view of God, you see yourself proportionally for what you really are. But we look around and see a world that doesn't even acknowledge this thing called sin.
And in that world, here's a problem we see everywhere: always a victim, never the villain. It's been a while, but I listened to Dr. Laura not long ago. A woman called in and said, "My husband's a sex addict." Laura said, "No he isn't." The caller said, "Do you know me? Do you know him? How can you say that?" Laura said to her: "Do you like sex?" "Yes." "Do you enjoy sex?" "Yes." "When do you have sex?" She said, "When I want to." Laura said, "So does he." Now, there are all sorts of things going on there, and I'm not dismissing the idea of addiction or chemical drivers — I know there are things that happen in that space. But roughly —
Sin, Desire, and Why We Do What We Do
What we have here is a sin issue and a desire issue. I used to drink a lot — almost every day. Then one day I quit. Was it the day I came to Christ in repentance and faith? No. I wish. I quit the day when the pain I was doing to myself and the people around me exceeded the joy I had in the drinking. That's when I quit.
Some of the men may remember a quarterback for the New York Giants named Joe Pisarcik. Joe Pisarcik was playing against the Eagles, and I happened to have bet on the game — the last football game I ever bet on. All he had to do was fall on the ball, and he wins, and I win my bet. For some unknown reason I will never figure out, he decides to hand the ball off instead. A fumble occurs, the ball bounces out, Herman Edwards picks it up, runs into the end zone — touchdown Eagles. The Eagles win, and I lose a bet I had already won. I said, I'm done. The pain of losing exceeded the joy of winning.
What is behind all of this? It is sin. When we do things, we are not victims — we are villains. It is our fault. It is sin.
How Sin Entered the World
Here is the second question: how did sin get into all of this? How did this happen? We go to Romans chapter 5, verse 12. Here is how sin got into the world: "Just as through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, so that death spread to all men, because all sinned." Who sinned? Every person who has ever lived. How did it happen? When Adam sinned, he plunged the whole world into ruin.
I get people all the time who say, "When I get to heaven I'm going to ask God..." I don't really have difficult questions for God. I do have one for Adam, and it goes something like: what were you thinking? Did you not understand this? When Adam sinned, we were identified with him — he represented us — and we were plunged into sin.
In the room today there are two groups of people. Some of you already believe this, and my hope is that you will not simply think "I already know it," but that you will want to know it more deeply and be reminded of it so you go deeper. Others of you may be hearing this and thinking it is out there. Maybe you are here for the very first time. The person who invited you is not doing a bait-and-switch — they did not know this is where I was going with this. You are here because God brought you here for a specific reason, which would be my guess. Or maybe you have been around for a while and have never really responded. I just want you to wrestle with this.
The Objection: Do You Really Believe in Adam?
When I hear that when Adam sinned we all sinned, I have two reactions. The first is: wait a minute — you really believe in Adam? Come on, it is 2009. I remember in March of 1980, when I went into a Bible study for the first time and met with Larry, and he started with this Adam material. I said, are you kidding me? It is 1980. Do you believe in that? Noah, Jonah — do you believe in all of that?
Here is the thing: for thousands of years, people have been saying the same thing. There was a Bible study long ago where someone sat down and said, "There was this Adam," and someone else said, "Come on, man — it's 187." They just did. We hear that the Bible is an old, dated book. It is. It is also a timeless book, written by a timeless God. You and I are fundamentally, at our core, the same as every person who has ever been born since Adam sinned. We are sinners.
The Objection: Is Imputation Fair?
The second reaction, if you really process it, is that it does not seem fair — that Adam's sin is imputed to us. The technical term is imputation, and it can feel unjust. But we do not want to go too far down that road, because the solution to this entire problem is Christ imputing His righteousness to us. So we are all for imputation. We all sinned — every one of us.
That is also, by the way, why the virgin birth is so important. If Jesus had had an earthly father like you or me, then I might as well have died on the cross for you, or you for me. How did it all begin? It began when Adam sinned.
Are All People Really Sinners?
Here is the third question: is this really for all of us? Are all people sinners? Romans chapter 3, verse 23 — all. Right there. All. Every person. All seven billion of us. All are sinners.
We actually acknowledge this all the time, even outside of a theological framework. Here is a simple proof. Finish this phrase: nobody's perfect. Nobody's perfect — we all know that. Well, if nobody is perfect, then everyone is flawed. That flaw is called sin. There are no perfect people running around the world.
A Conversation at the Office
When God saved me, I was working in an office with a man who was my manager and was not a Christian at all. When God saved me it was fairly radical, and a whole lot of life change followed. I talked to a number of different people, and he was one of them. I kept asking him to do a Bible study — asking and asking. He said no every time. Finally he said he would go to a Bible study if I went to one of his events. I asked what his event was, and after he told me a little about it I was unsure. He said, "Come on, go to this and I'll go to a Bible study." I agreed. When I got there, it was an EST seminar — and you have to be a little older to remember EST.
The Problem with Sin
We are all sinners. There is something wrong with us and with the world, and it seems to me that sin is the one thing for which we have empirical data. Every one of us is a sinner.
Here is the fourth question we need to examine: How great is sin's impact on your life? If you have a Bible, turn to page 122, or Romans 6. We are going to work through this in subsets, but in the broadest sense, Paul is talking about the effect sin has had on us as believers. He says at the last part of verse 6, "so we are no longer slaves to sin." The wage of sin is death. We are separated from God, and we are by nature sinners.
We love sin and we hate the things of God. We use the term "natural man" to describe that condition — the state all of us are in when we come into the world. Jesus said this: no one can serve two masters. You will either love one and hate the other. You will either love God or love the world, but you cannot love both simultaneously. You cannot serve two masters.
In that same book of Romans, where Paul says you are no longer a slave to sin, he opens by describing himself as a slave to God, to the Lord Jesus Christ. You are never in the position of master. You are always a slave.
Degrees of Sin and the Human Condition
Are there degrees of sin? Turn to page 119, Romans chapter 2. Paul is talking about how we are not without excuse, and in chapter 2 verse 5 he says, "because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of judgment." We are all sinners who are storing up wrath.
Now, I want to come at this from a slightly different angle. It does seem that there are degrees of hell or degrees of reward — we get that sense from Scripture — though I do not know exactly how hell gets worse. But in the broadest terms, all of us are lost. In his natural state, Billy Graham is no closer to Christ than Saddam Hussein in his natural state. We are all enslaved to our nature.
The Freed Hostage and the Ungrateful Heart
I was watching a program about hostages who had been released, and they noted two characteristics that appear almost universally in freed hostages. Number one, they are very thankful. Number two, they are extraordinarily gracious. They have experienced firsthand what captivity was like, and having been freed from it, their hearts are filled with thanksgiving. They are very kind, very gracious people.
We are not that. It just drives me crazy. If I go into Starbucks and I buy one of those drinks that costs $3.95, and I hand the person a five-dollar bill, they give me back a dollar and a nickel and I say thank you — and almost without fail, they respond: "No problem." Well, of course it is no problem. I just gave you four dollars for something that costs a nickel. It is your job. It is what they pay you to do. You are not a barista if I do not come in and buy this. You ought to be glad I am there.
When I was in my freshman year of college, I worked construction over the summer. I was a common laborer — the very bottom of the totem pole. I worked with all these men who rode me all summer, and it was actually a great experience. At one point I was given a job to dig a hole — a large hole, roughly twice as long and twice as wide as a good-sized rug, and deep enough that by the time I got down into it I was throwing dirt up and out of it. We were pouring footings for a porch on a building. By the third day I said, "Why don't you bring a backhoe in here and just dig this thing out?" He looked at me and said, "If I did that, college boy, you would not have a job." And I said, "That is a good point."
But that is exactly the attitude we carry everywhere. You go through a checkout line, you sign the credit card slip, hand it back, and they say, "Have a good one." We are not thankful. We are not gracious. We are not like freed hostages who understand what they have been delivered from.
The Sixth Question: How Many Sins Does It Take to Separate Me from God?
If you work in the service industry, when somebody gives you money for something you're selling, you say to them, "Thank you." When somebody holds a door for you, you say, "Thank you." If you hold a door for somebody and they say thank you to you, you would say, "You're welcome." This is kindness. When you're a freed hostage, your life is filled with graciousness and thanksgiving.
Now, here is the sixth question: How many sins does it take to separate me from God? Back to James, chapter 2, verse 10, page 178. As human beings, we are always looking to categorize this. We are always doing it by way of comparison. We want to say, "I'm not him, I'm not him, I'm not him."
Max Lucado writes about Jeffrey Dahmer. The last time I mentioned Jeffrey Dahmer, I laid out what it was that he did, for the sake of historical perspective, because a lot of people simply don't know who he is anymore. I received a letter saying, "I don't think you should talk about those things in church." Out of respect for that person, I'm not going to list what he did, but they were heinous and terrible things.
Max Lucado is writing and he says: what bothers me about Jeffrey Dahmer is not this, or this, or this. The trouble for me is that if reports are true, three months before he died, he became a Christian, was baptized, and will be in heaven. Now that is a problem for me. Until we can wrap our arms around the idea that a Jeffrey Dahmer can pray and receive Christ the same way you did, you don't truly know grace.
Because we are always making comparisons. We sometimes don't think God could save someone like Jeffrey Dahmer. But it took no more grace to save Jeffrey Dahmer than it took to save you.
The Dance Illustration: The Comparison Trap
We love the comparison. I was telling somebody this the other day — here is what we used to do to mess up an eighth-grade kid. We went to a dance every week. They would have certain dances, and then they would do slow ones. Whenever they did a slow one, you had to get three others. If you were a guy, you'd get three guys. You would go and stand around and hold hands. Then the girls dancing nearby would have to pick one of the four of you to dance with. It was just a total night of rejection. If you think about it, it is the stupidest thing you could do.
So I go the first night, and it is just rejection. The next night, my parents were driving me to the dance, and I realized the key was to find three guys uglier than me. Because I know she is going to look around and make her choice, and I just needed to not be the worst option. That is what we do. "I'm not so bad — look at him. I'm not so lost — look at him."
But to understand grace, we have to understand that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. All of us are lost. All of us need grace. So how many sins does it take to separate me from God? Technically, one. If I break the law, I've broken the law.
The Window Illustration: Breaking the Law Is Breaking the Law
Here is the picture. I knock a golf ball through a window. I walk up and there's a man standing there. He asks, "Is this your ball?" I confirm it is mine — a Titleist Pro V1 with a red dot. Then he says, "Well, you knocked it through my window." I realize it hit with such velocity that it didn't shatter the window — it just drove a hole straight through it.
I feel bad and I say, "I owe you. What does that window cost?" He says, "A thousand dollars." And I look at the hole and say, "Well, it looks like I broke about a hundredth of it — I owe you maybe ten bucks." He says, "No. You might as well take that five iron and knock all the glass out of the window." If I put that hole in the window, I've broken the window. If I break a law, I've broken the law.
Now, if I could hit the pause button here — do you see how that ties together with what we talked about at the beginning? When I begin to see God as we have in 1 and 2 Samuel, and see His grandeur and His might and His glory and His sovereignty, I now compare myself not to the three guys I'm standing with at the dance, but to Him — and I am in real trouble. I missed the mark. My theology isn't descending low enough.
The Seventh Question: What Are the Consequences for Sin in This Life?
Here is the seventh question: What are the consequences for sin in this life, the one we are in right now? You get a hint of it already. Let's go to Ephesians chapter 2, verse 1, page 151. Paul is writing to the church of believers at Ephesus, and he says this:
*"You were dead in your sins and trespasses, which you formerly walked according to the course of the world, according to the prince of power of the air, the spirit that is working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we all too formerly lived."*
And then he adds at the end: *"By nature we were children of wrath."*
The consequences of sin are that we are dead in our sins and trespasses, dead to spiritual things, and in rebellion against the one true God. When I was in college around that time, there was a bumper sticker that was everywhere — all over — this bumper sticker was everywhere.
Question Authority
"Question authority." Just two words. It was on every bumper sticker, every Volkswagen bus — everywhere. Nobody can tell you what to do. It is in us. It is who we are. We are wired that way.
I walk by this piano every Sunday, twice a day. I barely notice it. But if Aaron put a sign on it that said "Do not touch — wet paint," I guarantee I would think, *wet paint?* Who are you to tell me not to touch it? Who are you to tell me how fast to drive? It starts when you are a little kid, and our whole life is basically lived asking: Who made you king? Who gave you the authority? Who are you to tell me?
That is your flinch, and it is the consequence of sin in our lives. We are enslaved to this. We are by nature children of wrath, sons of disobedience, always looking out for ourselves. You do not have to tell me to look out for number one. That is exactly why Jesus was so revolutionary when He taught love your neighbor as yourself. He was not saying you need to go love that person a great deal — He was saying you love yourself so much, just try to love your neighbor to that same degree.
The Consequences of Sin After This Life
Three more questions remain, and we can deal with them fairly quickly. The first is: what are the consequences for sin after this life? Page 120, Romans chapter 2, verse 5: *"Because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself for the day of wrath."* You are storing up wrath. The Bible teaches something very simple here: there is a heaven to gain and a hell to shun.
I was meeting with a lady who was dying, making two, three, four visits to her. She said she wanted to talk about her funeral. Her kids did not know Christ. Her husband did not know Christ. Her family did not know Christ. She said, "I want you to tell them they are going to hell if they do not respond to the gospel." I suggested she write a letter that I could read instead.
A friend of mine was at exactly that kind of funeral, where the pastor stood up and said, "Your daughter — your wife, your mom, your sister — told me to tell you that you all say you are going to see her again, and she wants me to tell you that you are not going to see her again if you do not know Jesus." Those are real consequences. If you do not come to Christ in repentance and faith, it is not simply that you have a difficult life here — you spend eternity separated from God in a place called hell. We do not hear those terms very often anymore, but there is a heaven to gain and a hell to shun.
Are You Still a Sinner If You Have Never Heard of God?
The ninth question is: are you still a sinner if you have never heard about God? Page 119, Romans chapter 1, verse 18: *"For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them, for God made it evident to them"* — and at the end of verse 20 — *"so that they are without excuse."*
I will frequently have someone who is not yet a Christian ask that question: what about those who have never heard? If that is your big question right now, here is my answer. We can talk about that another time, because you are hearing the gospel right now — what about you? I am comfortable that the person who truly never heard is God's to judge. Would a holy God send someone to hell for refusing to come to a Christ they had never even heard of? He would not send them to hell for refusing to come — He would judge their sin.
Our actions as a church actually reveal what we believe. If people who have never heard can reach heaven simply by being good, why are we sending people to Morocco? Why would you share the gospel with anyone? Why would you, in effect, complicate things for them? If they can get to heaven just by being good, why not simply tell them to be as good as they can be? Jesus is the way, and the only way.
Is There Anything You Can Do to Solve Your Own Sin Problem?
The tenth question is: is there anything you can do to solve your own sin problem? Page 122, Romans chapter 6, verse 23 — the verse that gave birth to this entire series: *"The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."*
All of us have sinned and separated ourselves from God by sin. All of us are equally lost before Him. You are not any closer to Him than anyone else. If you say you just want what you deserve, what you have deserved is death — separation from God. There is absolutely nothing you can do to solve your own problem. You are helpless and hopeless in that condition on your own strength, your own might.
But Christ died so that you might have eternal life. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him might have eternal life. As I said at the beginning, there are two groups of people.
A Rescued Hostage
For those of you who know this material, you might look at it and think, "That is so basic." It is basic. That is exactly why we return to it over and over again — to remind you that you are a rescued hostage, and that reality should produce gratefulness, graciousness, and thanksgiving in your life. Because of that, you have a worshipful life. You should not have to walk in and say, "Boy, it's hard to get going in worship." Coming in with a heart prepared to worship — that is your responsibility, and it is mine.
An Invitation to Those Still Searching
There is a second group of people — those of you who are thinking, "I don't think I believe that." Maybe you have never heard it before. Maybe you simply thought, "I'm okay, I'll do it on my own." That, by the way, is called religion — joining a church, doing this or that. But what you need is Christ. You come to Him in repentance and faith, believing He is who He said He was.
If you are someone who is wrestling with that, I encourage you to talk to the person who brought you here today, or to visit the front of the chapel or the conference center, where members of our pastoral team would love to meet with you and talk about what it means to have a relationship with Christ.
Looking Ahead
Here is what we are going to talk about next week: What is so special about Jesus? What is the big deal about Jesus? Why is He such a big deal? We will talk about that next week.
Closing Prayer
Father, take this truth and drill it deep in our lives. For those of us who know Your Son Jesus and have come to Him in repentance and faith, I pray that we would see this simple truth and recognize how profound it truly is, and that You would produce in us a heart of thanksgiving and gratitude.
For those who are grappling right now, trying to think this through, I pray that You would keep them irritated and miserable until they move — that You would call them to Yourself, that they would act, that they would have the courage and the humility to talk to one of the men here at the front of the room or to the person who brought them here today.
Father, I pray Your blessing on this series as we continue our study. Prepare our hearts and conversations to see what You would have us do as we participate in this Advent Conspiracy and build new traditions. God, I pray that You would allow this church to be a tremendous demonstration of grace, mercy, and blessing in that Broadway. Do that work, Lord. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen.