Original Sin

(Charles Simeon)  LISTEN to Audio!  Download Audio

"Surely I was sinful at birth—sinful from the time my mother conceived me!" Psalm 51:5

David's account of himself in this verse was true, and it is equally true of all the human race.

Just so, Paul declares of himself, as well as all the rest of the human race that, "We were dead in our transgressions and sins . . . Like the rest, we were by nature children of wrath!" Ephesians 2:1, 3

Why is it that every child, from the first moment that he begins to act at all, manifests corrupt tempers and dispositions?

Since this has been the state of every child that has been born into the world, we are constrained to acknowledge that our very nature is corrupt; and that, as David tells us, we are estranged from the womb and go astray as soon as we are born! Psalm 58:3

Further, how can we account for the sufferings and death of infants, but on the supposition that they are partakers of Adam's guilt and corruption? Sufferings and death are the penalty of sin; and we cannot conceive that God would inflict that penalty on millions of infants, if they were not in some way or other liable to His wrath.

Paul notices this, as a compelling proof that all of Adam's posterity fell in him, and through him are partakers of guilt and misery. "Just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin; and in this way death came to all men, because all sinned." Romans 5:12

We find no intimation in the Scriptures that any are saved without faith in Christ. Christ is the only door by which we must enter into Heaven. He is the only way to the Father; nor, as long as the world shall stand, shall any come unto the Father but by Him!

"I am the gate; whoever enters through Me will be saved!" John 10:9

"I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me!" John 14:6

"Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under Heaven given to men by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12