What does it mean that we are conceived in sin?

He says, "In sin my mother conceived me." He is not speaking of a sinful act, but of the fact that, since his mother had a sinful nature, she could only give him the same nature. For this reason he speaks of truth in the inward parts, that is, it is vital to probe the root of the matter, to honestly judge this, that the nature itself will be restrained from pressing itself. The teaching of scripture concerning this self-judgment is found only in th New Testament (Romans 5,6,7,8, so David did not fully understand it though he did face facts honestly at this time, which is the first step in finding deliverance from the power of the sinful nature, the flesh, and leads to a recognition of God's work in making one to know wisdom (v. 6).

I am not supposing that David knew the fullness of this three-fold blessedness, and we must go to Psalm 32 to learn that he even knew the joy of forgiveness, he had not reached that point in our psalm, and we have still to follow him into a deeper agony and a fuller confession. As the light of God searches him every other being passes from his thoughts and he understands that it is against God that he had sinned, against His holy law, His inexorable justice, His mercy, His long-suffering and love. And further in his sins he had become the justification of solemn words that God had spoken concerning men. It is remarkable that the details of the full length description of sinful men (Jew and Gentile) given to us in Romans 3:9-18, are taken chiefly from David's own psalms. He had been the mouthpiece of God for the utterance of these things, and it may be that as they flowed from his lips he congratulated himself that he was not as others, but now he finds that he has become an exemplification of every evil; the germs were there hidden in his very nature and only waiting the opportunity to break out. And this brings him to the point of his deepest agony; and the most poignant cry in the Old Testament bursts from his soul, "Behold I was shapen in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me." He is not making an excuse for his sins, or casting the blame of them upon his mother; he is saying, "My very nature is corrupt, the springs of my being are polluted." It is not now what he had done, but what he is, his eyes are fully open now, he has come to the root of the tragedy. This heartbroken cry is paralleled in the New Testament, and by the man who "touching the righteousness of the law was blameless, " when he said, "I know that in me, that is in my flesh, good does not dwell, " and "Who shall deliver me from the body of this death." There is no difference between the worst and the best, between David and Saul of Tarsus, or you and me.

Like produces like. This is one of the fundamental laws of nature as established by God. It is stamped upon the Creation chapter — fish, fowl, and flesh were all ordained to bring forth each "after his kind." And man could do no other than this. "Adam," we read, "begat a son in his own likeness, after his own image" (Gen. 5:3). And so it has been throughout all the generations of men. Sinful men beget sinful children. Therefore it is written, "They go astray as soon as they are born, speaking lies" (Ps. 58:3), and "all we like sheep have gone astray" (Isa. 53:6), and "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God" (Rom. 3:23). In the great penitential Psalm, David confesses, "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me," which simply means, "I have come of a sinful stock, my very nature is sinful," and this is true of every man born into the world. Does it matter then or does it not, how the Lord was born into this world? Had He come by natural generation, would He not have been as every other man? To deny the Virgin birth is to deny His pre-existence in the Godhead, and to deny the holiness of His Manhood, and to rob mankind of the one and only Saviour.

The reason appears to be simply this. Where God begins his work of repentance in the soul of a sinner, sin becomes known and judged not merely as to its fruits — i.e. sins or evil works — but as to its root and inward character. An instance of this we find in Ps. 51. There the penitent king of Israel, who had been more faithful when a shepherd than when he was a king (after the God-sent word of the prophet Nathan, "Thou art the man!" had, like a sharp arrow, pierced his heart and conscience, and placed him in God's holy presence), not only confesses his great transgressions and sins, i.e., what he had done, but what he is. He not only judges the bad fruits of the bad tree, but the bad tree itself. Not by way of a light excuse, but in thorough self-judgment, he says, "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me." He lays the axe to the root of the tree, to judge not his parents and progenitors, but himself.

(vv. 5-6) Furthermore, the sin is traced to its origin and found to consist, not simply in sinful acts, but in a sinful nature. Hence the sinner requires not only cleansing from actual sins, but a new nature in “the inward parts.”

The term "original sin" may not be found in the Bible, but the truth which is conveyed by the term is there right enough. In Genesis 5:3 we read, "Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image." Note the words we have italicised. Originally he had been created in God's likeness, but he did not reproduce himself during his brief time of innocence when there might have been another man also in God's likeness. He fell first and then begat children in his own likeness as a fallen creature. The law of Genesis 1 "after his kind" at once operated. Hence in Romans 5:19 we read that "by one man's disobedience many were made [or, constituted] sinners." All his descendants came into the world sinners in their very constitution. That is what is meant by "original sin."

For our racial head we have to go back to Adam, and to Adam in his fallen condition, for only when fallen did he beget sons and daughters. His fall came about by an act of sin, but that act induced a state or condition of sin which permeated his very being. Thereby his whole spiritual constitution was altered so fundamentally as to affect all his descendants. He could only beget children "in his own likeness, after his image" (Gen. 5:3) — the likeness and image of a fallen man. Heredity of this sort is a terrible fact, borne witness to by Scripture. Does God in the Gospel propose any remedy for this awful blight which lies upon the human race? Can He deal with the nature from which the acts of sin spring: with the root which produces the hideous fruits, as well as with the fruits themselves?

There is no other explanation of the fact that the children of Adam universally have a corrupted moral nature. The moral nature of man was first corrupted in him — our progenitor. Having become corrupted in him, it has passed on naturally as an inheritance to his descendants. They have a fallen, sinful nature through him. All his children are thus involved in his fall and ruin — the many involved by the act of the one.

“By one man sin entered into the world.” Innocence existed in one man — Adam. God made Adam free from evil; without the knowledge of sin. This was the starting point of man's existence upon earth — a life in its moral characteristics totally distinct from our present life. But Adam preferring disobedience to obedience, and exercising his will, his nature became evil, and thereupon the character of the fountain of human life became changed. Innocence disappeared from the earth, and sin entered the world. This is the origin of our sinful nature which we received through our parents, and with which we were born. We trace the river from this present day to the past generation — we follow it back further and further till we reach its source — and we find that every age has produced a nature which is sinful.

The nature of man is, moreover, actively evil, and the activities of our nature are our own individual responsibilities. If a wicked father beget a wicked son, the wickedness of the son is his own wickedness and his own responsibility, and not that of his parent. The law of the land would not excuse a thief because his father and grandfather had been thieves before him, and neither does the divine law excuse us individually because of the sinful nature of the parent of our race.

In the first part of Romans, what we have done - our sins, is the chief subject, and Christ delivered for them in grace, so that they are gone for ever for those who believe. But there is another question to be settled - not only what we have done, but what we are. These two questions are raised in Genesis 3. God said to Eve, in verse 13, "What is this that thou hast done?" and to Adam (v. 9), "Where art thou?" God has, so to speak, asked the question in the first part of the epistle, "What hast thou done?" And when everything is brought to light, and all that we have done is nothing but sin, in His love and grace He has given His Son to put it away. This is up to Romans 5:11. Now the question of what we are by nature is taken up, "Where art thou?" Then, how God delivers us, not only from our sins, but from what we are as children of Adam, from our sinful nature - which is a much deeper thing. Why do we commit sins? Because we are all born into this world with a corrupt, fallen nature, as in Psalm 51: "Behold, I was shapen in iniquity; and in sin did my mother conceive me." Yes, a little infant is born in sin; and how soon the sinful nature begins to manifest itself! How soon does a child begin to have a will of its own, to show temper and to be disobedient! The testimony of Scripture is plain as to this evil nature, that it is utterly bad, and not only so, but unimprovable (a fact which many of us are slow to learn).