What is sin according to the Bible?

Three words are given in Scripture to define sin; they are brought together in Exodus 34:7, Psalm 32 and Psalm 51 — they are transgression, iniquity and sin. These words are not mere synonyms that could displace one another and nothing be lost, for each has it own terrible meaning. TRANSGRESSION is revolt from, it means a tearing of ones self away. God has declared His will for men, but they prefer their own wills, and in the pursuit of their own wills they tear themselves away from God. INIQUITY means twisted, crooked, perverse. God has laid down a road for the feet of men to tread, and that road is as straight as His everlasting sceptre, but men have made for themselves crooked ways (Isa. 59:8); they are a crooked and perverse generation (Phil. 2:15). SIN means missing the mark. God has set up His mark, the end at which every man should aim. God Himself should be the end and aim of every man's life, but every man has substituted self for God, and set up his own mark to displace God's; and has missed the very mark and purpose of his existence. Along with sin in this threefold character goes GUILE; it permeates the life of every man who has not been honest before God His effort is to appear different from what he knows himself to be, to cover up and hide his sinfulness and even to imagine that be can deceive God Himself as to it. Then the New Testament gives us a striking definition of sin in 1 John 3:4 where we should read, "for sin is lawlessness," and that covers all that sin is; it is not a mere yielding to the sudden and capricious impulses of our nature, but the determination that lies deep in a man's will, though perhaps seldom expressed, to go his own way and be independent of God.

To the question, "What is sin?" many contradictory answers would in all probability be given. God's definition of it — which alone is authoritative — may be found in the Revised Version of 1 John 3:4: "Sin is lawlessness." This way of defining it cuts very deep. Every exercise of the human will in independence of God is by this divine statement declared to be sin. It matters not what the act may be, whether it be that which human courts would punish, or whether it be what would pass muster in the eyes of men, every action taken without reference to God is sin. This leaves no loophole for escape to any of us. Judged by such a standard, every child of Adam must be brought in guilty. Man having been created a being dependent upon his Maker, the fact that he acts, and even loves to act, apart from Him is proof of his revolted and alienated condition.

But you may ask, What is sin? Scripture does not leave us without a definition of what sin is. "Sin is lawlessness" (1 John 3:4, R.V.) — that is, the creature doing his own will. Now, I think I cannot go beyond the truth in saying that every one of us likes our own way. There is not a man in this audience but likes his own way. The Spirit of God in describing our condition, says in the Old Testament, "All we, like sheep, have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way" (Isa. 53:6). One man takes his way — it is the wine-cup, and shameless orgies; another, the race-course, and dissolute company; another, the card-table, and the gambling-hell; and another, the billiard-room, and its concomitant waste of time and money. Sin may take any shape you like. It may take the shape of what men would term "innocent pleasures," but which they would not care should come out in the light of day. The point is this, you and I like our own way. I acknowledge it. I liked my own way, ay, and I took it too. What happened? I am thankful to God for it, He stopped me. How did He stop me? He stopped me by the revelation to my heart of what His grace was — the grace that came by Jesus Christ.

Before considering the chapter in detail it may be well to enquire, What is sin? And, what is involved in continuing in, or under the power of, sin? Sin is defined for us in the word of God as "lawlessness" (1 John 3:4, N.Tn.). It is the evil principle of doing ones own will without reference to God, or, in other words, insubjection to God. By one man — Adam, this evil principle entered into the world; as a result, a system has grown up — called the world — which is entirely dominated by sin, or the will of man. The result of man doing his own will is depicted in Romans 3:9 to 19. It has filled the world with misery and sorrow and brought man under death and judgment. Moreover, what is true of the world as a whole is also true of each individual. The misery of each individual life arises from doing one's own will without reference to the will of God.

The rendering of 1 John 3:4, in the A.V., "sin is the transgression of the law," is a mistranslation. The Greek word is ἀνομία, from ἀ, negative, and νόμος, law. This word occurs fourteen times, and in this verse only is it translated in the A.V. 'transgression of the law.' In 2 Cor. 6:14 it is 'unrighteousness,' and in eleven places it is rendered 'iniquity,' signifying any wickedness. Further, ἄνομος, from the same root, is translated 'without law' in 1 Cor. 9:21; 'unlawful' in 2 Peter 2:8; and 'lawless' in 1 Tim. 1:9. These passages clearly indicate that the meaning of 1 John 3:4 is "Every one that practises sin, practises also lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness: " that is, doing one's own will, regardless of all restraint of God and man. This applies whether there is a definite law or not, but when there is a definite law sin is also transgression.

Sin is not at all limited to crime, or to glaring evil. What a mischievously and unequivocally false version is that given in the A.V. of 1 John 3:4, where we read that "sin is the transgression of the law!" Millions have thence derived their notion of sin, and have thereby been misled into the great error, on the one hand, of ignoring a vast deal of real sin, and on the other of arguing that all men must be under the law, inasmuch as it is certain that all sinned. But any such reasoning proceeds on a false principle. For the true meaning of the apostle's statement is, that "sin is lawlessness," the far wider and subtler evil of doing one's own will without the check of divinely imposed authority. In the R.V. it is properly rendered, "sin is lawlessness," which is absolutely true, and applies to all mankind whether they did or did not know the law.

(V. 4). The Apostle then contrasts the lawlessness of the old nature with the righteousness of the new nature that believers possess as born of God. He states that, “Every one that practises sin practises also lawlessness; and sin is lawlessness” (N.Tn.). Sin is not simply transgressing a known law, as the defective translation of the Authorised Version suggests. The principle of sin is lawlessness, or doing one's own will apart altogether from any law. As another has said, “Sin is the acting without the curb of law or restraint of another's authority — acting from one's own will” (J.N.D.).

Sin is lawlesness. So the real translation of 1 John 3:4 tells us—“Everyone that practises sin practises also lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness” (NT). It is most unfortunate that this verse is so badly translated, for the right definition of sin is most important. Everything that comes from the hand of God is under law. The planets must keep to their orbits, apple trees must bear apples, and apes beget apes, and so on throughout the length and breadth of creation.

But man in the realm of action has some choice. He may conform fully to God’s laws for him, or he may not. When he diverges from the will of God and exerts his own will it is sin, and “sin is lawlessness.” Sin is missing the mark. Transgression is trespass, or overstepping the mark, breaking a positive command. Iniquity is perverseness, a deeper shade of guilt.

"Sin" is that which at the fall of Adam gained an entrance into the world. Just as the poison of a snake, once injected into la man's body, will run through his whole system doing its deadly work, so sin - the virus of that old serpent the devil - has permeated man's moral being to his ruin. The result of this is "all have sinned." "Sins," of thought, word, or act, whether of omission or commission, are chargeable to each of us.

What, then, is lawlessness? It is simply the refusal of all rule, the throwing off of all divine restraint. The assertion of man's will in defiance of God's. Sin is just that. Such was the course to which Adam committed himself in eating the forbidden fruit. How bitter the results!