As human beings, we have at least two things in common. First, we have been born. Second, we were born sinful. Our sin problem began at the point of birth, for we were born separated from God.

Sometimes people have trouble with this truth. They look at a newborn baby and say, “How can such a tiny, helpless person be sinful?” But few people have trouble accepting the fact that a newborn baby is self-centered! Never mind if mother is tired or father has to work tomorrow. If baby wants to be fed or cleaned up or entertained, he has ways of letting it be known. A baby is completely self-centered.

Being born into this world is a tragic experience! “The inheritance of children is that of sin. Sin has separated them from God. Child Guidance, p. 475. Because of Adam’s sin, his posterity were born with inherent propensities of disobedience. See Ellen G. White Comments, S.D.A. Bible Commentary, vol. 5, p. 1128.

In the first seven theses we have been dealing with the subject of righteousness. Since the opposite of righteousness is sin, that seems to be the next logical subject to consider. A clear understanding of righteousness and sin is essential to any study of the subject of salvation by faith.

How you handle these two topics can be the crack in the sidewalk that becomes the Grand Canyon later on.

Our study on righteousness so far might be summed up by saying that righteousness comes through relationship with Jesus; it is not based on behavior. If that is true, then we must also define sin as something more than behavior. We are sinful by birth; we are sinful by nature. It is our natures that are evil; our evil deeds are only the result.

Paul says in Ephesians 2:3 that we are by nature the children of wrath. Psalm 58:3 says, “The wicked are estranged from the womb: they go astray as soon as they be born.” And in case you’re not sure whom to include among the “wicked,” remember Romans 3:10, “There are none righteous, no, not one.”

A scorpion wanted to cross the river, so the story goes. He found a frog along the riverbank and asked for a ride on his back.

“Oh no,” said the frog. “If I were to let you crawl up on my back, you would sting me, and I would die.”

“Why would I do that?” asked the scorpion. “If I stung you and you died, then we would both drown, and I would never make it across the river.”

Well, the scorpion’s argument made sense to the frog, so he allowed the scorpion to climb on his back, and he began to swim across the river.

About halfway across, the scorpion stung him. As the frog croaked his last, he said, “Why did you do that? Now we’ll both die!”

The scorpion replied sadly, “I know, but I couldn’t help it. It is my nature.”

This is the dilemma of the human race. Our natures are fallen. We cannot help ourselves. Even as we realize that we are destroying ourselves, we find that we are helpless to stop sinning, for it is our natures that are evil. “The result of eating of the tree of knowledge of good and evil is manifest in every man’s experience. There is in his nature a bent to evil, a force which, unaided, he cannot resist. Education, p. 29. Because of Adam’s sin, “our natures are fallen and we cannot make our-selves righteous. Steps to Christ, p. 62.

Because our sin problem goes deeper than simply doing wrong things, because we are sinful by nature from the moment we are born into this world of sin, then the answer to the problem of sin must go deeper than behavior. God proposes to start all over again. He offers us a new birth, with an altogether new nature.

Jesus explained to Nicodemus in His midnight sermon to that one-soul audience that unless there is a new birth, we have no hope of ever seeing the kingdom of heaven. The first birth is no good for eternal life, a second birth must follow. The good news of salvation is that because of Jesus we can receive new natures, and by sharing His divine nature, we can escape the corruption of the sinful world into which we were born.