Acquitted from sins?

by dothemath 7 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  dothemath

  This is in reference to Romans 6: 7.............often quoted from the platform- "for he who has died has been acquitted from his sin"

  If the talk is regarding the future of people who have died, it's evident they will all (except those committing an unforgivable sin) have a second chance.

  Yet other talks emphasize the necessity of living in harmony with God's standards, and that they could be subject to a severe judgment..................Eccl. 12: 14- "for the true God himself will bring every sort of work into the judgment in relation to every hidden thing, as to whether it is good or bad".

  Depending on the talk's theme.........either one approach or the other is used to support the view of the speaker.

  I was wondering if anyone familiar with other religions has any thoughts or explanations to their view of these scriptures.
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  mrsjones5

  If you read the whole chapter of Romans 6 it says something vastly different from the society's point of view.

  Romans 6:

  Dead to Sin, Alive in Christ

  1 What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? 2 By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? 3 Or don't you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

  5 If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. 6 For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, [a] that we should no longer be slaves to sin— 7 because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.

  8 Now if we died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. 9 For we know that since Christ was raised from the dead, he cannot die again; death no longer has mastery over him. 10 The death he died, he died to sin once for all; but the life he lives, he lives to God.

  11 In the same way, count yourselves dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus. 12 Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. 13 Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness. 14 For sin shall not be your master, because you are not under law, but under grace.

  Slaves to Righteousness

  15 What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! 16 Don't you know that when you offer yourselves to someone to obey him as slaves, you are slaves to the one whom you obey—whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? 17 But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were entrusted. 18 You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.

  19 I put this in human terms because you are weak in your natural selves. Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness. 20 When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. 21 What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! 22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves to God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in [b] Christ Jesus our Lord.
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  Leolaia

  Here is what I wrote last month on the subject of Romans 6:7 and final judgment:

  Verse 7 continues the thought in verse 6. The prior verse refers to a release from slavery to sin through the "destruction of the body". The body is destroyed at death. Slavery is a legal debt which holds on a person throughout life, and "sin" is conceived as the slave-holder, but this debt ends at death; a person does not remain a slave when he is dead. The gar "for" in v. 7 indicates that the thought in v. 7 is dependent on the conception in v. 6. So the "acquittal" from sin -- or the legal freeing from sin -- occurs through death. This could either be literal death, or, as the overall context of ch. 6 makes clear, metaphorically through baptism in which the "old self" is put to death. While a person could subsequently sin after baptism, this is on one's own choice; one is not sinning because of being a slave. And tho one is legally freed from slavery through death, this is does not mean that "a man's death atoned for his sins in relation to God, or that a dead man was no longer accountable to God for his sins" (Cranfield). This is because the legal relationship between man and sin is of an entirely different order than between man and God.

  The meaning in v. 23 is a little different. Here sin is an employer who pays wages. The language, in fact, has military imagery (hopla "weapons" in v. 13, opsónion "cooked food" in v. 23); the picture is of a general paying his soldiers money to buy food. The metaphor tho is still applicable to slaves because Roman slaves normally received a peculium "pocket-money" for incidental expenses, including food (cf. Cicero Phil. 8.32, Varro R. R. 1.2.17; Seneca, Moralia 80.7), which could even be saved over a period of years to secure their own release from slavery. Many Roman soldiers, in fact, were conscripted slaves. The overall picture is of sin as a general or slave-owner (e.g. the same slave-owner of v. 6-7) who pays out death to his slaves. This payment secures the release of the slaves from sin, just as Roman slaves can save up their peculium to secure their own release. This has no bearing, however, on the judgment of the "works" these former slaves had done while under slavery, for this concerns the relationship between slaves and God, not between the slaves and their former master.

  The Watchtower doctrine contradicts the widespread NT (and apocalyptic Jewish) notion of resurrection as a resurrection for judgment on Judgment Day (Matthew 10:15, 11:22-42, 12:41-42; Romans 2:5, 14:10; 2 Corinthians 5:1-10; 2 Thessalonians 1:5-10; Hebrews 6:2, 9:27; Jude 14-15; Revelation 20:11-15), judgment such that "Man is destined to die once and after that face judgment" (Hebrews 9:27), such that "each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad" (2 Corinthians 5:10). There are many similar examples of such statements in the intertestamental literature, such as 1 Enoch, 2 Baruch, 4 Ezra, the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, and in Josephus. The Watchtower teaching is that the slate is wiped clean in the resurrection, whereas Revelation says that "the dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books".

  Paul shared a view of eschatological judgment, as 2 Corinthians makes clear; Romans 6:7 states that man is "freed from sin" when he dies, as he no longer has the ability to sin, having lost his "sinful body" (6:6), and no more "in the flesh" (8:10). For sin "reigns in mortal bodies" and the body can be "turned into an unholy weapon fighting on the side of sin" (6:12-13), tho the job of the Christian is to keep themselves away from sin. Sin is the source of death (5:12), and thus the "wages of sin is death" (6:23); this does not mean that the slate of one's deeds is wiped clean through death, it simply means that sin has death as its reward. Those who die who continued to wilfully sin after baptism also would have "give an account of himself" for everybody "will have to stand before the judgment seat of God" (Romans 14:10). Similarly, referring to those either "living in the body" or "exiled from it" (e.g. dead), Paul stated that "all the truth about us will be brought out in the law court of Christ, and each of us will get what he deserves for the things he DID in the body, good and bad" (2 Corinthians 5:10).
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  hamsterbait

  The point I take from this is that everybody will die due to inherited sin.

  Whether they might be considered worthy of a resurrection will depend on what they did during their life. An over draft of sin is paid back by dying. The account is set to $0.00

  In order to come back to life requires an input of credit to the account that a dead person cannot earn for himself.

  Christ died to put everybody's account into credit - they then get a resurrection. Like Adam they can then blow it, or continue to get interest through faith.

  HB (of the "are humans beings bullshitting, or are they cleverer than ancient gods" class)
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  Honesty

  Whether they might be considered worthy of a resurrection will depend on what they did during their life.

  According to the bible everyone is going to be resurrected:

  Life and Judgment

  24 “ I assure you: Anyone who hears My word and believes Him who sent Me has eternal life and will not come under judgment but has passed from death to life.

  25 “ I assure you: An hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. 26 For just as the Father has life in Himself, so also He has granted to the Son to have life in Himself. 27 And He has granted Him the right to pass judgment, because He is the Son of Man. 28 Do not be amazed at this, because a time is coming when all who are in the graves will hear His voice 29 and come out—those who have done good things, to the resurrection of life, but those who have done wicked things, to the resurrection of judgment.

  John 5:24-29 (HCSB)
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  hamsterbait

  Sorry Honesty -

  My point was that without Christ dying for us, nobody would be ransomed from the grave and be resurrected.

  i am so frazzled today I could happily die now and not wake up!! (YOu know the feeling)

  HB
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  Honesty

  Sorry Honesty -

  My point was that without Christ dying for us, nobody would be ransomed from the grave and be resurrected.

  i am so frazzled today I could happily die now and not wake up!! (YOu know the feeling)

  HB

  HB, you are right!!

  It took me a few minutes after reading all the posts to realise everyone who has ever lived and died is resurrected. A Chriistian friend and I were discussing the resurrection and everlasting life. He said, "Everyone is going to be resurrected and have eternal life because God made man in His image and in His likeness. Some of them are going to have a happy life and others are not going to have a happy life because they have rejected Christ's free gift of life."
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  JosephMalik

  7 For he that is dead is freed from sin. 8 Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him: To all, The dead spoken of in Romans are those dead in association with Christ. This was explained clearly throughout the passages. It was never intended to mean that our own death acquits us of our sins. This is not possible just as our Lord taught: Joh 8:21 Then said Jesus again unto them, I go my way, and ye shall seek me, and shall die in your sins: whither I go, ye cannot come. Joh 8:24 I said therefore unto you, that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins. While disciples of our Lord can achieve acquital from their sins or Justification and Life to put it another way even before they die this does not mean that their physical death contributes to such acquittal or freedom from sin somehow. I am sure many of you are aware of the expression "saved by grace." This is why the scriptures also teach: Heb 9:27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die , but after this the judgment. Everyone must die (or be changed) to enter this Kingdom. There are no exceptions as the WT attempts to teach. There will not be mortal human beings in this Kingdom. No one simply lives to walk in. The result is not necessarily a resurrection (or being changed) for everyone but a judgment, yes. This is what our Lord was discussing in the illustration of the sheep and goats. During this judgment the goats are not resurrected (or changed) when our Lord returns. This is illustrated in scripture in several places so there should be no confusion. A sin against the holy spirit is not forgiven. Mt 12:31 “Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men”. Rev. 20:15 "And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire". We should know that what we do now matters. We should also be aware of the fact that what we will do after our resurrection if we are chosen for such resurrection for whatever reason also matters. The outcome of such judgment that most will face will be determined at an appropriate time or test. To those looking forward to only good times then, well think again. 1Th 1:10 And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come. Joseph