freeatlast
New Member
I do not believe men have a sin nature, that is a word others use. I am only using it so that we can understand each other. I believe man is "flesh". The flesh has natural lusts and desires. These lusts and desires are not sinful, as the flesh has no will, it cannot decide to do good or evil. It is the soul/spirit of man that makes the decision process. If a man obeys the lust of the flesh when it is contrary to God's laws, at that point a man sins and becomes a sinner. He becomes sinful.
I do believe the flesh can become "accustomed" to sin. Accustomed means learned behavior or habit. No one is born a junky, and probably no person is a junky if they try heroin once. But if they continue to take heroin they can become addicted to it. So, a person becomes more and more corrupt as they practice sin. The more a person practices sin, the weaker they become in resisting sin.
And this is what God said in Gen 6:12
Gen 6:12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
Look up the word "corrupt" in any dictionary. It means to go from a state of good to bad or evil. Leave a banana on the kitchen counter for a week or so and it will corrupt. It will go from a good banana to a rotten banana.
And this is what God says of men. They corrupted themselves. They went from a state of good to evil.
Psa 14:3 They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one.
This is the verse Paul was quoting in Romans. Notice that it says man has "become" filthy. Man did not start out filthy, but chose to sin and became depraved.
If you understand this, then Ecc 7:29 makes perfect sense.
Ecc 7:29 Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright; but they have sought out many inventions.
God did not make Adam and Eve sinful. They were flesh and had lusts and desires, but they also had free will and the ability to choose to do right or wrong. When they chose to do evil they "became" filthy. They became corrupt.
But this verse is not speaking of Adam and Eve only, but all men. "They" is plural and shows this verse applies to all men.
The problem is that Eve did not have any desire for the tree until an outside source deceived her and Adam is never said to have had any desire for it. In other words the desire that Eve experienced was not because of herself or even the tree. If it was then she would have had the desire all along, but it is clear she did not. Until the serpent tricked her into believing a lie she had no sinful desire. It is reasonable to conclude that without the serpent's lie she would have never desired and never ate. She did not eat out of some sin nature already present. She ate from volition because of deception. She evidently was completely content to obey the command with no inward desire for the tree, but ate because she was deceived.