Charles Wesley (1707-1788) saves a slave on death row from hell rather than from execution by hanging

Let us, then, go to him outside the camp,

bearing the disgrace he bore, (Hebrews 13:13).

Charles Wesley (18 December 1707 – 29 March 1788) was an English leader of the Methodist movement, most widely known for writing about 6,500 hymns.

May We Spend the Night on Death Row?

Newgate exercise yard, 1872, by Gustave Doré

Charles Wesley gives us an example of how one might obey Hebrews 13:13 and go “out the camp” and bear the abuse he (Jesus Christ) endured. On July 18, 1738, two months after his conversion, Charles Wesley did an amazing thing. He had spent the week witnessing to inmates at the Newgate prison with a friend named “Bray,” whom he described as “a poor ignorant mechanic.” One of the men they spoke to was “a black [slave] that had robbed his master.” He was sick with a fever and was condemned to die.


On Tuesday, Wesley and Bray asked if they could be locked in overnight with the prisoners who were to be executed the next day [this is outside the camp!]. That night they spoke the gospel. They told the men that “One came down from heaven to save lost sinners.” They described the sufferings of the Son of God, his sorrows, agony, and death.

The "Tyburn Tree". For many centuries, the name Tyburn was synonymous with capital punishment, it having been the principal place for execution of London criminals and convicted traitors, including many religious martyrs. It was also known as 'God's Tribunal', in the 18th century.

The next day the men were loaded onto a cart and taken to Tyburn. Wesley went with them. Ropes were fastened around their necks so that the cart could be driven off, leaving them swinging in the air to choke to death.


The fruit of Wesley and Bray’s nightlong labour was astonishing. Here is what Wesley wrote:

“They were all cheerful; full of comfort, peace and triumph; assuredly persuaded Christ had died for them, and waited to receive them into paradise… The black [slave]… saluted me with his looks. As often as his eyes met mine, he smiled with the most composed, delightful countenance I ever saw.

Descent from the Cross, depicted by Rubens (1616-17)

We left them going to meet their Lord, ready for the Bridegroom. When the cart drew off, not one stirred, or struggle for life, but meekly gave up their spirits. Exactly at twelve they were turned off. I spoke a few suitable words to the crowds; and returned, full of peace and confidence in our friends’ happiness. That hour under the gallows was the most blessed hour of my life.”

The astonishing power of Wesley's message

about the truth and love of Christ

Quid Est Veritas? Christ and Pilate, by Nikolai Ge.

Two things in this story amaze and inspire me. One is the astonishing power of Wesley’s message about the truth and love of Christ. All the condemned prisoners were converted, and they were so deeply converted that they could look death in the face (without a long period of “follow up” or “discipling”) and give up their lives with confidence that Christ would receive them. Their suffering was not for righteousness’ sake, but the same dynamics were at work to sustain them. They looked on their suffering as something they must pass through on the way to heaven, and the hope of glory was so real that they died in peace. Oh, for such power in witness!

Wesley went to the prison and asked

to be locked up all night

Prisoners picking oakum at Coldbath Fields Prison in London, c. 1864.

The other thing that amazes me is the sheer fact that Wesley went to the prison and asked to be locked up all night with condemned criminals who had nothing more to lose if they killed another person. Wesley had no supervisor telling him that this was his job. He was not a professional prison minister. It would have been comfortable and pleasant to spend the evening at home conversing with friends. Then why did he go?

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio - The Conversion of St. Paul

God put it in his heart to go. And Wesley yielded. There are hundreds of strange and radical things God is calling his people to do in the cause of world missions. Not everyone will hear the same call. Yours will be unique. It may be something you never dreamed of doing. But I urge you to listen to the leading of the Spirit to see where “outside the camp” he may be taking you “to bear the reproach he endured.”

Source: Piper, John. Let The Nations Be Glad!: The Supremacy of God In Missions. 3rd ed. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2010, pages 103-105.

Shocking: Douglas J. Moo, PhD, Professor at Wheaton College, argues that persons apart from Christ are totally depraved and are totally unable to please God.

Douglas J. Moo, born in La Porte, Indiana in 1950.

The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God;

it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.

Those who are in the realm of the flesh

cannot please God,

(Romans 8:7-8).

Saint Jerome in the Wilderness The saint spent four years in the Syrian desert as a hermit, mortifying his flesh and elevating his spirit through study.

Paul's assessment of persons apart from Christ may justly be summed up in the theological categories of total depravity and total inability.

Every person apart from Christ

is thoroughly in the grip of the power of sin

Cain killing Abel (c. 1600) by Bartolomeo Manfredi

"Total depravity" does not mean that all people are as evil as they possibly could be -- that all people commit every possible sin -- nor does it deny that there is knowledge of the good within each person.  What is meant rather is that every person apart from Christ is thoroughly in the grip of the power of sin, and that this power extends to all the person's faculties.

All non-Christians have a "mind-set"

that is innately hostile to God

Wrath, by Jacques de l'Ange

Paul's language makes this clear: all non-Christians have a "mind-set," a total life-direction, that is innately hostile to God (v. 7).  All people, by nature derived from Adam, are incurably bent towards their own good (incurvatus in se) rather than the good of others or of God.

The symptoms of this underlying sickness

The Worship of Mammon (1909) by Evelyn De Morgan.

The various sins to which we are attracted -- desire for riches, or station in life, or power, or sexual pleasure -- are but different symptoms of this underlying sickness, this idolatrous bent toward self-gratification.  Once again, we must remember that Paul is not here using "flesh" as we often do, to denote sexual sin specifically.

Persons are manifesting that destructive, self-centered

rebellion against God and his law

which can be overcome

only by the power of God's Spirit in Christ

A Sistine Chapel fresco depicts the expulsion of Adam and Eve for transgressing God's command not to eat the fruit of the Tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

To be "in the flesh," or "carnal," or "fleshly," includes, in the sense Paul is using flesh here, all sins.  The person who is preoccupied with his or her own success in business, at the expense of others and of God, is just as much dominated by the flesh as the person who commits adultery.  Both persons are manifesting, in different ways, that destructive, self-centered rebellion against God and his law which can be overcome only by the power of God's Spirit in Christ.  Verse 8, on the other hand, plainly shows that people cannot rescue themselves from this condition.  As long as people are "in the flesh" -- and only the Spirit can rescue us from this envelopment in the flesh -- they are totally unable to please God.

Source: Moo, Douglas J. The Letter to the Romans. 2nd ed. New International Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2018, page 511.

Is it rational to believe in God?

1929 cover of the USSR League of Militant Atheists magazine, showing the gods of the Abrahamic religions being crushed by the Communist 5-year plan.

The Christian perspective is rational; the unbeliever's is based on blind faith

A Lion Attacking a Horse by George Stubbs 1770

a. When the unbeliever attacks Christianity for being based on "faith" as opposed to "reason," it is important to reverse the complaint.  The unbeliever, too, has presuppositions that he does not question and that govern every aspect of his thought and life.  Thus in a relevant sense, he too has "faith."  He too argues in a circle.  It is not as if the two are equal, however, for the non-Christian has no basis for trusting reason, except his blind faith.  If this world is ultimately the product of chance plus matter, of space and time, why should we assume that events in our heads will tell us anything reliable about the real world?  The Christian, though, knows that God has given reason to us as a reliable tool for knowing Him, the world, and ourselves.  Thus the shoe is on the other foot.  The Christian perspective is rational; the unbeliever's is based on blind faith.

Scripture says that the unbeliever has refused to acknowledge and obey God, exchanged the truth for a lie, and sought to suppress the truth

Quid Est Veritas? Christ and Pilate, by Nikolai Ge.

b. It is also appropriate for the apologist to point out to the unbeliever what Scripture says about him.  Although he is made in God's image and surrounded by God's clear revelation, he has refused to acknowledge and obey God, exchanged the truth for a lie, and sought to suppress the truth, to hinder its functioning.

The unbeliever seeks to substitute the truth with idolatry or nihilism

Moses Indignant at the Golden Calf by William Blake, 1799–1800

c. Something also can be said about what the unbeliever seeks to substitute for the truth -- the rationalist-irrationalist dialectic.  We may recall that the non-Christian rationalist claims an autonomous criterion of truth apart from God's revelation; the non-Christian irrationalist denies the existence of truth and rationality.  These are the only two possibilities if one rejects the God of Scripture: idolatry or nihilism.

The rationalist could also be the Pharisee, the church elder who thinks that because of his good works or doctrinal knowledge he deserves God's favor

The Pharisee and the Publican (Le pharisien et le publicain) by James Tissot, 1886-94

Rationalists and irrationalists are not found only among professional philosophers.  Ordinary unbelievers also demonstrate these commitments, though not in such epistemologically self-conscious ways.  The rationalist could be the self-made businessman who sees himself as the master of his fate or the local politician who thinks that by careful government planning we may overcome all of our social woes or the bartender who has an opinion on everything or the neighbor who thinks that "modern science" has utterly disproved Christianity.  (He could also be the Pharisee, the church elder who thinks that because of his good works or doctrinal knowledge he deserves God's favor, or the "black sheep" -- actually a Pharisee in another garb -- who thinks that he must become a much better person before he will have the right to seek God.)  The irrationalist could be the town drunk who couldn't care less about anything or the happy milkman who lives on sentimentality and seems bewildered when anyone asks him his basis for living or the angry teenager who hates all authority and seeks to destroy everything he sees.



Rationalists and irrationalists are often at odds with one another, but under the skin they are the same, united in unbelief.

The non-Christian accepts reason

only by an irrational leap

The Sacrifice of Isaac by Caravaggio

(i) Rationalism is irrationalistic.  The non-Christian has no right to have faith in reason.  He accepts it only by an irrational leap.  The rationalist's rational scheme never gives him the divine knowledge that he claims.  Since this is God's world, the facts never fit into his godless system.  Faced with this problem, three courses are possible to the unbeliever: become an irrationalist, compromise with irrationalism (admitting that the scheme is not fully adequate), or cling to his scheme and deny the existence of any discrepancies.  The latter course is the most consistently rationalistic, but it too has pitfalls.  It pulls the rationalist father away from reality and isolates him in a world of his own.  The farther he goes in this direction, the more he is isolated, the more he comes to know only his own system, the less he comes to know the world.  And what do we call it when someone is locked in a fantasy world, knowing only his own thought processes, ignorant of reality?  Well, we could call him an irrationalist!  Thus the rationalist is forced to become an irrationalist -- either directly or by way of some compromise with irrationalism as a middle ground.  The middle ground, however, is unstable.  Where do we draw the line between the competence of reason and its limitations?  The Christian has the guidance of revelation to do that, but the non-Christian has no basis for making any decision.  He can only follow his inclinations -- irrationalistically.  In all of those ways, then, rationalism must lead to irrationalism.

Irrationalism, once compromised, is refuted

Dr. Philippe Pinel at the Salpêtrière, 1795 by Tony Robert-Fleury.

(ii) Irrationalism is rationalistic.  (A) Irrationalism can only be asserted on a rationalistic basis.  How can one know that there is no truth or meaning?  To know that, he would have to know the whole universe.  It is that difficult to prove a negative.  (B) Irrationalism is self-refuting.  It claims to know that there is no knowledge; it believes it to be true that there are no truths, thus asserting rationalism and denying it at the same time!  (C) Irrationalists generally compromise their irrationalism in the way they live.  Remember Schaeffer's example of John Cage, who preaches irrationalism through his music but who assumes an orderly world when he grows mushrooms.  Short of the lunatic asylum, such inconsistence is inescapable.  But irrationalism, once compromised, is refuted.  Once one concedes the existence of any meaning or order, he is no longer able to deny the existence of meaning or order.

Rationalism and irrationalism are opposed to Christianity, yet depend on Christianity

Pure Rationalism Painting by Matthew Quick

(iii) Rationalism and irrationalism are parasitic on Christianity.  Of course, rationalism and irrationalism are both radically opposed to Christianity, yet they depend on Christianity in some ways for their plausibility.  It is, after all, the Christian revelation that informs us that human reason has both powers and limitations.  Rationalism and irrationalism build on those notions of powers and limitations, respectively, but they do so independently of God, and neither is able to specify what those powers and limitations are.  Thus rationalists and irrationalists have no principle to keep them from the extremes of sheer irrationalism and sheer rationalism.


In those ways, both rationalism and irrationalism (as well as the various compromise positions) are vulnerable to Christian attack.  None of these positions is really distinct from the others, and thus each is subject to all the difficulties mentioned.  These positions would have no plausibility at all if it were not for their resemblance to Christianity.


Those analyses can guide our witness to many different kinds of people.  Of course, people may not be willing to listen to us.  They may lose interest and walk away -- at that point becoming irrationalists, abandoning the search for truth.  Or an inquirer may become so irrationalistic that he will not be moved by anything you say to him.  If you charge him with inconsistency between his irrationalism and his life-decisions, he may answer, "So what?  Who cares about consistency?"  Once a person's thinking gets that far from the truth, there isn't much you can say to him as an apologist, except to witness to him by your life and proclamation.  A person like that is much like someone who is catatonic or otherwise withdrawn from reality.  With my colleague Jay Adams, I agree that in such cases you should keep talking but don't expect (at first, anyway) to carry on any rational arguments.

Point to Jesus as the only one who can give a lasting peace and comfort in a harsh world.

The Descent from the Cross (van der Weyden)

This discussion has been a bit philosophical, and the reader might well wonder if any of it will help in witnessing to "ordinary people."  Well, remember what I said earlier: we find rationalists and irrationalists not only among philosophers but also among all sorts of people.  Consider the fellow who has "dropped out" of life.  In a rare sober moment, he confesses to you that he sees no meaning in life.  Ask him why he drinks.  His answer will reveal that he does value something, whether that is drunkenness itself or freedom from pain or whatever.  Further questions will reveal additional contradictions with his irrationalist perspective.  Ask him why he values what he values, and you will be able to show him how arbitrary his values are.  Point to Jesus as the only one who can give a lasting peace and comfort in a harsh world.  Of course, at some point, he may lose interest or be unwilling to talk any further.  No apologetic method can guarantee that that won't happen.  We can only do our best and pray for God to work.

Source: Frame, John. The Doctrine of the Knowledge of God. New Jersey: P&R Publishing. Pages 360-363. 1987.

Born in 1913 in Holland, Anthony Hoekema (1913-1988) believed that humans are polluted, resulting in pervasive depravity and spiritual inability.

The Depravity of Mankind before the Flood after Cornelis Cornelisz van Haarlem Mauritshuis

We are morally polluted

Nguyen Thanh, Art exhibition shines pollution effects on human

Another aspect of original sin is pollution.  Pollution, in distinction from guilt, is a moral concept; it has to do with our moral condition rather than with our status before the law.  We can define original pollution (the pollution involved in original sin) as the corruption of our nature that is the result of sin and produces sin.  As a necessary implication of our involvement in Adam's guilt, all human beings are born in a state of corruption.  We should distinguish between two aspects of original pollution: pervasive depravity and spiritual inability.

The Little Saint From Copsa Mica Art Print by Ion vincent D'Anu

Pervasive Depravity

Noah's Ark Cycle: 3. The Flood by Kaspar Memberger (1555–1618)

What I prefer to call pervasive depravity has been traditionally known in Reformed theology as "total depravity" -- a term that has often been misunderstood.  Negatively, the concept does not mean: (1) that every human being is as thoroughly depraved as he or she can possibly become; (2) that unregenerate people do not have a conscience by means of which they can distinguish between good and evil; (3) that unregenerate people will invariably indulge in every conceivable form of sin; or (4) that unregenerate people are unable to perform certain actions that are good and helpful in the sight of others.  Since to many people "total depravity" suggests these misunderstandings, I prefer "pervasive depravity."

William Blake's color printing of God Judging Adam original composed in 1795. In the Biblical story, God's judgement results from the fall of man.

Pervasive depravity affects every aspect of human nature

Pervasive depravity, then, means that (1) the corruption of original sin extends to every aspect of human nature: to one's reason and will as well as to one's appetites and impulses; and (2) there is not present in man by nature love to God as the motivating principle of his life.

You must be born again

Sandro Botticelli, The Birth of Venus (c. 1484–86).

What is the scriptural proof for the doctrine of pervasive depravity? Actually, this doctrine underlies all of the New Testament teaching.  Jesus' insistence unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God (John 3:3) implies that human beings are unable, in their natural, unregenerate state, even to see the kingdom of God, let alone enter it.  The entire New Testament message is addressed to sinners who do not love God by nature, who do not love one another, and who need to be radically changed by the Holy Spirit before they will be able to do what is pleasing in God's sight.

The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately corrupt; who can understand it

Sacred Heart, painted in c. 1770 by José de Páez

But let us look at some specific passages.  An Old Testament text that comes to mind in this connection is Jeremiah 17:9, "The heart [the innermost aspect of man] is deceitful above all things, and desperately corrupt; who can understand it? (RSV).  Two passages from the Gospels are relevant to this issue.  Jesus, in a dispute with the Pharisees about the necessity of washing one's hands before eating, explains that it is not what goes into a man but what comes out of a man that defiles him: "For from within, out of men's hearts, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly.  All these evils come from inside and make a man 'unclean'" (Mark 7:21-23).  In a disputation with the Jews in connection with the healing of a man on the Sabbath day, Jesus said, "I know that you do not have the love of God in your hearts" (John 5:42).

I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh

Flesh and the Devil (1926) is a romantic drama silent film released by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and stars Greta Garbo, John Gilbert, Lars Hanson, and Barbara Kent, directed by Clarence Brown, and based on the novel The Undying Past by Hermann Sudermann.

A number of passages in the Pauline epistles teach the doctrine of pervasive depravity.  One is Romans 7:18, "For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh.  I can will what is right, but I cannot do it" (RSV).  We should note here that although Paul does not always use the word flesh in a bad sense, it is characteristic of his writing that he often uses it to denote the willing instrument of sin.  In this passage and the one next quoted, therefore, flesh does not refer to man's physical body, but rather designates his total nature when it is under the domination or enslavement of sin.  This concept of flesh, in other words, is precisely the biblical way of describing what I have called pervasive depravity.

The mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God

Joseph and Potiphar's Wife, by Guido Reni 1630

The other passage that speaks of the flesh is Romans 8:7a, "For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God" (RSV).  Note that this text confirms the second point made under the definition of pervasive depravity, namely, that man by nature does not love God but is hostile toward him.

Do not live thinking in a futile manner

Danaides by John William Waterhouse

label QS:Len,"Danaides"

label QS:Lpl,"Danaidy"

Another vivid description of pervasive depravity is found in Ephesians 4:17-19:

So I tell you this, and insist on it in the Lord, that you must no longer live as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their thinking.  They are darkened in their understanding and separated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them due to the hardening of their hearts.  Having lost all sensitivity, they have given themselves over to sensuality so as the indulge in every kind of impurity, with a continual lust for more.

Don't deny God by your actions

The Denial of Saint Peter by Caravaggio (1610)

To the same effect are Paul's words in Titus 1:15-16:

To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are corrupted and do not believe, nothing is pure.  In fact, both their minds and consciences are corrupted.  They claim to know God, but by their actions they deny him.  They are detestable, disobedient, and unfit for doing anything good.

We all once lived in the passions of our flesh

Saint Jerome in the Wilderness by Pinturicchio.  The saint spent four years in the Syrian desert as a hermit, mortifying his flesh and elevating his spirit through study.

In another epistle, however, Paul tells us that even those who are now believers were at one time in the same state of depravity as these wicked Gentiles:

And you [the believers in Ephesus, or possibly, throughout Asia Minor] he made alive, when you were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience.  Among these we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of body and mind, and so we were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. (Eph 2:1-3, RSV).

We are objects of God's wrath

The Great Day of His Wrath, by John Martin (1789–1854).

"Children of wrath," as was observed earlier, means the objects of God's wrath.  In other words, Paul is saying, even believers are by nature, apart from God's renewing grace, so evil and depraved that they are rightly the objects of the wrath of God.

The human being is by nature unregenerate man

The Christian painting Saint Vincent Ferrer preaching to the Infidels by Jean-Baptiste Mauzaisse (1820) hanging in St. Peter's Cathedral, Vannes, the place of burial for Saint Vincent Ferrer

It is important to remember that the passages just quoted describe not the believer who through the working of God's Holy Spirit is now in Christ but the human being as he is by nature, unregenerate man.  The doctrine of pervasive depravity, in other words, is not a description of the regenerate person or of the Christian believer, but of the natural man.

Every person is born in a state of spiritual inability

"Mater Divinae Providentiae," by Scipione Pulzone (note: Jesus Christ, who is depicted in this painting, is excluded from being born in a state of spiritual inability)

The second aspect of original pollution is spiritual inability, traditionally called "total inability."  That every person is born in a state of spiritual inability is another result of Adam's sin.  This inability does not mean that the unregenerate person by nature is unable to do good in any sense of the word.  Because of God's common grace, as we shall see later, the development of sin in history and society is restrained.  The unregenerate person can still do certain kinds of good and can exercise certain kinds of virtue.  Yet even such good deeds are neither prompted by love to God, nor done in voluntary obedience to the will of God.

The human will is spiritually impotent

Healing of the Blind Man (1871) by Carl Bloch

When we speak about man's spiritual inability, we mean two things: (1) the unregenerate person cannot do, say or think that which totally meets with God's approval, and therefore totally fulfills God's law; and (2) the unregenerate person is unable apart from the special working of the Holy Spirit to change the basic direction of his or her life from sinful self-love to love for God.  "Spiritual inability" is really only another way of describing the doctrine of "pervasive depravity," this time with an emphasis on the spiritual impotence of the will.  Needles to say, these two concepts overlap in meaning.

Man is unable by nature to turn to God in repentance and faith

Close up of a 17th-century depiction of one of the 28 articles of the Augsburg Confession by Wenceslas Hollar, with repentance depicted as being a combination of contrition and faith

What is the scriptural proof for the doctrine of spiritual inability?  This doctrine, too, underlies all of New Testament teaching.  The New Testament's insistence on man's need for rebirth, spiritual renewal, and sanctification underscores man's inability by nature to turn to God in repentance and faith and to live a life that totally pleases God.  But let us again look at some specific passages.

Humans are unable to turn to Christ in their own strength

Nicodemus (left) talking to Jesus, by Henry Ossawa Tanner

We turn first to the Gospels, specifically the Gospel of John.  Here Jesus said to Nicodemus, "I tell you the truth, unless a man is born againt, he cannot see the kingdom of God ... Unless a man is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God" (3:3, 5).  Nicodemus needed to be told that a person can neither see nor enter the kingdom of God that Jesus founded unless a radical change should have taken place in him, a change here called a new birth.  In John 6:44 Jesus said to some Jews who were arguing with him, "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him," thus expressing in vivid terms the inability of human beings to turn to Christ in their own strength.  In the allegory of the vine and the branches Jesus further described the inability of man to bear spiritual fruit apart from him:

Remain in me, and I will remain in you.  No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine.  Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.

I am the vine; you are the branches.  If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. (15:4-5) 

Even if man wishes to do what is good and right,
he is unable to do it

02/14 of Simeon Solomon's “Art Pictures from the Old Testament” : Abraham's sacrifice

We find more evidence for the doctrine of spiritual inability in Paul's writings.  In Romans 7:18-19 Paul highlights in graphic terms the impotence of men and women by nature, telling us that even if such persons wish to do what is good and right, they are still not able to do it:

For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh.  I can will what is right, but I cannot do it.  For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. (RSV)

Romans 8:7-8 sets forth man's spiritual inability in bold relief: "For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot; and those who are in the flesh [that is, under the enslavement of the flesh] cannot please God" (RSV).

We are by nature spiritually dead

The Expulsion from the Garden of Eden, before and after restoration.

Other Pauline passages stress the same thought.  Just as Jesus said that apart from spiritual rebirth man cannot even see the kingdom of God, Paul says that the natural man can neither understand nor accept what God's Spirit teaches: "The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Cor 2:14).  In a passage in which he speaks about the ministry of the apostles and other Christian workers, Paul further describes the inability of man apart from God's strength to fulfill his calling as a Christian worker: "We dare to say such things because of the confidence we have in God through Christ.  Not that we are in any way confident of doing anything by our own resources --- our ability comes from God" (2 Cor. 3:4-5, Phillips).  No more striking way of expressing our spiritual impotence could be found than to say that we are by nature spiritually dead; this is precisely what Paul says about the former state of believers in Ephesians 2:4-5: "But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions."

Like a deadly poison, sin has penetrated and infected the very center of man's being

Depiction of the sin of Adam and Eve by Jan Brueghel the Elder and Pieter Paul Rubens.

As we have seen, Scripture has a lot to say about original sin.  Yet, even as believers, we often fail to emphasize this teaching.  We need to recognize the necessity of a thorough understanding of the doctrine of original sin.  As Philip Hughes says,

Original sin, however mysterious its nature may be, tells us that the reality of sin is something far deeper than the mere outward commission of sinful deeds ... It tells us that there is an inner root of sinfulness which corrupts man's true nature and from which his sinful deeds spring.  Like a deadly poison, sin has penetrated to and infected the very center of man's being; hence his need for the total experience of rebirth by which, through the grace of God in Christ Jesus, the restoration of his true manhood is effected.

 

Source: Hoekema, Anthony. Created In God’s Image. Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1986, pages 149-154.