I've Reposted this (again) because it Appears that No one wants to "Touch" this?
I would think that this is something Worth Discussing.
I would like to Discuss what you guys believe Verse 5 to mean and also Verses 7 and 10. To me it is Clear�
Man is Born In SIN�Born with Sin on their Soul (not Imputed�as some assert) � Verse 5 �
and God �WASHES� our Sin�s away (Baptism) � Verse 7 �
and Creates a New Heart (Regeneration) � Verse 10.
Psalm 51:1-10
New International Version (NIV)
Psalm 51
Psalm 51[a]
For the director of music. A psalm of David. When the prophet Nathan came to him after David had committed adultery with Bathsheba.
1 Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash away all my iniquity
and cleanse me from my sin.
3 For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is always before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight;
so you are right in your verdict
and justified when you judge.
5 Surely I was sinful at birth,
sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
6 Yet you desired faithfulness even in the womb;
you taught me wisdom in that secret place.
7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones you have crushed rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins
and blot out all my iniquity.
10 Create in me a pure heart, O God,
and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
5 Surely I was sinful at birth,
sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
What else can �Sinful� mean�other than Exactly what it says�Sinful��Full of Sin�?
If it means as some of you contend�that Man is Born with a Sinful Nature or as others Claim that it means that Man is Born with Adam�s Sin �Imputed� to him�then WHY DIDN�T THE HOLY SPIRIT ENSURE that that Meaning was Expressed?
It doesn�t say ��I Had a Sinful NATURE at Birth,�� or ��I had Adams Sin Imputed to me at Birth,��.
No�The Holy Spirit INSPIRED the Writer to Say ��I WAS SINFUL��
Sinful�Full of Sin�at BIRTH!
Ask God why that is? Question The Holy Spirit as to the Clarity of this Verse.
Verse 7 reads:
7 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean;
wash me, and I will be whiter than snow.
��Wash me, and I WILL BE Whiter than Snow.�
What Kind of Washing do you think the Writer is Speaking of? Washing with Water and Soap or Washing with Water and The Holy Spirit? Water and Hyssop will Cleanse you�Water and The Holy Spirit will
�Make your Soul as White as Snow�.
Baptism Removes All Sins and as Verse 10 tells us
10 Create in me a pure heart, O God,
and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
Baptism Creates a NEW HEART�a New Heart AND
RENEWS a �Steadfast Spirit� within us. Baptism Regenerates�Creates a New Creature�REBORNS us.
Does Scripture Lie? What else could these Verses Mean? How Much Stretching and Spinning and Twisting Must be done to these Verses to make them Deny what they so Plainly and Clearly SAY?
I ask you to Submit to Scripture�not to what Man has Taught you. I ask you to Submit to God�s Will (what God Desires of you) and �LISTEN� to The Holy Spirit.
Clearly no one is justified before God by the law, because, �The righteous will live by faith.� GALATIANS 3:11
The doctrine of justification, the storm center of the Reformation, was a major concern of the apostle Paul. For him it was the heart of the gospel (Rom. 1:17; 3:21-5:21; Gal. 2:15-5:1) shaping both his message (Acts 13:38-39) and his devotion and spiritual life (2 Cor. 5:13-21; Phil. 3:4-14). Though other New Testament writers affirm the same doctrine in substance, the terms in which Protestants have affirmed and defended it for almost five centuries are drawn primarily from Paul.
Justification is a judicial act of God pardoning sinners (wicked and ungodly persons, Rom. 4:5; 3:9-24), accepting them as just, and so putting permanently right their previously estranged relationship with himself. This justifying sentence is God�s gift of righteousness (Rom. 5:15-17), his bestowal of a status of acceptance for Jesus� sake (2 Cor. 5:21).
God�s justifying judgment seems strange, for pronouncing sinners righteous may appear to be precisely the unjust action on the judge�s part that God�s own law forbade (Deut. 25:1; Prov. 17:15). Yet it is in fact a just judgment, for its basis is the righteousness of Jesus Christ who as �the last Adam� (1 Cor. 15:45), our representative head acting on our behalf, obeyed the law that bound us and endured the retribution for lawlessness that was our due and so (to use a medieval technical term) �merited� our justification. So we are justified justly, on the basis of justice done (Rom. 3:25-26) and Christ�s righteousness reckoned to our account (Rom. 5:18-19).
God�s justifying decision is the judgment of the Last Day, declaring where we shall spend eternity, brought forward into the present and pronounced here and now. It is the last judgment that will ever be passed on our destiny; God will never go back on it, however much Satan may appeal against God�s verdict (Zech. 3:1; Rev. 12:10; Rom. 8:33-34). To be justified is to be eternally secure (Rom. 5:1-5; 8:30).
The necessary means, or instrumental cause, of justification is personal faith in Jesus Christ as crucified Savior and risen Lord (Rom. 4:23-25; 10:8-13). This is because the meritorious ground of our justification is entirely in Christ. As we give ourselves in faith to Jesus, Jesus gives us his gift of righteousness, so that in the very act of �closing with Christ,� as older Reformed teachers put it, we receive divine pardon and acceptance which we could not otherwise have (Gal. 2:15-16; 3:24).
Official Roman Catholic theology includes sanctification in the definition of justification, which it sees as a process rather than a single decisive event, and affirms that while faith contributes to our acceptance with God, our works of satisfaction and merit contribute too. Rome sees baptism, viewed as a channel of sanctifying grace, as the primary instrumental cause of justification, and the sacrament of penance, whereby congruous merit is achieved through works of satisfaction, as the supplementary restorative cause whenever the grace of God�s initial acceptance is lost through mortal sin. Congruous, as distinct from condign, merit means merit that it is fitting, though not absolutely necessary, for God to reward by a fresh flow of sanctifying grace. On the Roman Catholic view, therefore, believers save themselves with the help of the grace that flows from Christ through the church�s sacramental system, and in this life no sense of confidence in God�s grace can ordinarily be had. Such teaching is a far cry from that of Paul.
