Old Testament Foundations: A Biblical View of the Relationship of Sin and the Fruits of Sin: Sickness, Demonization, Death, Natural Calamity, by Peter H. Davids

This nature of faith shows up in James when James speaks of prayer in 1:5 and 4:3. The faith without doubt of 1:5 is a trust in God as the one who freely gives good gifts rather than the “faith” of the double-minded who does not really trust God at all, but prays as a last resort or in case it might help, although their real sense of security is found not in relationship with God but in the world. Likewise in 4:3 prayers are not answered because they are prayed out of the motivation of desire, what Paul would call “the flesh.” The next verse makes it clear that the person is trying to straddle two stools: he or she wants to have God and also be a friend of the world. In the process they have become God’s enemy. Obviously, someone who has to find security in the world as well as in God cannot be a person who trusts God very much at all.³¹ Yet the elders who are able to pray “the prayer of faith” can expect to see the sick raised, the fruit of sin (whether the specific sin of the individual or the fruit of sin in general) reversed (Jas. 5:15).

None of this idea about faith being relational trust in God or about faith in God leading to the reversal of the fruit of sin would be strange to Paul or to other New Testament writers. Since, in Paul, true faith leads to a sense of sonship (e.g. Gal 4:4-7) and an experience of the Spirit which includes the working of miracles (Gal 3:4-5), it is clearly relational trust that he is talking about. In the Johannine tradition the one who has true faith will do even greater works than those of Jesus (John 14:12; the works of Jesus cited in the context are his miracles,³² those works which John has cited as “signs” which should lead to belief³³). It is the one who believes who “overcomes the world” (1 John 5:4). This trust in Christ is what overcomes the effects of sin, for whether it is proclamation or loving others or healing the sick (all mentioned in the Johannine corpus), “The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work” (1 John 3:8 NIV).

Bound together with faith is repentance. Repentance is the turning from sin which is logically the preparatory move before faith. Thus Zacchaeus shows at least curiosity in seeking to see Jesus, but his clear internal motivation in the end (we are not told when it arose) is that of repentance which is seen in his parting from his money (Luke 19:8). This is certainly mixed with faith in that he recognizes Jesus as an authoritative figure (“lord”). For Luke, of course, this is a miracle in that without such a miracle no rich person can be saved (Luke 18:24-27). There are few other clear examples of repentance in the teaching of Jesus, but then many of the followers of Jesus had previously been associated with John the Baptist, whose ministry was a call to repentance.

In the epistles Jas 5:16 clearly connects repentance with the healing of the fruit of sin. Having just mentioned that if the sickness of a person were due to sin the sin would be forgiven when the elders prayed for healing, James turns from the specific situation of calling the elders to the general principle: “Confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you may be healed.” The point here is that one should confess sins, where appropriate, and then pray for healing, and that healing will follow. In case people object that they are merely ordinary people and not qualified to pray, James continues with the example of Elijah, an ordinary man who prayed with great effect.

In all of these situations cited, whether in the Gospels or in the epistles, the fruits of sin are reversed through the coming of Jesus and ultimately through his death on the Cross to atone for sin. The fruits of sin can be reversed through a sovereign act which does not presuppose any faith on the part of the recipient, but it is most likely to come about in those situations in which there is repentance from sin (if personal sin is involved in the situation) and faith in Christ. Negatively, a lack of faith in Jesus appears to block the reception of this reversal, even when Jesus himself is personally present (Mat 13:58; Mk 6:5-6). This reversal extends to all classes of the fruit of sin: death, broken relationships, alienation from God, demonization, and physical illness. Yet it is still not the full story.

 

The Not-Yet Nature of Reversing the Fruit of Sin

While in Jesus and the early church we see some of the fruit of sin reversed, there is also an acknowledgment that the fruits of sin have not yet been totally reversed. While we could cite examples in all realms of experience, the clearest of these is death. Death came through sin, but the resurrections of the dead which we see in Scripture are only occasional. It is true that Jesus is reported in the various Gospels to have raised two people from the dead. It is also true that part of the Matthean mission charge to the Twelve was “raise the dead” (Mat 10:8). Yet Acts reports only two (or possibly three) dead people being raised, and, unlike the summary reports in which many sick are said to be healed, there are no such summaries (e.g. “many dead were raised to life”) for raising the dead. At the same time, there is a clear expectation in the New Testament of a final resurrection of the dead when all of the dead would be raised (“the redemption of our bodies,” Rom 8:23). Thus the “not yet” of the present points to the coming fulfillment of human hope, while the “already” of the occasional raising of the dead whets the appetite for the full event.³⁴

Tags: Biblical, calamity, davids, death, demonization, foundations, fruits, natural, peter, relationship, sickness, sin, testament, view

Category: Biblical Studies, Fall 2006