1 Timothy 1:15-17
It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all. Yet for this reason I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life. Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.
The importance of learning this doctrine is simply that it shows us how deeply rooted in sin humanity is and how far down God has to reach to bring us out from that deadly path. As a sin-filled species we can do nothing, unless we do it in Christ, to please the Father. All “good deeds” are sin to God unless Christ is in it. Even though throughout the day we don’t do all of the bad things that we could do, our depravity and sin state is not seen in relation to men, rather it is seen in relation to God.
It is crucial to see our depravity in relation to God.
1 Corinthians 10:31
Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.
If we are to do everything to the glory of God then it’s not only when we do “bad” things that we fail but also when we do “good” things not to the glory of God. This also means that everyone that is not leaning on God does them (“good” and “bad” things) not for the glory of God, therefore everything they do is sin.
Romans 14:23
But he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because his eating is not from faith; and whatever is not from faith is sin.
If whatever is not from faith is sin, then that means that unbelievers only sin. As John Piper puts it, if a pagan philanthropist builds a hospital in a third world country, we may say that it
is good, but God still says that it’s sin because it did not proceed from faith. People who ignore God in their good deeds offend God.
James 2:10-11
For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. For He who said, “DO NOT COMMIT ADULTERY,” also said, “DO NOT COMMIT MURDER.” Now if you do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.
Even if you keep 99.9% of God’s law and you missed it by .1% you are still a lawbreaker. If you keep 9 out of 10 commandments but your one law that you broke was that you were covetous over your neighbor’s car, then you looked into the face of the God who said “Do not covet”, you pondered His heart and His will and you said to that God “NO!”, and that same God you told “NO!” said all of the other commandments. The unity of the commandments is the unity of the person of God. Obedience is not a response to pieces of commandments, obedience is a response to a person, and if you look a person who has the authority of God in the face and He says “Here is the place where the battle is being fought, right here, covetousness, my will is for you to resist that, trust me, I will provide your needs, don’t yield to that,” and you say “I’m going to yield to this!” you have broken God, you have cut yourself off from God. If you try to justify yourself by saying “but I got 9 of 10 right!,” your really saying “I can pick and choose from God and His grocery list of commandments. The ones I want to do, I’ll do, and the ones I don’t want to do, I won’t do,” and that makes you a lawbreaker.
Human Depravity Is Total in at Least Five Senses
1. Depravity affects every human.
Romans 3:23
All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
1 Kings 8:46
There is no man who does not sin.
Psalm 143:2
And do not enter into judgment with Your servant, for in Your sight no man living is righteous.
1 John 1:8
If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us.
The totality of this depravity embraces the entire human race.
2. Our rebellion or hardness against God is total, that is, apart from the grace of God there is no delight in the holiness of God, and there is no glad submission to the sovereign authority of God.
Romans 3:9-11, 18
What then? Are we (Jews) better than they (Gentiles)? Not at all; for we have already charged that both Jews and Greeks are all under sin; as it is written, “THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE; THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD . . . THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES.”
Paul is not saying “sins” as in “here’s one, there’s one,” because we all will continue to commit “sins”, but sin here means this powerful force like a disease that plagues humanity. This is also not saying no one literally seeks God (Acts 17:27). It’s more like saying that nobody seeks Him out of true, heartfelt repentance. It could also mean that no one seeks God successfully. The fact that religion or spirituality is so prevalent in America is a mark of human depravity. It is a myth that man in his natural state is genuinely seeking God. Men do seek God. But they do not seek him for who he is. They seek him in a pinch as one who might preserve them from death or enhance their worldly enjoyments. Apart from conversion, no one comes to the light of God.
John 3:19-21
This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.
Yes there are those who come to the light—namely those whose deeds are the work of God. "Wrought in God" means worked by God. Apart from this gracious work of God all men hate the light of God and will not come to him lest their evil be exposed—this is total rebellion.
If we find someone in this world like Cornelius (from Acts 10), who is praying and seeking, we have found someone in whom God’s grace is already at work, drawing and wooing.
Romans 1:18
For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness.
3. In his total rebellion everything man does is sin.
Romans 14:23
Whatever is not from faith is sin.
Hebrews 11:6
And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him.
Romans 7:18
For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not.
So what Paul is saying is that apart from the work of God's Spirit all we think and feel and do is not good.
4. Man’s inability to submit to God and do good is total.
Romans 8:5-9
For those who are according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who are according to the Spirit, the things of the Spirit. For the mind set on the flesh [literally: “the mind of the flesh”] is death, but the mind set on the Spirit [literally: “the mind of the Spirit”] is life and peace, because the mind set on the flesh [literally: “the mind of the flesh”] is hostile toward God; for it does not subject itself to the law of God, for it is not even able to do so, and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. The "mind of the flesh" is the mind of man apart from the indwelling Spirit of God. So we see that natural man has a mindset that does not and cannot submit to God. Man cannot reform himself.
However, you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. But if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Him.
John 3:5-7
Jesus answered, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be amazed that I said to you, ‘You must be born again.’”
Until someone is born again, they are only flesh and only have the mind of the flesh.
Romans 6:17-18
But thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin, you became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you were committed, and having been freed from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.
Ephesians 2:1-5
And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).
The point of deadness is that we are incapable of any life with God.
Ephesians 4:17-18
So this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart.
Our hearts are like a stone toward God.
John 6:44
No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him; and I will raise him up on the last day.
1 Corinthians 2:14
But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised.
Jeremiah 17:9
The heart is more deceitful than all else and is desperately [incurably] sick; who can understand it?
Our hearts are blind and incapable of seeing the glory of God in Christ. It’s not like we can choose to do good and choose God, because we were born into sin and only God could pull us out. We were dead in sin, i.e. we were dead and could not do anything to do anything God-ward on our own. Natural man does not accept the things of God because they are foolish to him. He cannot understand them because they are spiritually appraised. The natural man is someone who is born of the flesh and does not walk in the spirit.
5. Our rebellion is totally deserving of eternal punishment.
Ephesians 2:3
Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.
We are under God's wrath because of the corruption of our hearts that make us as good as dead before God.
2 Thessalonians 1:8-9
[God will] deal out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power.
Matthew 25:46
These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.
If these texts are true, then there must be something about us that’s pretty bad (totally depraved). The reality of hell is God's clear indictment of the infiniteness of our guilt. If our corruption were not deserving of an eternal punishment, God would be unjust to threaten us with a punishment so severe as eternal torment. But the Scriptures teach that God is just in condemning unbelievers to eternal hell. Therefore, to the extent that hell is a total sentence of condemnation, to that extent must we think of ourselves as totally blameworthy apart from the saving grace of God.
Summary and Conclusion
In summary, total depravity means that apart from any enabling grace from God, our hardness and rebellion against God is total, everything we do in this rebellion is sin, our inability to submit to God or reform ourselves is total, and we are therefore totally deserving of eternal punishment. It is hard to exaggerate the importance of admitting our condition to be this bad. If we think of ourselves as basically good or even less than totally at odds with God, our grasp of the work of God in redemption will be defective. But if we humble ourselves under this terrible truth of our total depravity, we will be in a position to see and appreciate the glory and wonder of the work of God discussed in the next four points.
Barring a barrage of questions or comments (lol), Thursday we will be taking a look at the grace of God.
(Sources include John Piper, Desiring God, and Travis Carden)
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