Quotes about Sin

We should eliminate sin if we wish to eliminate the scourge of tyrants.

But there are more wicked men to be found than good; according to Eccles. 1:15: "The number of fools is infinite.

God is not offended except by our acting contrary to our own good

To sin is to fall short of a perfect action; hence to be able to sin is to be able to fall short in action, which is repugnant to omnipotence.

Believe it or not, Christianity is not about good people getting better. If anything, it is good news for bad people coping with their failure to be good.

No pain, no gain. Without danger, the virtue of courage cannot be developed. Without trials and tribulations we can have no patience. God has to permit sin before we can experience forgiveness. Higher-order virtues are dependent on allowing lower-order evils.

Children never forget injustice. They forgive heaps of things grown-up people mind; but that sin is the unpardonable sin.

Certainly we struggle as victims of other people's unkindness. We have been sinned against. But we cannot excuse our sinful responses to others on the grounds of their mistreatment of us. We are responsible for what we do. We are both strugglers and sinners, victims and agents, people who hurt and people who harm.

It is time for us Christians to face up to our responsibility for holiness. Too often we say we are "defeated" by this or that sin. No, we are not defeated; we are simply disobedient. It might be well if we stopped using the terms "victory" and "defeat" to describe our progress in holiness. Rather we should use the terms "obedience" and "disobedience.

When God wanted to defeat sin, His ultimate weapon was the sacrifice of His own Son. On Christmas Day two thousand years ago, the birth of a tiny baby in an obscure village in the Middle East was God's supreme triumph of good over evil.

I hope I know my own unworthiness, and that I hate and despise myself and all my fellow-creatures as every practicable Christian should.

Mindful, then, of what we had read together, I thought of the two men who went up into the Temple to pray, and I knew there were no better words that I could say beside his bed, than 'O Lord, be merciful to him, a sinner!