Do Protestants Believe in Mortal Sins and Venial Sins?

[Marybeloved]

@Edras

And about everyone you know going to hell?? If you read all my previous post you’ll see that it’s not that simple. You see, there’s a reason why we have been told not to judge- It’s something only God can do. It’s not just about doing something forbidden, but also the predisposition of the person doing it- This is something only God can judge. He’s the only one who knows about “honestly ignorant” people ie, people who truly don’t know any better and people who don’t want to know any better because of pride and selfish reasons.

But when we pray and struggle, we improve things even if we can’t see it. My own cousin and brother became very orthodox and date chastely just because they saw me take my faith seriously. I didn’t even “preach” per se, but when you get up and go, people do see and it gives them permission to do the same. You see, there are people like you who know the truth and want to live according to it but are discouraged, just like you by the overwhelming tide of immorality and relativism. When they see someone actually live it, they gain some strength and make a start themselves. Don’t think you’re alone.

Peace.

 

[Marybeloved]

Ok, I can understand this. Would you agree that in your second paragraph the sins that you say weaken our bond to charity/sanctifying grace can, if not confessed and oft repeated, can lead us away from the Spirit, and therefore could be considered “mortal”?

I think this is what Luther was thinking when he says: "In the sight of God sins are then truly venial when they are feared by men to be mortal.” And of course, the reverse is true, as well.

Jon

There’s a book or article in which I’m sure I’ve read something very akin to what you’re saying- I’ll try find it- Or was it a formation class??

Yes, I think I’ve come across this concept in the catholic understanding. That is, a strong persistence in venial sins coupled with failure to repent, can end up causing death of the soul. I wish I could remember the article so that I could understand it better

But I remember St Teresa of Avila saw all deliberate sin, even venial, as thoroughly evil. But in the catholic mystical theology, we know that the holier a person becomes, the clearer their spiritual sight gets and they begin to have a true hatred of sin, much like Jesus. Not just hating the consequences of sin/punishment, which comes from self love, but hating it for what it really is. As they perceive God’s immense holiness and beauty and goodness, they understand in their very boneswhat it really is, to choose anything at all above him, and it causes them a lot of anguish- This is hatred of sin that comes from pure love of God. St Teresa just doesn’t understand (as a saint) how anyone who truly loved God would want to offend him, even in a “small” matter.

In the interior life (I guess what protestants would call their walk with the lord), there’s an understanding that there are stages.

When we first set out on this road, we typically walk away from mortal sin and struggle for a long time not to keep returning to them- especially if it’s a strong habit that we had acquired, and we repent as soon as we find that we have fallen. If someone continues well on the road, one day, they’ll discover that they no longer commit mortal sins, but they struggle with deliberate venial sins, such as little convenient lies etc. If they continue following Jesus, they will slowly but surely become very uncomfortable with even with these sins, and will acquire a predisposition not to commit them. While they are sincerely struggling against them, when the time is right, God will take them through a series of “dark nights”. This means that God will take over their purification for the most part leaving them a very passive role. God does this when you’ve reached the limits of what you can do for yourself even if aided by his grace, and he does the work himself, rooting out the deep roots of bad habits, faults, pride and sin that you cannot root out yourself. When he’s completely done, the person is truly “out of this world”. A saint, another Christ.

So you see, deliberate venial sin puts a road block to spiritual growth. And on this road, there’s no standing still. There’s going forward or falling behind. A state like this persisting for long, will certainly, unless cured, drop one into the pit of death waiting for those falling from the road. But thank God our Lord never tires of giving repeated chances to begin again.

 

[Georgia]

I was thinking about how some denominations reject the classifications of sin and did a little searching for a Fundamentalist Baptist, KJV-only, position. Here is what I found.

According to them, there is eternal security of the believer, so a person who has been saved can never lose his salvation. They cite John 10: 27-30. The important part of that I have often heard quoted is “no one can snatch them out of my hand.”

Their interpretation seems to omit that possibility that a person could later reject God’s grace. In conversations with people holding those views, I have asked what would happen if a person were saved as a child and in later life became a murderer. The reply was that a person who was really saved would not commit such a major sin. They seem to say that no one at all, not even a person leaving the fold, is capable of damnation because that would be snatching them out of Our Lord’s hand.

In the context of this thread, those in some Fundamentalist denominations certainly reject the possibility of mortal sin. If a person is saved forever, nothing he does can bar him from Heaven. Once you take that position, all sin is on the same level.

 

[Marybeloved]

I was thinking about how some denominations reject the classifications of sin and did a little searching for a Fundamentalist Baptist, KJV-only, position. Here is what I found.

According to them, there is eternal security of the believer, so a person who has been saved can never lose his salvation. They cite John 10: 27-30. The important part of that I have often heard quoted is “no one can snatch them out of my hand.”

Their interpretation seems to omit that possibility that a person could later reject God’s grace. In conversations with people holding those views, I have asked what would happen if a person were saved as a child and in later life became a murderer. The reply was that a person who was really saved would not commit such a major sin. They seem to say that no one at all, not even a person leaving the fold, is capable of damnation because that would be snatching them out of Our Lord’s hand.

In the context of this thread, those in some Fundamentalist denominations certainly reject the possibility of mortal sin. If a person is saved forever, nothing he does can bar him from Heaven. Once you take that position, all sin is on the same level.

I also believe that nothing could “snatch” us from the hand of God. But I know that we can certainly “leave” that hand ourselves, if that’s what we want!! Discovering the truth and choosing to follow Jesus does not destroy one’s free will. If you later change your mind, God will not drag you into heaven kicking and screaming!!! My own experience has been that the journey of faith is not a straight path, but a zigzag road. I remember when I first started out I was very fervent, and after two years, I fell away from God for almost a whole year, because I decided that “it was just too too difficult” and also realized later that I was angry with God for some loss I experienced. Thankfully, our Lord came after me, and when I started again, I was much better than before. This idea that, if you’re truly saved, you’ll never fall, and “once saved” nothing, not even your own free will, can take it away, is contrary to the real experience of the walk of faith, to say nothing of scripture itself!

 

[TrueLight]

I was thinking about how some denominations reject the classifications of sin and did a little searching for a Fundamentalist Baptist, KJV-only, position. Here is what I found.

According to them, there is eternal security of the believer, so a person who has been saved can never lose his salvation. They cite John 10: 27-30. The important part of that I have often heard quoted is “no one can snatch them out of my hand.”

Their interpretation seems to omit that possibility that a person could later reject God’s grace. In conversations with people holding those views, I have asked what would happen if a person were saved as a child and in later life became a murderer. The reply was that a person who was really saved would not commit such a major sin. They seem to say that no one at all, not even a person leaving the fold, is capable of damnation because that would be snatching them out of Our Lord’s hand.

In the context of this thread, those in some Fundamentalist denominations certainly reject the possibility of mortal sin. If a person is saved forever, nothing he does can bar him from Heaven. Once you take that position, all sin is on the same level.

This is a very good summary of the Baptist position.

This is what I was raised to believe.

Baptists do believe in the unpardonable sin against the Holy Spirit, although it wasn’t exactly clear what that was.

But basically, the idea was if you were truly saved, even if you wandered away from the faith, you would find your way back before you died. If you never found your way back, it meant you were never truly saved.

 

[JRRTFAN]

Are there any Protestant denominations which have a similar concept to that of Catholicism with regard to mortal sins and venial sins, or is this distinction found only in Catholicism? If there is a similar distinction in certain branches of Protestantism, what is the distinction? If not, what do various Protestant denominations say about the nature and types of sin?

There are but I couldn’t name the denominations. For instance, if you take a High Church Anglican like C S Lewis you will find the theological distinction in degrees of sin apparent. In the fundamentalist community, where one becomes “saved” and cannot lose salvation even by one’s own choice (i.e., mortal sin) the distinction disappears and stealing a pencil from work is exactly the same as shooting up an old folks home.

 

[JRRTFAN]

I was thinking about how some denominations reject the classifications of sin and did a little searching for a Fundamentalist Baptist, KJV-only, position. Here is what I found.

According to them, there is eternal security of the believer, so a person who has been saved can never lose his salvation. They cite John 10: 27-30. The important part of that I have often heard quoted is “no one can snatch them out of my hand.”

Their interpretation seems to omit that possibility that a person could later reject God’s grace. In conversations with people holding those views, I have asked what would happen if a person were saved as a child and in later life became a murderer. The reply was that a person who was really saved would not commit such a major sin. They seem to say that no one at all, not even a person leaving the fold, is capable of damnation because that would be snatching them out of Our Lord’s hand.

In the context of this thread, those in some Fundamentalist denominations certainly reject the possibility of mortal sin. If a person is saved forever, nothing he does can bar him from Heaven. Once you take that position, all sin is on the same level.

My personal tendency is to contrast a nominal offense against something outrageous for illustrative purposes. But to illustrate a more common situation, how many divorced and remarrried “saved” persons are there? Objectively, these people are in a state of mortal sin.

 

[Georgia]

My personal tendency is to contrast a nominal offense against something outrageous for illustrative purposes. But to illustrate a more common situation, how many divorced and remarrried “saved” persons are there? Objectively, these people are in a state of mortal sin.

I agree with you completely, but those who accept OSAS would say we are both wrong. When they claim that no sin is mortal other than the unpardonable sin, they then follow with saying that a person may be punished in this life for unrepented and unforgiven sin. When I was growing up in a KJV-only church, I remember many sermons in which the preacher used the phrase “There will be bloodshed in the woodshed” to characterize the earthly punishments that unrepented sin would bring.

The worst they accept for the afterlife is that a person will have a lesser reward in Heaven. They also reject the notion of a purgation before entering Heaven. Every funeral I ever attended at my old church included a talk about how the deceased was in Heaven at that moment and that we could all have that same assurance. It didn’t matter if that person lived the life that would only be discussed in whispers. If there was a salvation moment at any time in that person’s life, he was thought to be with Our Lord and Savior.

 

[Marybeloved]

This is a very good summary of the Baptist position.

This is what I was raised to believe.

Baptists do believe in the unpardonable sin against the Holy Spirit, although it wasn’t exactly clear what that was.

But basically, the idea was if you were truly saved, even if you wandered away from the faith, you would find your way back before you died. If you never found your way back, it meant you were never truly saved.

I wonder then, how they’d explain Adam’s disobedience? Or David’s sin against Uriah? Or Solomon’s dabbling in idolatry? Or most importantly, the falling away of all the apostles due to cowardice and greed that night between the first Holy Thursday and Good Friday? These people were all in friendship with God. Adam was in perfect condition, in the state of perfect grace- It did not prevent him from destroying this friendship by his sin. The Apostles had just received communion for heaven’s sake. And David? The man after God’s own heart? Solomon, who spoke with God himself and was asked “ask me anything and I will give it to you?”

St Peter had been given the keys to the Kingdom of heaven! And he denied Jesus–denied him! Isn’t this the very antitheses of getting “saved” which is accepting Jesus as lord? Then we would have to conclude, no he couldn’t sin like that- Then perhaps he was never really “saved” right? Peter had gotten, “saved” alright, according to the meaning usually ascribed to the word. Certainly if at no other time, then when he said “Thou art the Christ- The son of the living God!” which Jesus certainly accepted as coming from the father himself. How about when he pledged himself to Christ “Where else shall we go, Lord? You have the words of eternal life.” and “Wherever you go, Lord, I will follow, to Prison, even death.” This man then publicly disowned Christ- and people believe that it’s impossible “once saved” to leave Christ?

How about Judas Iscariot, did he not follow Jesus because he believed in him? What choices did he make afterwards, and where did they lead him? How about Ananias and Saphira who dared to lie to the Spirit? How about the many “brethren” st Paul keeps talking to in his letters regarding their bad conduct? Why warn “saved” individuals that if they take communion unworthily, they shall be taking it to their own condemnation? Why does he himself (st Paul) command us to “work out our own salvation with fear and trembling” (Phil 2:12) and worry himself “…lest, after preaching to others, I myself should be disqualified” and indeed says that he subdues his body for this very fear? Does that sound like a man certain of his own eternal security? And if he is not, surely why should the Baptists assume that they are?

I hope that this is not universal among protestants. It’s manifestly unbiblical and we only discuss it now, because it was invented and propagated some few centuries ago. But many nowadays disagree with that whole “sola fide” or faith alone doctrine that clearly directly contradicts st James 2:24 “for we are not saved by faith alone”.Our Lord himself tells us that “those who endure to the end shall be saved”. So we should not appropriate to ourselves a guarantee that God has in no way given to us. God promises that he has provided the way, the means, all the helps, everything we need,- He has not promised us what choices we ourselves will make, because he wasn’t just playing around when he created free will. He means it to actually be free.

 

[Marybeloved]

Nevertheless, it’s really cruel to think that nearly everybody I know will end up in Hell. Most of them because they have/had sex before marriage!
That really scares me…
What can I do about it? I’ve told some of them, well, but except that they laughed at me and/or said, “We don’t live in the Middle Ages anymore, boy!”, nothing happend…

The only thing you can do…pray, and try to live the gospel. When you’re happily living the truth, people notice and be attracted to it-that’s why the saints had such an impact. Be confident that in Jesus’ hands, your prayers can do wonders.

I am not sure how this works with divorce and remarriage in my Baptist Church.
I think they are more liberal on this than the RCC, because they don’t see marriage as a sacrament.
And what they, as you have described, always emphasis is, that if you are a Child of God, that, if you ask Him for forgiveness, He will forgive you.
I mean, the woman I had mentioned in another post on this thread you were referring to, is divorced and now happily (re)married with he present husband. (Seen from the Catholic perspective, however, I think she really commited adultery, because, I assume, that she has been married in the RCC. - However, in the meantime, she is in the Baptist Church and has resigned from the RCC…)
I am not really sure if you’d need an annulement, as, as I have mentioned above, marriage is not a sacrament among Baptists. (In fact in Baptist Churches there are no sacraments in the Catholic sense at all…)

Like I said before, the situation (of whether or not these persons are spiritually dead or not based on mortal sin) is a little more complicated and should be left in God’s hands. Objectively, though. Two baptized Christians (catholic or not) when they marry, do contract a sacrament- if ‘contract’ is the right way to put it. Sacrament just means the marriage is a special way to access the grace of the cross for that particular situation- marriage, family life, children etc. People who don’t marry certainly don’t get this grace because they don’t need it, the same way married people don’t get the grace to live a life of celibacy, or ruling the church. Obviously the sacrament of marriage excludes illicit relationships and invalid marriages, such as the ones you describe.

But even putting that aside, I don’t see why belief (or lack thereof) in marriage as a sacrament should affect the status of the marriages contracted by Christians. Being a “bible-believing” “sola scriptura” denomination, shouldn’t the word of God carry a lot of weight regarding this matter? Doesn’t Jesus’ opinion supersede every other opinion on the matter? This is what he said:

Luke 16:18
“Every one who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.”

Mark 10:2-12:
"And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce, and to put her away.” But Jesus said to them, “For your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder.” And in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. And he said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another, commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”

Isn’t our Lord as plain as plain can be here? Sometimes so called “sola scriptura” churches puzzle me by how much they ignore the plain text of scripture, when they accuse the Catholic Church of supposedly subverting scripture. It seems to me that when it comes to the real difficult or inconvenient realities, only the catholic Church is willing to stubbornly adhere to the plain teaching of scripture.

 

[JRRTFAN]

I agree with you completely, but those who accept OSAS would say we are both wrong. When they claim that no sin is mortal other than the unpardonable sin, they then follow with saying that a person may be punished in this life for unrepented and unforgiven sin. When I was growing up in a KJV-only church, I remember many sermons in which the preacher used the phrase “There will be bloodshed in the woodshed” to characterize the earthly punishments that unrepented sin would bring.

The worst they accept for the afterlife is that a person will have a lesser reward in Heaven. They also reject the notion of a purgation before entering Heaven. Every funeral I ever attended at my old church included a talk about how the deceased was in Heaven at that moment and that we could all have that same assurance. It didn’t matter if that person lived the life that would only be discussed in whispers. If there was a salvation moment at any time in that person’s life, he was thought to be with Our Lord and Savior.

I have contemplated this endlessly since my family left the Church 17 years ago for laser lights, Armani suits, pretty girl singers and snappy preaching. But where the rubber meets the road there is simply nothing in their theology recognizing a final jusdgment, Mt. 25 is about somebody else and 1 Jn 5:16 et. seq. must be a mistranslation or teaching about the unforgivable sin, (which it is not). I just do not understand how intelligent people, and many are more intelligent than I, can not come to grips with the concepts of grace and forgiveness and that, in the end, it’s what your relationship is with God on that day, not what it was when you accepted Jesus 50 years before.