Fact-checking our beliefs [False ideas Christians believe about…Sin. Part 1]

Did you know Napoleon wasn’t really short? Or that oil doesn’t keep pasta from sticking? Or that the whole right brain vs. left brain thing might not be true? I found this series of false facts from Readers Digest, and some are really surprising and fun. 

When you think about these facts, it reminds us that we hold some ideas to be true, but we might be wrong. 

This blog series will be like that, except about Christianity and the Bible.  Over the centuries, Christians have come to believe statements that are either totally false, or somewhat false.  In a world of so-called fake news, we are used to having to fact-check, especially what we hear from politicians, right?  So when it comes to the Bible and theology, we Christians are people who seek after truth! 

For the next few months we’re going to be fact-checking a number of ideas that we Christians can be heard saying.  Sometimes they are statements that seem true, but they need some explanation. 

Here’s how it works.  Many authors have written articles such as “7 things Christians say that are not true.”  Just Google something like that and you’ll see what I mean.  I read a bunch of those kinds of articles, and created a master list of the phrases or ideas that these authors talked about.  I didn’t agree with every single one, I was surprised by some, and some of the statements directly contradicted each other, as we will see in this first series of posts.  In the end I had a list numbering more than 30.  So I decided to group up the ones that were related, and preach topically on them.

This week’s series is about sin.  Have you heard these phrases before?

• All sins are the same.  No sin is worse than any other. 
• Or it’s contrast, Some sins are worse than others.
• Love the sinner, hate the sin.

You might look at that list and think, “But wait…isn’t at least one of those statements in the Bible?”  In other words, “Isn’t that statement true?” 

What I am attempting in this series, and perhaps I will fail, is to show that each one of these statements or principles is either totally false, or somehow partially false.  Some of these statements or principles are not in the Bible.  Some, however, are based on biblical material, but misunderstood by many people.  So let’s fact check these statements about sin.  First it is important for us to ask, what is sin? Check back tomorrow for that!