1 K. 8:46—“there is no man that sinneth not”; Ps. 143:2—“enter not into judgment with thy servant; For in thy sight no man living is righteous”; Prov. 20:9—“Who can say, I have made my heart clean, I am pure from my sin?”; Eccl. 7:20—“Surely there is not a righteous man upon earth, that doeth good, and sinneth not”; Luke 11:13—“If ye, then, being evil”; Rom. 3:10, 12—“There is none righteous, no, not one.... There is none that doeth good, no, not so much as one”; 19, 20—“that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God: because by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight; for through the law cometh the knowledge of sin”; 23—“for all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God”; Gal. 3:22—“the scripture shut up all things under sin”; James 3:2—“For in many things we all stumble”; 1 John 1:8—“If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” Compare Mat. 6:12—“forgive us our debts”—given as a prayer for all men; 14—“if ye forgive men their trespasses”—the condition of our own forgiveness.
(b) Implied in declarations of the universal need of atonement, regeneration, and repentance.
Universal need of atonement: Mark 16:16—“He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved” (Mark 16:9-20, though probably not written by Mark, is nevertheless of canonical authority); John 3:16—“God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish”; 6:50—“This is the bread which cometh down out of heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die”; 12:47—“I came not to judge the world, but to save the world”; Acts 4:12—“in none other is there salvation: for neither is there any other name under heaven, that is given among men, wherein we must be saved.” Universal need of regeneration: John 3:3, 5—“Except one be born anew, he cannot see the kingdom of God.... Except one be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” Universal need of repentance: Acts 17:30—“commandeth men that they should all everywhere repent.” Yet Mrs. Mary Baker G. Eddy, in her “Unity of Good,” speaks of “the illusion which calls sin real and man a sinner needing a Savior.”
(c) Shown from the condemnation resting upon all who do not accept Christ.
John 3:18—“he that believeth not hath been judged already, because he hath not believed on the name of the only begotten Son of God”; 36—“he that obeyeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him”; Compare 1 John 5:19—“the whole world lieth in [i. e., in union with] the evil one”; see Annotated Paragraph Bible, in loco. Kaftan, Dogmatik, 318—“Law requires love to God. This implies love to our neighbor, not only abstaining from all injury to him, but righteousness in all our relations, forgiving instead of requiting, help to enemies as well as friends in all salutary ways, self-discipline, avoidance of all sensuous immoderation, subjection of all sensuous activity as means for spiritual ends in the kingdom of God, and all this, not as a matter of outward conduct merely, but from the heart and as the satisfaction of one's own will and desire. This is the will of God respecting us, which Jesus has revealed and of which he is the example in his life. Instead of this, man universally seeks to promote his own life, pleasure, and honor.”
(d) Consistent with those passages which at first sight seem to ascribe to certain men a goodness which renders them acceptable to God, where a closer examination will show that in each case the goodness supposed is a merely imperfect and fancied goodness, a goodness of mere aspiration and impulse due to preliminary workings of God's Spirit, or a goodness resulting from the trust of a conscious sinner in God's method of salvation.
In Mat 9:12—“They that are whole have no need of a physician, but they that are sick”—Jesus means those who in their own esteem are whole; cf. 13—“I came not to call the righteous, but sinners”—“if any were truly righteous, they would not need my salvation; if they think themselves so, they will not care to seek it” (An. Par. Bib.). In Luke 10:30-37—the parable of the good Samaritan—Jesus intimates, not that the good Samaritan was not a sinner, but that there were saved sinners outside of the bounds of Israel. In Acts 10:35—“in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is acceptable to him”—Peter declares, not that Cornelius was not a sinner, but that God had accepted him through Christ; Cornelius was already justified, but he needed to know (1) that he was saved, and (2) how he was saved; and Peter was sent to tell him of the fact, and of the method, of his salvation in Christ. In Rom. 2:14—“for when Gentiles that have not the law do by nature the things of the law, these, not having the law, are a law unto themselves”—it is only said that in certain respects the obedience of these Gentiles shows that they have an unwritten law in their hearts; it is not said that they perfectly obey the law and therefore have no sin—for Paul says immediately after (Rom. 3:9)—“we before laid to the charge both of Jews and Greeks, that they are all under sin.”
So with regard to the words “perfect” and “upright,” as applied to godly men. We shall see, when we come to consider the doctrine of Sanctification, that the word “perfect,” as applied to spiritual conditions already attained, signifies only a relative perfection, equivalent to sincere piety or maturity of Christian judgment, in other words, the perfection of a sinner who has long trusted in Christ, and in whom Christ has overcome his chief defects of character. See 1 Cor. 2:6—“we speak wisdom among the perfect” (Am. Rev.: “among them that are full-grown”); Phil. 3:15—“let us therefore, as many as are perfect, be thus minded”—i. e., to press toward the goal—a goal expressly said by the apostles to be not yet attained (v. 12-14).
“Est deus in nobis; agitante calescimus illo.” God is the “spark that fires our clay.”S. S. Times, Sept. 21, 1901:609—“Humanity is better and worse than men have painted it. There has been a kind of theological pessimism in denouncing human sinfulness, which has been blind to the abounding love and patience and courage and fidelity to duty among men.” A. H. Strong, Christ in Creation, 287-290—“There is a natural life of Christ, and that life pulses and throbs in all men everywhere. All men are created in Christ, before they are recreated in him. The whole race lives, moves, and has its being in him, for he is the soul of its soul and the life of its life.” To Christ then, and not to unaided human nature, we attribute the noble impulses of unregenerate men. These impulses are drawings of his Spirit, moving men to repentance. But they are influences of his grace which, if resisted, leave the soul in more than its original darkness.
2. Proof from history, observation, and the common judgment of mankind.