Michael tackles a listener question: “Why doesn’t God just make it so believers cannot sin after conversion?” The answer to this question balloons rather quickly to touch on many other things, including, in keeping with the trend of this podcast, the nature of reality. Enjoy!

LINKS:

Michael’s Patreon

Human Nature in Its Fourfold State

Impeccability

NH Ep. 17: The Origin of the Soul (where you’ll find a discussion of the human nature and flesh identity of Jesus beginning at ~50:18)

NH Ep. 18: Physical and Spiritual, Heaven and Earth (for a discussion of visible/invisible)

Monergism

Atlanta Storytellers (The Event at Eddie’s Attic was “The Songs that Shape Us”)

TRANSCRIPT (the content, for the most part):

This is Episode 23 of the Nothing Human Podcast: Why Doesn’t God Just Make Us Perfect Already?

Welcome to the Nothing Human Podcast. I’m Michael Minkoff, and I want to explore the big human questions in a way that makes complex ideas more accessible and practical for any and everyone. All I need from you is curiosity and attention. Join me on this journey of discovery, and I promise you’ll see that’s there’s really nothing about the big-T Truth we can’t understand better together.

All of the episodes for Nothing Human and my bonus podcast Being Something Extra are available on my website, Nothing Human Podcast .com. If you have any questions or comments, please comment on the relevant episode on my website, and I will make sure to respond either there or in a podcast. If you want to support me in my work, please rate and review this podcast wherever you are listening to it. If you want to support me further, you can become my patron for as little as five dollars a month on Patreon. There’s a link in the show notes on my website. Thank you all for your support.

It’s been a bit. If you support me on Patreon, you already know I took a break from the podcast to go on a road trip out west with my family. I needed the break and the vacation, and I hardly knew how much until I was nearly finished with it. All said, I feel refreshed and ready to get back into a productive rhythm.

But … I’m not ready to release the next video of my conversation with Christa. That one still needs a good bit of work in post. At the same time, I don’t want to leave you hanging much longer for the content I know you all crave. So I’m going to take a stab at answering a listener question today. The question is from my friend Joe, and in this case, I actually have his recording of the question, and I’ve gotten permission to share that recording. So here goes:

JOE: Hey, Michael. I wanted to say thank you so much for the podcast. I’ve been listening to many of the episodes multiple times, and digesting them and then circling back around to them with a fresh perspective after a couple of weeks. I still have more I want to comment on from the various parts of the series, and I’m still re-listening to various parts.

I do have a question though that doesn’t really fit into any one episode as of yet. So I want to leave you a message about my question and you can do with it whatever you will. So the question is why is it that God thinks it necessary or chooses to have a world—you know, the real world we live in—where after salvation and being filled with the Holy Spirit, He leaves us in the state of being where we have the Holy Spirit, salvation, but we still bear a sinful nature that wants to take control, lead us to sin, and ultimately just be at odds with our new creation state of being? I’m thinking like God can do whatever he wants with the universe. He can decide however he wants things to unfold. We know from Scripture that, in eternity in the future, we’re going to have a state of being where we are sinless, we do not sin, we have no desire to sin, we do not choose to sin, and you could argue it’s not even possible for us to sin. But why do we have this state of being where He didn’t choose to just rewire us spiritually and bodily in such a way that we just do not desire to sin after salvation? I would prefer it that way.

I think there are many layers down we can go into the ramifications of what it would look like. And I’ve been very unsatisfied with the answers from other Christians. So, let me give you some of the examples of what they’ve said. Some responses I have had from others included things like, “You know you have the old man and the new man. You still have a sin nature. And, you know, you’re supposed to experience sanctification during the church age. So you’re supposed to be less and less sinful and more and more bodily and spiritually reflecting Jesus Christ.” And the reason I’m not satisfied with that being the answer is that tells me what God is doing in this present age and how things are unfolding, but it’s not answering the why. Why is it that God wants it this way? He could have had it any way He wanted. And wouldn’t the all-powerful creator who ultimately hates sin want to eliminate the ability of his own kind, his own people, his own sons and daughters, to practice sinfulness when the Holy Spirit resides in us? We are the temple of the Holy Spirit. Why on earth would we have the capacity to sin if God who is all powerful has taken residence and can mold us and shape us however he sees fit?

And before I sign off, I’ll just say that I would also not be satisfied with an answer like, ”Well, God is not going to treat us like robots. He’s not going to force us to change.” Because that’s ridiculous. Because something is going to happen in the future in our new state of being where we will simply have no cause or desire to sin. And that is all brought about by force of changes that God brings about. So ultimately God will be responsible for changing our state of being so that we do not have the desire to sin anymore. And it will be God getting the credit. It will not be something like, “Well, you know, we can’t do it this way now because we would take pride in our sinlessness and then that’s a sin. So if we were sinless now as Christians in the church age we would ultimately commit the sin of pride.” No no no. We’re not going to be proud either when we ultimately don’t sin anymore. So I just don’t see why in the church age in the present conditions, God just didn’t skip to the part where we’re no longer sinning. And the reason I bring it up is because I think it would just be a whole lot better for all of us and the unfolding of history on so many levels if it was just a done deal at the time of salvation forward.

So I think the question Joe is asking, put in shorthand theological terms, is why is sanctification necessary in God’s plan? Why would God put Christians through this process of struggling with the sin nature inside of us for our whole Christian lives? And, why would God put even unbelievers through the temptation of unbelief which occurs because of so many inconsistent and struggling sometimes even hypocritical Christians? Wouldn’t it be better all around if He just skipped the struggle and made us sinless at the moment of our regeneration? Why would He have us struggle with sin, and even fall to its temptation, if He could just make us righteous instantaneously? Since God hates sin, why would He allow it to coexist in us His children with His Spirit after conversion, even for a minute?

And in case you think this question lacks practical value, I think wrestling with this and similar questions is almost impossible to avoid while you’re exploring the Christian life. Maybe you have witnessed the enormous destructive consequences of a well-known Christian pulling a King David …. or the fatigue or discouragement you can feel from having to be vigilant about fighting temptation …. or the uncertainty concerning your salvation that can occur when you go through periods of faltering. It’s natural to ask, occasionally, why won’t God just make us perfect already? So, like the problem of evil or questions of why or whether God planned the fall of humankind, these are questions we ask for real practical reasons. They matter to us. We love God and have a relationship with Him, and sometimes we get confused or even hurt by the choices He makes concerning us and the world. So I appreciate the question, Joe, and I’ll do my best to think through it with you productively.

Let’s start with the question itself. We need to know more about what we’re actually asking.
There are a few ways to frame the crux of this question, and I think it’s helpful to walk around in it a bit. I have mentioned before how Augustine talks about the four possible states of humankind—sometimes called the state of innocence, the state of nature, the state of grace, and the state of eternity.
In the state of innocence before the fall, humans had the ability to sin.

In the state of nature after sin, after the fall but pre-conversion, humans don’t have the ability not to sin. we do it by corrupted nature and always operate according to that nature.

In the state of grace, after conversion but before death, we have the ability to sin still because of indwelling sin, but we also have the ability again through regeneration of not sinning.

In the state of eternity, believers can’t sin. According to Augustine, the unconverted are born into and never progress beyond the state of nature.

Really quickly as an aside, I will mention that the inability to sin is not usually called sinlessness. The term sinlessness refers to having never sinned or being cleared from all sin, but does not necessarily say whether you could have sinned or can sin. Theologians use the term impeccability to refer to the inability to sin. And they use sinlessness to refer to having never sinned. In this sense, as we mentioned in our discussion of the human nature of Jesus, we would say that, before the resurrection, Jesus was sinless but not impeccable. He could have sinned. As the Scriptures say, He was tempted in every way, like we are, yet without sin. But after resurrection, Jesus became impeccable in his resurrected human nature. I’ll be using some of these terms later, so I just wanted to introduce them here. But let’s get back to Augustine and the fourfold state.

Augustine’s four states of humankind were discussed at great length by Puritan Thomas Boston in his book The Fourfold State of Man, a wildly popular book among Scottish Christians in the 18th century. But as far as I can tell, neither Augustine nor Boston, for all their words, discuss exactly or directly why the state of grace is necessary in God’s plan. Neither of them, at least as far as I have found (and I would be thrilled to be proven wrong on this) even discuss any potential benefits to the believer, the world, the gospel, or the plan of salvation, by having believers struggle against sin.

But I like the framing of the fourfold state, because it allows us to see what massive changes to our whole concept of the Christian life would be necessary if God removed the state of grace. We can see that none of this framework of human nature and history holds, as is, without sanctification in this life.

To explore this further, consider that, at least as far as we have constructed it from Augustine and Boston, the state of grace is between the state of nature and the state of eternity. Since, for now, it seems obvious that death or at least, a translation into heaven from earth, is necessary to enter into the state of eternity, the vast majority of converted people will die, and only after that will they enter into a state of impeccable perfection. I say vast majority, by the way, because Enoch and Elijah apparently didn’t die, per se, though it seems their fallen bodies must like ours await the resurrection. And they were no longer here on earth either. Perhaps they could not in their state of translation even exist on earth, we don’t know. And, we also have the witness of Paul who says that believers still alive when Jesus returns will not die but be “transformed” or “changed”—whatever that means. Honestly, I’m not sure anyone is entirely sure what that means, maybe not even Paul.

All that said, it seems that under ordinary historical conditions, it’s not possible to become impeccable without either death or a direct translation into heaven. This is not addressing the issue of why like Joe asked yet, I understand. But it’s an important what. If in fact, it is not possible to exist in a fallen body and on a fallen earth with an impeccable spirit, then Joe’s question must shift. Instead of asking why God doesn’t remove the state of grace, you are now asking why God doesn’t just take the life of every Christian as soon as he or she is converted and take them home to heaven without the struggle of sanctification.

But you might ask, “Why couldn’t God make impeccability possible without death?” Consider the possibility that that might be like asking,“Why not make it so a seed can become a tree and still be a seed?” or “Why not make it so steel can be shaped cold, without being heated first?” or something like that. In other words, it might be an interesting hypothetical, but maybe it’s also not how this reality works or could work, logically. Maybe it’s not even logically possible to be impeccable, as in unchangingly incapable of sin, and still exist as you had existed in the passing plane of existence known as this earth subjected to futility or in a decaying and inconstant body. The fact that Elijah and Enoch were changed and translated into a heavenly state of incorruption without a death as we know it, and that this may be similar to what believers experience at the end of history, means that God can do that. But basically not without removing someone from the earth as it is or transforming earth from what it is in the fires of renovation and consummation to come.

And you could give me yet another why. Why is that? Why couldn’t God translate us to heavenly incorruptibility or make us impeccable, meaning unable to sin, and also leave us on a sinful, fallen earth in a corrupt and futile body on its way to death? You can see already perhaps, that the whole fabric of nature would need to be rewoven to make this a reality. Can the psyche of sin be separated from the decaying flesh it has poisoned without the destruction of that flesh? Can the poison of the sinful soul that has interwoven and infused itself inextricably in the flesh of our psychical bodies be removed entirely by any other process than total destruction? And would you have God put the fresh new wine of the new creation spirit in the old wineskin of the corrupted and decaying body? Would the body eventually still die in that case? Is it even possible for them to be compatible, even for a moment? I don’t know.

Perhaps we should consider then whether an impeccable person could have the same relationship to a fallen earth or fallen flesh? We discussed the nature of heaven and earth and the visible and the invisible in a previous episode. It seems that an incorruptible being would not be present or visible in the passing away earth the way a corrupted or corruptible being is present. All that to say, I would venture to say that such a process would not be possible because of the nature of life and death, light and dark, holiness and corruption. They, by nature and definition, cannot intermix without changing their nature. So let’s ask the modified question:

If the only possible path to removing the sin nature in us is for it to actually die, then perhaps we could ask “Why doesn’t God take believers to heaven as soon as we’re converted?” That’s a good question. And actually, the answer to it might end up helping us in our original question. I won’t spend too much time on it though, since it wasn’t Joe’s original question. The Apostle Paul answers it pretty straightforwardly in Philippians 1:18f:

Yes, and I will rejoice, for I know that this will turn out for my deliverance through your prayers and the provision of the Spirit of Jesus Christ, according to my earnest expectation and hope, that I will not be put to shame in anything, but that with all boldness, Christ will even now, as always, be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death. For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain. But if I am to live on in the flesh, this will mean fruitful labor for me; and I do not know which to choose. But I am hard-pressed from both directions, having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is very much better; yet to remain on in the flesh is more necessary for your sake. Convinced of this, I know that I will remain and continue with you all for your progress and joy in the faith,

So enough of that for now. I do love the weeds, but let’s get back on track. I think Joe’s question implies that removing the state of grace, or that period of sanctification, is something God could do, and that it would not violate anything in His nature or the nature of His created reality if He decided to do it. The assumption is that He could do it as well without automatically and by nature translating us to heaven and out of this world. I’m not sure I can concede any of that, for the reasons I’ve already discussed. But let’s say we grant all that for the sake of the question, can we make any headway into God’s motivations and reasoning here?

I’ll discuss this under three headings: the benefits to God in this plan, the benefits to believers, and the benefits to unbelievers and the world.

First, I think God allows us to struggle with sin because He desires our wrestling and collaboration and true partnership. Joe says he doesn’t want an answer that says changing us immediately would make us automotons, but I think there is some truth to this objection actually. The process of salvation is initiated and energized by God, but it invites and in some ways demands our collaboration. Especially in more Calvinistic and Reformed circles, this tends to be emphasized less or even rejected, but God wants partnership in the Gospel and even in our own salvation. There are myriad Scriptures that support this. Including texts like “Work out your salvation with fear and trembling.” Or the fact that Jesus tells healed believers, “Your faith has made you well.” No one would deny that God’s power makes them well. Yet God credits their faith as a cause of their wellness. Both can be true. And both must be upheld.

God wants us wrestling, not complacent. Even to today, we are the true Israel, the ones who wrestle with God and with humankind and overcome. To shortcut that and make it impossible for us to sin immediately on conversion would disallow us from being full partners in the reconciliation of all things to God. We begin by reconciling ourselves, while yet sinners. And reconciling involves choices. And if we don’t have a choice to make, by definition we couldn’t make that choice. Would not Satan and even we perhaps rightly say, we might choose differently if only we could. The state of grace cuts off that objection and that uncertainty. We don’t choose God because we have no other choice. We choose God because, even returned by regeneration to the state of having a choice, we love Him. Love must be voluntary, and I disagree that the work God does in us at any point robs us of that possibility of real love, real choice. God desires real love from us and a real choice of Him. And the state of grace ensures that possibility for us is secured. At the end of time, God will not say to us, “Look what I did.” We will be praising Him and saying Look what You did. But God follows the advice He gave us: Let another praise you and not your own lips. His word to us on the last day will be “Well done good and faithful servant.” If He credits our righteousness to us, it will be on a real and not a fake basis. We really did choose righteousness, or He would not be right to credit us with making that choice. This is one way we will participate in the divine nature. Because God exercises humility and deference within Himself, even without us. The Father glorifies the Son and the Spirit, the Son glorifies the Father and the Spirit, the Spirit glorifies the Father and the Son. While the Father tells the Son, You accomplished this! The Son is telling the Father, You accomplished this. And in the Spirit we are all praising and loving each other, not reserving praise or love to ourselves. God wants to preserve that, and our real part in that, both for us but also for Himself.

There are also benefits to God in both providence and the full unfolding of His forgiveness through sin. God shows Himself infinitely wise in that He utilizes the consequences of sin to accomplish His beautiful purposes. This includes the sins of believers which always precedes renewed repentance, and the fruit of repentance is great and precious. Consider that David’s sin with Bathsheba, and David’s subsequent repentance, produced Solomon. Solomon’s sin, for which God did not remove His favor if we take God’s promise to David seriously, produced Solomon’s repentance, as inscribed in Ecclesiastes. I for one am glad Ecclesiastes exists. God desires to display the full range of His mysterious wisdom in accomplishing the highest ends with the lowest tools. Even sin, even the sins of those who should be on His team, He can turn to the purposes of glory. I will praise Him all the more for drawing straight lines with such crooked sticks.

I also think His love is magnified in this. He shows Himself unconditionally loving in the way He responds not only to the aggression of enemies but also the betrayal of friends. Note how the state of grace makes it possible for God to be betrayed, even over and over again, and yet to keep loving and forgiving. That is so much greater a love than merely forgiving the sins of ignorant unbelievers. We know God’s love much more clearly and magnificently because of the state of grace.

There are also benefits to us. We can say, in the end, that we really chose God. That it wasn’t just for the gifts He gave or the fact that we had no other choice. We can say, No, I had a choice. I chose God and His righteousness. That is a blessed gift in the state of grace I would never choose to lose. Even if I could be made impeccable in conversion, I would choose to have that chance to prove before God and myself and others that I freely love Him and that I fought for that love and kept hungering and thirsting for it, though often unsatisfied.

And this struggle against sin also allows me to unify with Christ in all things. He joined with me in all human temptations. He was free from sin but able to sin. And He needed to be like that for my salvation—to accomplish a truly human righteousness. Having become like us, He invites us now to become like Him. Having purchased my justification, the wiping clear of my guilt in sin, He now invites me to walk in righteousness like He did, suffering against sin even to the point of shedding blood. If He made me impeccable upon conversion, I would not know in my person what Jesus experienced for His whole life. Again, this is a gift and a blessing to me to be able to suffer righteously with Jesus against sin and temptation. Again, I would not forego this particular communion with Jesus, and I am thankful to God for the opportunity. I would be made like Him in all things.

Further, I can understand sin and temptation differently when I am able to choose against it even while it remains a live possibility. This gives me access to understanding I wouldn’t have otherwise. In a sense, the ability to sin in myself and that sin nature in me that I am able to experience and even be overcome by, grants me a clearer closer look at sin, specifically because I have a choice about it. Before I was converted, I operated only in my sin nature. I had no ability not to sin. I couldn’t see it for what it was. In paradise, I will not be able to sin. I won’t be able to experience sin like I do now. So now, in the state of grace, I have a unique relationship to my sin that allows me through the lens of righteousness to see all of myself very intimately and clearly. Now, I have a close-up view of sin and my sin nature, because it is still in me, but I can be and am distinct from it. This clear knowledge of sin and its devastating consequences will be with me for eternity. Even in impeccability, I will have this particular experience of sin to aid me in glorifying God and loving other people.

One of the aspects of that knowledge comes from mourning over sin and truly hating it as a bitter enemy. I never mourned over my own sin before conversion like I do now. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. I would not mourn over sin in myself in nearly the same way if it were gone from me even as a possibility. I would not feel in my spirit the same bitterness of sin and death if it were pulled from me as soon as I might start to be able to feel and know it clearly. Again, I would not forego that precious knowledge. I will have eternity to be impeccable. In that state I will remember this life and even look upon human history. This memory of my state of grace is essential to the clarity of my vision for eternity.

Further, the state of grace benefits unbelievers and the world. At no point in my Christian life, and perhaps less and less as time goes on, am I ignorant of the deception and power of sin and temptation. While I am witnessing to others of the hope of God, I can understand their pull to sin in my person and even empathize with the struggles they are experiencing. Just as Christ became a great High priest because He was familiar with the struggles of temptation and the frailty of human being, there is no sin an unbeliever might be struggling with that I could not also fall into. This gives me access to a humility and compassion toward unbelievers that is vital to witnessing to them of the hope I have in Jesus. I need to continue, even as I can see things from the righteousness of God, to empathize with and understand where unbelievers and the world are coming from. If I did not even have the ability to sin, I would be cut off from that connection to a world I am called to love with merciful and compassionate understanding.

Further, the work I do in addressing sin in the world and working toward the reconciliation of all things begins in me. Fighting sin in myself, while accepting the love of Jesus and seeing myself as both beloved and broken is precisely how I should see the world. The world, like me is beloved and broken. Unbelievers, like me, are beloved and broken. If I would help the world to see itself like this, and accept the love and healing of God, I must do it in myself first. God has made me like Jesus in this, so I can be an ambassador of Him to the world. It is for their sake too, that I fight against sin in myself. And the ongoing presence of that sin gives me urgency and fervency. It is good to want righteousness now! To feel like you need it right now, and to think, When will God give it to me? That’s good. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. They will be satisfied.

Perhaps there are many more reasons for God’s plan in this, frustrating as it sometimes is, but these are some of the few I uncovered while thinking through the implications of Joe’s question. Perhaps you are someone who feels discouraged about your lack of progress in holiness or the slowness of that process. Maybe you keep slipping into an old familiar sin or you just get sick of seeing how hypocrites and secret sin ruin so much good in the world. I want you to know you’re not alone. It’s good to mourn over the betrayals of sin, in ourselves and in the world. But Jesus has loved us so much that He invites us to understand and love the world as it is like He does. While we were and are sinners, Jesus loves us. And he wants us, like Him, to long for the consummation of righteousness that will make it all right. Even in heaven, souls made perfect are saying, “How long?” They haven’t forgotten what it feels like in the state of grace, and we never will either. So remember, my friends in the struggle, you like the world are beloved and broken. And God in His love and grace invites you to choose freely to pursue the reconciliation and healing in Jesus that will make this kosmos whole.

Thanks for listening. I’ll be releasing pt. 3 of my conversation with Christa next. And I plan a few more of those, to finish the recap on the Three Powers. I talked with her yesterday as well, and she has some other non-three-powers-related questions. So we might do that too. Then I’ll be doing the podcast version of my as yet unpublished book Truth is Not an Empty Word. If you have any comments or questions, remember to navigate over to my website Nothing Human Podcast.com and leave me a note on the relevant episode. Thank you all so much for listening. Until next time…