Accountability

When are we responsible for our sins?

Jesus said to his disciples, “I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another. “If the world hates you, be aware that it hated me before it hated you. If you belonged to the world, the world would love you as its own. Because you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world-- therefore the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, ‘Servants are not greater than their master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you; if they kept my word, they will keep yours also. But they will do all these things to you on account of my name, because they do not know him who sent me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin. Whoever hates me hates my Father also. If I had not done among them the works that no one else did, they would not have sin. But now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. It was to fulfill the word that is written in their law, ‘They hated me without a cause.’ “When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, he will testify on my behalf. You also are to testify because you have been with me from the beginning.” - John 15:17-27

In John’s Gospel, Jesus says some interesting things about sin and our responsibility for it.

If he had not come and spoken to hem , he says, they would not have sin.  But now that they have heard him, they are accountable for their sins.

In our present justice system, ignorance of the law is not a defense, meaning we cannot claim we didn’t know what we did was illegal, and get away with the crime.  Here, Jesus seems to be saying that in God’s eyes, we are not held accountable for our sins if we don’t know they are sins.

But once we know, watch out.  Is that a good system?  

You could argue that it is what it is, meaning we are accountable for our sins and there is no getting out of it, like the ignorance defense failure.

But we want to believe that Jesus died for our sins, meaning we will not be held accountable for them.  That doesn’t seem to be what he is saying here, so if we choose to go along and do whatever we want, we might just want to rethink that.

Of course, we can always seek forgiveness, if we repent, acknowledging our faults and failures.  But it would be wise no to wait too long. 

More to come...