Sinner Saint (A Surprising Primer to the Christian Life)

Few mysteries of the faith are so perplexing as the ongoing presence of sin in the life of the believer. On the one hand, Christians are no longer slaves to sin. On the other hand we find ourselves rocked by it, daily battling conflicting impulses and neuroses, caught in the middle of a cosmic tug-of-war between good and evil desires. What are we to make of this? Whatever we may believe theologically, practically speaking, the struggle is universal. The honest truth is that we’re not as good as we would like to be. In other words, the answer to the question “Could I be better?” is always a resounding yes. Various answers to this problem have been posited throughout the history of the church: Insufficient faith. Lack of willpower. Incomplete sanctification. All such answers, however, envision a kind of progress where we shed our old “sinner” and experience a kind of metamorphosis into the new “saint.” But does such an explanation actually jive with what we experience? Does such an operative principle play out consistently in the lives of the great heroes of the faith? And, most importantly, does it actually align with the full counsel of God? What if there were another option, a way of understanding ourselves that shunned simplistic “either-or” explanations for a more honest “both-and”? What if there were a way of being real about our failures yet insisting that, in Christ, they don’t define us? Welcome to the reformation doctrine of the simul, where we find ourselves sinful and righteous, broken and redeemed, and–above all–unconditionally loved by the God who overlooks our shortcomings on account of his Son.