Were the men and women of the Bible sinners or saints?

by my friend and sister in Christ
Faythe Butler

 The men and women of the Bible who walked with and abided in the Lord were saints of God as long as they continued to abide faithfully in the Lord and live in true obedience to Him.    

I find it very sad though when certain people try to look at righteous men and women of the Bible and try to seek out a sin in their life and make it sound like they were everyday sinners instead of God fearing followers of the Lord. This is a very disrespectful thing to look at the holy men and women of the Bible and compare them to people who are unrepentant sinners just because this holy man may have some how sinned at some previous time in their life.

It is true that several holy men of the Bible fell into a sin, but let's look at each situation carefully before judging all of them as sinners: 

NOAH was drunk once - Many do not put the blame on Noah for becoming drunk and was most likely not his fault since he was a holy man of God and could not have been a drunkard for sure. This incident of drunkenness we have to remember occurred  after  the flood and the conditions of the world greatly changed after the flood. Noah would have had no idea that the fruit of the grapes from which he had previously drank of would become alcoholic, and he would have had no idea of knowing that certain foods would ferment when exposed to the direct rays of the sunlight. This is most likely the reason for his drunkenness, or it may have been due to Noah's old age or some other mishap, but nowhere in Scripture does God refer to this episode as a willful sin of Noah's.

ABRAHAM and ISAAC lied- There is definitely no excuse for lying at all, and actually Abraham did not lie for his wife was his sister since they shared the same father: (Gen 20:12 And yet indeed she is my sister; she is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife.) But when we look at the situation surrounding what happened here in Genesis 20 we see that they were trying to be kept from getting killed, and I think we can agree that this could be forgiven in such a situation. It would have been more wise if they would have said the full truth and relied on God in this situation, but God loved them and this was forgivable considering the situation. 

MOSES killed a person- Yes Moses killed a man, but it was not intentional or planned out. It was purely by accident and it was a horrifying situation that this could have occurred to him I'm sure. He felt remorse and would have never planned a murder for He was a child of God and feared God. 

DAVID was guilty of adultery and murder- Yes this is true. David succumbed to temptation and committed dreadful sin and sin separates us from God and leads to eternal separation from God unless it is repented of with no intent to ever return to those sins. During this time which lasted approximately a year or so, David clearly could not have been walking with God and he lost his salvation. David had to repent in dust and ashes before he could have a right relationship with God again. But while David walked as a child of God he lived a life of holiness and purity and was not a sinning person, but a righteous and God fearing person. God will have mercy on us too if we've fallen away if we just sincerely come broken before Him and repent. 

SOLOMON was an idolater- Yes, Solomon in his old age did not heed God's warning that if he forsook God and turned away from God, that God in turn would forsake Solomon. Solomon did forsake God by becoming an idolater just as some of his wives were, and he turned away from God and lost his salvation. There is no record that Solomon ever repented, but he desired the murder of Jeroboam at the end of his life, so is he had a murderous heart at his death and sadly it seems he never repented or returned to the Lord.

PETER cursed and lied - Yes Peter did this, but this was definitely not his normal way. He fell into a temptation and soon after he deeply regretted what he did and cried out sadly and deeply repented for what he did. A true child of God will repent deeply if such a case would occur and could never continue in a sin.
 

CONCLUSION:  There may be other incidents of children of God falling into a sin, but in each and every rare case, the child of God deeply deeply repented and forsook that sin altogether and did not continue in it. It is a grievous thing to portray the holy saints of old as common everyday type sinners who had no fear of God and did not walk with God for this is completely untrue. God was willing to forgive them of a sin and have mercy upon them if they truly repented humbly from the heart and forsook their sin. God is willing to have mercy on all of us too if we've fallen away and is so ready to forgive if we'll only come honestly before Him and humbly repent and put our faith in Him. 

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