Evangelicals Now are running a set of articles with John Stevens and Matthew Roberts engaging the concupiscence debate. I’m looking forward to reading them and hoping that there will be proper interaction rather than the talking past each other that so far has characterised the debate. I hope that Matthew will particularly engage with the serious holes that exist in the argument he and others including David and Jonathan Gibson have advanced, which I’ve been identifying here on Faithroots.
Whilst I’m yet to get to read all the articles, I was concerned to see how Evangelicals Now were promoting the articles on their frontpage banner.
The wording is similar to that used by Matthew in his book Pride. As I pointed out when commenting on his book, it is tautological. Of course, sinful desire is sin. The clue is in the word “sin.” This is to mis-frame the debate. The question isn’t about whether sinful desire is sinful. That is already agreed and non-contentious. The question is about when desire becomes sinful. Whilst the New Testament may at times talk about evil desire, or just desire, it doesn’t tend to use the term “sinful”.
The question then is when our desires become sinful. I have argued that it is not sinful to be tempted. However, desire becomes sin when, instead of resisting temptation, we accommodate, appease, entertain and cultivate wrong desires.
I hope that either through the articles or by EN amending their frontpage that the record will be corrected.
Faithroots 