[the nature of] Sin

"Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, and in this way death came to all people, because all sinned" Romans 5:12

"The bible does not say that God punished the human race for one man's sin, but that the nature of sin, namely, my claim to my right to myself, entered into the human race through one man...BUT it also says that another Man (being God) took upon Himself the sin of the human race and put it away-an infinitely more profound revelation."

 "Otherwise Christ would have had to suffer many times since the creation of the world. But he has appeared once for all at the culmination of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of himself." Hebrews 9:26

"The nature of sin is not immorality and wrongdoing, but the nature of self-realization which leads us to say, "I am my own god." When our Lord faced either people with all the forces of evil in them, or people who were clean-living, moral, and upright, He paid no attention to the moral degradation of one, not any attention to the moral attainment of the other. He looked at something we do not see, namely, the nature of man."

"He did not need any testimony about mankind, for he knew what was in each person." John 2:25

"It is through the cross of Christ that God redeemed the entire human race from the possibility of damnation through the heredity of sin. God nowhere holds a person responsible for having the heredity of sin, and does not condemn anyone because of it. Condemnation comes when I realize that Jesus Christ came to deliver me from this heredity of sin, and yet I refuse to let Him do so."

"This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil." John 3:19

(Oswald Chambers; The Nature of Degeneration)