Accepting Personal Responsibility

KEY VERSE: “The soul that sinneth, it shall die. The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, neither shall the father bear the iniquity of the son: the righteousness of the righteous shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked shall be upon him.” —Ezekiel 18:20

SELECTED SCRIPTURE: Ezekiel 18:1-5, 7-13, 19, 20

OUR KEY VERSE is one of the most important verses in the Bible. The general concept of many Christian readers of the Bible is that man has an ‘immortal soul’. They say: his body dies, but his soul continues to live, and will go either to heaven or to a place of eternal torment. This is not correct.

When Adam was created in Eden, the Scriptures clearly say, “The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.” (Gen. 2:7) Man did not receive a separate and distinct entity such as an ‘immortal soul’, and nowhere in the Bible is such an expression found. Rather, the combining of the body with the breath of life constituted the living soul.

When Adam disobeyed God, he was sentenced to death. As Ezekiel tells us, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” All of Adam’s progeny are still under that same sentence, being ‘in Adam’; therefore, “all die.” (I Cor. 15:22) Ever since Adam sinned there has been “none righteous, no not one.”—Rom. 3:10, Ps. 14:1-3

Since Adam’s fall, the proverb cited in Ezekiel 18:2 has been altogether true, and a way of life: “The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” The inherited weakness of the children of Adam has fulfilled the many scriptures that express this thought: “All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God.” (Rom. 3:23) Everything that happened was in God’s plan: “As by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.”—Rom. 5:19

Through the ransom provided by Jesus Christ, the condition of ‘inheriting’ death will be changed. Jeremiah’s prophecy deals with a time when the proverb in chapter 31:29 will no longer apply. He precedes his quotation by saying: “In those days they shall say no more [this proverb], but every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge.” (vs. 30) That time is the Millennial Age—God’s kingdom, when each one will be personally responsible for his own sins.

These statements by Jeremiah are a fitting introduction to the prophecy (Jer. 31:31-34) regarding the making of the New Covenant at the time when God’s kingdom is established.

The prophecy of Ezekiel 18, then, deals with concrete examples of past relationships, and how they will have no meaning so far as God’s judgments are concerned. A person who will live righteously in God’s kingdom will live. A person who had lived righteously before, and now becomes wicked, will die. All past transgressions will be forgiven through the ransom of Christ. What a father or a son did in the past will not apply anymore.

Ezekiel tells Israel in chapter 18:31,32: Reform and live. This is the period of God’s judgments, when God says to Israel, “Therefore I will judge you,” (vs. 30) How glad we are that God “will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.”—I Tim. 2:4

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