It is, of course, a
fact that the world is full of people who are ill, infirm and disabled.
One question that
Christians often ask is how much of a connection there is between sin and
illness. If we are struck down with a serious disease, for example, is it
because of something we did wrong? For many, this is a burning question.
ALL HUMAN ILLNESS IS INDIRECTLY THE RESULT OF SIN
It is certainly true
that all human illness and disability is at least indirectly the result of sin.
As a human race, we
have chosen to rebel against our Maker. This has led to each of us becoming
damaged in various ways, sometimes by suffering illness and disability. So when
we become ill or disabled, we are certainly at fault insofar as we are members
of a sinful human race.
Christians widely
agree about this corporate responsibility for sin.
SOME SINS ARE THE PHYSICAL RESULTS OF PERSONAL SIN
Something else that it
isn’t necessary to defend is that many illnesses are the physical results of personal sin.
One common example of
this in Western countries is people overeating and becoming ill as a result.
There are many who suffer physical illnesses because they have repeatedly
committed the sin of gluttony.
No reasonable
Christian would deny that this sort of physical cause and effect exists between
personal sin and illness.
THE BIG QUESTION
The question that many
Christians ask is not about corporate responsibility for sin, or about the
physical causes of illnesses. Rather, the question is whether there is some
sort of a spiritual connection between personal sin and illness.
If someone suffers
from an illness, might it be because they committed a certain sin or sins, even
though there is no physical connection between the sin and the illness? This is
what many want to know.
TURNING TO THE BIBLE
To try and answer this
question, we need to turn to the Bible to see what it has to say. Scripture is
our God-given “Manual for the Human Life,” and what it says is always key.
As we will see below,
the Bible makes it very clear that sometimes illness is not the result of
personal sin, but sometimes it is.
EXAMPLES OF NO CONNECTION BETWEEN PERSONAL SIN AND
ILLNESS
Let’s look first at some
passages which tell us of people who were ill or disabled, without personal sin
being the cause.
Actually, the final
example doesn’t involve illness or disability, but it is relevant for our
topic, as I will explain in due course.
The book of Job
To begin with, a
famous biblical example of where illness, and other disasters, are not the
result of personal sin is the book of Job.
The book begins, in
Job 1:1, by introducing Job in this way:
“There was a man in the land of Uz whose name
was Job, and that man was blameless and upright, one who feared God and turned
away from evil.”
(Scripture readings in
this article are from the English Standard Version.)
As the rest of the
book goes on to show, however, Job’s uprightness didn’t spare him from
suffering terribly, including in illness (e.g., Job 2:1-8; 7:5).
Much of the book is
taken up by speeches of Job’s friends, who insist that calamity and personal
sin are closely connected (e.g., Job 4:1-21; 8:1-22; 11:1-6).
But Job’s friends,
although sincere, were just plain wrong (e.g., Job 1:8, 22; 2:3, 10).
John 9:1-3
A New Testament
example of disability that is not the result of personal sin can be found in
John 9:1-3, which reads as follows:
“1 As he [Jesus] passed by, he saw a man
blind from birth. 2 And his
disciples asked him, ‘Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was
born blind?’ 3 Jesus answered, ‘It
was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might
be displayed in him.’”
Jesus is clear that this
man’s blindness was not the result of personal sin.
The disciples seemed
to assume that he was either born blind as a pre-punishment for future sins he
would commit, or that his parents sinned in some way. But Jesus leaves them in
no doubt that such thinking is badly mistaken.
Luke 13:1-5
Another passage that
is relevant for our topic is Luke 13:1-5. Illness is not actually mentioned in
this text, but it is worth noting nevertheless. The passage reads as follows:
“1 There were some present at that very
time who told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their
sacrifices.
2 And he
answered them, ‘Do you think that these Galileans were worse sinners than all
the other Galileans, because they suffered in this way? 3 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise
perish. 4 Or those eighteen on whom
the tower in Siloam fell and killed them: do you think that they were worse
offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem? 5 No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all likewise
perish.’”
Jesus refers here to
two groups of people who had suffered horrible deaths. And He says that the
fact that they died in these ways doesn’t mean that they were worse sinners
than other people.
Although Jesus doesn’t
spell out the logic of His argument, it is likely that He is implying that the
suffering these people experienced was not the result of personal sins.
And if people suffer
disasters like these that are not caused by personal sin, it makes sense to
think that the same would often apply to suffering from illnesses too.
EXAMPLES OF A CONNECTION BETWEEN PERSONAL SIN AND
ILLNESS
Let’s turn now to look
at some biblical passages which show a connection between personal sin and
illness.
2 Samuel 11-12
In 2 Samuel 11:1-12:12,
we are told how David committed the sins of adultery and murder, and how the
prophet Nathan rebuked him for what he had done.
Then in 2 Samuel
12:13-14, we read:
“13 David said to
Nathan, ‘I have sinned against the LORD.’ And Nathan said to David, ‘The LORD
also has put away your sin; you shall not die. 14 Nevertheless, because by this deed you have utterly scorned the
LORD, the child who is born to you shall die.’”
In verses 15-23 we
learn how Nathan’s prophecy was fulfilled. David’s baby son became ill and died.
Verse 14 is very clear
that David’s sin caused the death of his son.
This whole business of
a child being affected by a parent’s sin is a very difficult issue, and not one
that I want to discuss here.
For our purposes, it
is enough to note that this passage provides an example of personal sin leading
to illness and death.
Acts 12:21-23
Our next example
concerns the Jewish king Herod Agrippa I. In Acts 12:21-23, Luke tells us:
“21 On an appointed
day Herod put on his royal robes, took his seat upon the throne, and delivered
an oration to them. 22 And the
people were shouting, ‘The voice of a god, and not of a man!’ 23 Immediately an angel of the Lord
struck him down, because he did not give God the glory, and he was eaten by
worms and breathed his last.”
Although v. 23 says
that an angel immediately struck Herod down, Luke surely doesn’t mean that he
died at the time he was before the crowd.
Rather, Luke apparently
means that he immediately contracted a fatal disease. There are two reasons for
this. First, the reference to being eaten by worms seems to be about suffering from
a disease. And second, Luke implies that Herod was eaten by worms before he
breathed his last, and it surely took some time for him to be eaten by the
worms.
It seems, then, that
an angel struck down Herod by giving him a fatal disease.
And the passage is
completely clear that the angel did this as a punishment for personal sin,
because Herod accepted the crowd saying that he was a god.
1 Corinthians 11:27-30
Our next example
concerns Christians. In 1 Corinthians 11:27-30, Paul writes:
“27 Whoever,
therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner
will be guilty concerning the body and blood of the Lord. 28 Let a person examine himself, then, and so eat of the bread and
drink of the cup. 29 For anyone who
eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment on
himself. 30 That is why many of you
are weak and ill, and some have died.”
The Corinthian
Christians were making a real mess of celebrating the Lord’s Supper. They were
not treating this sacrament with nearly the respect that it deserved. So Paul
sharply criticises them.
In v. 30 he is very
clear that many of them have become ill because they have been committing this
sin. And he even says that some have died as a result.
It is unlikely that
all in the Corinthian church were genuinely born-of-the-Spirit believers. Yet
to claim that all those Paul refers to in v. 30 would not have been genuine
Christians is totally unwarranted.
This passage should
leave us in no doubt that personal sin does sometimes lead to illness, and that
this happens even to Christians.
SUMMING UP
The texts we have
looked at, then, make it clear that illness is sometimes the result of personal
sin, but that sometimes it has nothing to do with personal sin.
James 5:14-16
This conclusion is
well illustrated by James 5:14-16, where James writes:
“14 Is anyone among
you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over
him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. 15 And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the
Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. 16 Therefore, confess your sins to one
another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a
righteous person has great power as it is working.”
Note in v. 15 how
James says, “And if he has committed sins, he will
be forgiven.” The way that this immediately follows the preceding instruction
about illness and healing surely means that James is implying that some Christians who
become ill do so because of committing sins.
There are, however, many
who deny this. They claim that when James says, “And
if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven,” he is saying something
unconnected to what he has just said about illness and healing. They claim that
in v. 15 James is saying two separate things about those who are ill: one, that
they should be prayed for, and two, that if, on an unrelated note, they have
committed sins, they will be forgiven.
This is an extremely unnatural
interpretation of James’s words. Under this interpretation, the reference to
committing sins seems to come out of nowhere and fits very poorly with the
context.
Instead, we should accept
that James is implying here that illness is sometimes caused by sin.
On the other hand,
however, James is very clear that personal sin is not always the cause of
illness. He says, “if he has
committed sins,” which certainly implies that sometimes sin would not be the
cause.
James, then, sums up
the biblical position on this issue well. Sometimes personal sin is the cause
of illness, and sometimes it isn’t.
ACCEPTING BIBLICAL TEACHING ON THIS ISSUE
There are huge numbers
of Christians today who deny that personal sin is ever the spiritual cause of
illness. They will always rush to tell anyone suffering from an illness that it
is not because of sins they have committed.
I think in some ways
their motivation for doing this is good. They know that people suffering from
illness sometimes get depressed by the thought that they might be responsible. So
they want to prevent their suffering from increasing.
It is not acceptable,
however, to distort biblical teaching, even if it is out of a desire to comfort
people. We must also be careful not to give in to the temptation to believe
what we want to believe about things. Many Christians have clearly fallen into
this trap on this issue.
Besides, if someone
does have an illness that has been caused by personal sin, we are doing them no
favours at all if we say that sin is not the cause. Usually, the more we
understand the truth about a situation, the better placed we will be to resolve
it.
We should all
therefore choose to accept biblical teaching on this topic. Personal sin is
sometimes the cause of illness, and sometimes it isn’t.
FURTHER THOUGHTS
My main aim in this
article has simply been to show that illness is sometimes caused by personal
sin. It isn’t my intention here to discuss the ramifications of this in any
detail.
Nevertheless, I will
make a few brief comments.
How often sin is the cause of illness
Firstly, there is the
difficult question of how often personal sin is the cause of illness and how
often it isn’t.
I suspect that quite a
large majority of the time it isn’t the cause, but I am not confident about
that.
When Christians become ill because of personal sin
Secondly, there is the
issue of how we understand the mechanics of Christians becoming ill because of
personal sin. As we saw above, believers do sometimes get ill in this way.
The difficulty here is
that we Christians are God’s saved people, who have received His forgiveness.
So it looks quite strange to suppose that when we sin, God punishes us by
making us ill.
When Christians become
ill through personal sin, I think, instead of seeing this as God’s retributive
justice, we do better to see it differently.
First, instead of viewing
the illness as justice being meted out, I think it is preferable to view it as
a consequence of God’s protection being withdrawn to some extent. The sin leads
to God becoming more distant, which in turn leads to greater exposure to
dangers, including illness.
And second, we can probably
see it along the lines of God’s discipline.
In Hebrews 12:7, the
writer asks rhetorically:
“For what son is there whom his father does
not discipline?”
And then he goes on in
v. 11 to say:
“For the moment all discipline seems painful
rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness
to those who have been trained by it.”
I think that looking
at this issue in terms of God’s discipline is a helpful approach.
For Christians who
become ill through personal sin, then, we do better to view things in terms of God’s
discipline and the withdrawal of His presence, rather than as Him administering
justice by punishing.
Counselling those who are ill
Finally, because
illness is sometimes due to personal sin, this means that counselling those who
are ill can be a challenge.
If someone is troubled
that they might be ill because of sin, it won’t do to simplistically deny that
there is ever a spiritual connection between personal sin and illness. And in
some cases, discernment might be needed to help people appropriately.
Incidentally, this
point speaks volumes for the usefulness of the gifts of the Holy Spirit
referred to in 1 Corinthians 12:8, i.e., messages of wisdom and messages of
knowledge. Sometimes, one of these gifts might provide an important piece of
information that can be used when counseling believers who are ill.
Of course, even if we
become convinced that a certain illness is the result of committing a sin, that
doesn’t mean that God is any less able to heal it than if no sin were the
cause. Once we confess our sins, God forgives them (1 John 1:9), so any
obstacle to healing caused by unrepentance is immediately removed.
The truth of the
matter is that God works everything for the good of Christians (Romans 8:28),
and that He is with us (Matthew 28:20). So, like Paul, we can confidently put
the past, including our sins, behind us and move forwards with the Lord into
the future (Philippians 3:13).
See also:
