Sin in the Old and in the New Testament

“And all the country wept with a loud voice, and all the people passed over. The king himself also passed over the torrent Kidron, and all the people passed over toward the way of the wilderness.” (2Samuel 15:23)

Let’s start with some background on this verse. Absalom, David’s son has taken over the kingdom. King David is forced to escape with some of the people. This is when they come to the stream named Kidron. It was a small trench east of Jerusalem which ran from east to southeast of Jerusalem and on to the Dead Sea. It was mostly dry except in the winter, which is why when Jesus crossed over, John specified that it was in the winter which meant it was filled with water (John 18:1) but had to be crossed to go to the Garden of Gethsemani where He was betrayed by Judas.  In order to escape into the wilderness King David and his entourage had to cross the stream.

This probably took place in the winter because the words “torrent Kidron” are used. It was a dry stream except for the winter when the winter rains filled it with water. The people crossed it and so does the king. (2 Samuel 15:1-37) This Scripture says that all the country wept.  Surely the inhabitants of Jerusalem wept. And the people that were with the king wept. They were going into the unknow, not knowing if they would return to Jerusalem and not knowing if they would survive.

Once they crossed the stream they were in the valley Kidron and on to the wilderness or in other words uninhabited land. Jerusalem and the people had known joy and peace during King David’s reign. Now sin and depravity had come with Absalom. (2 Samuel 16:20-23)

All this happened as prophesied by Nathan the prophet because of David’s sin with Uriah and Bethsheba. (2Samuel 12:1-12) “And therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife. So says Jehovah, Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house, and I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor. And he shall lie with your wives in the sight of this sun. For you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel and before the sun.” (2Samuel 12:10-12)

Our sins have consequences. It did in the Old Testament. And it does also in the New Testament. Not only were there consequences for sin in the Old Testament, but also punishment. The difference in the New Testament is that the consequences are not punishment. All punishment for sin was taken by Jesus. For instance, if a couple has illegitimate sex and the result is pregnancy, the pregnancy is not a punishment, but a consequence of the sin. “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked. For whatever a man sows, that he also will reap.” (Galatians 6:7) There is a difference.

Sin must be punished. It is death, total separation from God because sin causes death in the presence of the holiness and righteousness of God. “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” (Romans 6:23) And this is all sin. There is no distinction between small and big sins. Getting angry with someone is as deadly as murder. Jesus said, “You have heard that it was said to the ancients, "You shall not kill" —and, "Whoever shall kill shall be liable to the judgment." But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be liable to the judgment. And whoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be liable to the Sanhedrin; but whoever shall say, Fool! shall be liable to be thrown into the fire of hell.”

(Matthew 5:21-22)

Now it’s a fact that Christians sin. There is no way around it. John said, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His Word is not in us.” (1John 1:8-10) But our sins are forgiven because we have accepted the sacrifice of Jesus and have surrounded our lives to Him. We sin because we are in a process of being made in the image of Christ, but it’s a lifelong process. Each time sin arises, we are to acknowledge it as sin, not as a character flaw, and repent of it. It is forgiven, but we haven’t repented of it evidently because it has arisen in us and we participated in it. When we received Christ as our Savior we repented of all our sin. But now we realize there is more sin in us, in reality in our flesh, so we must repent of it and allow the Holy Spirit to deal with us about it. Now to avoid confusion, our born-again human spirit was born of God.  It is clean, pure, free of sin and in the continual presence of God. But because we live in this world and have this flesh, we have to have dominion over it, so we don’t defile ourselves with sin. So again, the sin is forgiven, but we must repent of it.

In a nutshell, David was suffering the punishment and the consequences for his sin. The prophet Nathan had prophesied it and it came to bear. Sin has to be punished. In the Old Testament there was no complete absolution for sin. It is only the sacrifice of Jesus that took all the punishment for sin. Those who sin without Jesus will suffer the punishment for sin after this dispensation of grace and mercy has ended. For now, there is grace and mercy, and we don’t see the punishment for sin, but the consequences of sin and the consequences of being without God’s protection.