Has the Nazarene Church changed their definition of Sin

[bigsierra]

in their statement of faith recently?

http://www.nazarene.org/gensec/we_believe.html

5.3. We believe that actual or personal sin is a voluntary violation of a known law of God by a morally responsible person. It is therefore not to be confused with involuntary and inescapable shortcomings, infirmities, faults, mistakes, failures, or other deviations from a standard of perfect conduct that are the residual effects of the Fall. However, such innocent effects do not include attitudes or responses contrary to the spirit of Christ, which may properly be called sins of the spirit. We believe that personal sin is primarily and essentially a violation of the law of love; and that in relation to Christ sin may be defined as unbelief.

I remember the "We believe that actual or personal sin is a voluntary violation of a known law of God by a morally responsible person."
I don't remember "It is therefore not to be confused with involuntary and inescapable shortcomings, infirmities, faults, mistakes, failures, or other deviations from a standard of perfect conduct that are the residual effects of the Fall."

This seems to do away with what some churches call venial sins. Wouldn't a one of these "failures" be considered "sin" since in some cases it would be a know voluntary violation? Anger, Lust, Gluttony, putting your self first. Those may seem inescapable, but with God and the Holy Spirt, they shouldn't be. Maybe that's not how it's defined, on closer study.

 

[WesleyJohn]

.

 

[bigsierra]

Bump this if I don't reply within a few days. I am not in my office, and so I don't have the past few Manual's available to me. I do know that there were some changes made at the last General Assembly (2001), but I don't think this was one of them.

Peace,

WJ

If it was that recent of a change, my parents probably have one of the older manuals. I will check with them too.

I still have the other question about the "failures", if they do.

Thanks WesleyJohn

 

[Crono]

I've been associated with the Church of the Nazarene since 1996 when I started at Trevecca, and that part of the manual hasn't changed since then. From my understanding, this has always been the way that the Nazarene church understood sin, even if it may not have been written that way at one time.