“Everything in all of creation responds to God, until you get to man and we have the audacity to look him in the face and say ‘no.’ From this sin, we see lostness all over this book (Isaiah). What does it mean to be lost? It means to be cut off from God. To live alienated from God. Separated from Christ (Eph 2:12). Romans 5:18: one trespass led to condemnation for everyone. In our sinfulness we are cut off from God, we are enemies of God. We are slaves to sin, John 8:34. Jesus said ‘truly truly I say to you: everyone who commits sin is a slave to sin.’ 2 Timothy 2:26 says we are captured in the snare of the evil one, having been captured by him to do his will. We are children of wrath, Eph 2:3, and darkened in our understanding. And this affects every facet of our being. And this is the natural state of all of us. Romans 3: ‘there is none who seeks God, not even one. There are none who understand.'”
A side note: I know this is not Platt’s purpose, but it is really remarkable how well he knows the Scripture. He is quoting dozens of Scriptures from memory. This is a good model for all of us.
Platt is really driving home the lostness of the human condition. A reflection: I’m reading through Jeremiah right now, and over and over you see Jeremiah denouncing the sins of Israel. And what stands out is: this is the state of all of us, by nature apart from God. Jeremiah isn’t just denouncing the sin of “those people over there.” The point of the book is that we are all fallen, every one of us, and our only hope is to look to God in Christ for mercy. That is, we cannot come to God on the basis of our good works. Apart from him, we don’t have any. The way to a relationship with God is to acknowledge our sin to him and trust in Christ for mercy, not in anything we do, have done, or can do.