Why Does Sin Earn Death?

I’ve always liked knowing why. My asking “why?” didn’t stop when I grew out of toddlerhood (although I hope it got less annoying). I remember my high school basketball coach and math teacher pointing out that I liked knowing the “why” of everything – why these drills, and why those moves for a layup, and why do we have to work out that algebra problem at the board?? But when I understood the why, things were easier to remember and easier to submit to and follow – and easier to explain to others. I love to understand as much as I can about everything. 

One thing I’ve always wondered about to one degree or another is why “the wages of sin is death.” I mean, I get that that’s what God says; I don’t question whether it’s true. And I trust that He’s good, and that it’s right, somehow. But, like, why is death the penalty for sin? Have you ever wondered about that? Like, why not something else? Why not a severe reprimand, or imprisonment of some sort, or, you know, community service, or some other sort of temporary punishment? Or why not just remorse and an apology? Or, even better, some might say, why not just let it go, just forgive, without requiring anything? 

And have you ever wondered why a “little” sin would earn death just like a “big” sin – why a moment of envy or a little white lie would get the same death penalty as murdering 1000 people in cold blood? Has that ever seemed difficult to understand? 

It’s an interesting question. Why death? Why death for every sin, no matter the severity? And along the same lines, why is sacrifice needed to cover sin? Why the death and the blood of Jesus? 

Is all this just because God decided to make it so? Is death something God chose to use as the penalty for sin? Is it an arbitrary, artificial consequence, inflicted upon us – a punishment He doles out just because He can, or just because He’s that mad? Could sin have earned something different? 

Or is death a natural, unavoidable consequence of sin?

There are several things we need to recognize and understand before we can answer this question. I will include Scripture references at the end, for ease of reading – but even though it’s at the end, Scripture is vastly more important than my writing, so be sure to read it and check my conclusions against it!  

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First: God, the Creator of all things, is the Source of all Life. This is pretty basic, I know, but it’s important to really think about it. Without God, nothing and no one would live at all, in any way. Without Him, life is just not possible. He created each of us, and sustains our lives in every moment; He holds all things (including us) together.

Life, for humans, can be both physical and spiritual. Without God giving us physical life and continually sustaining our physical bodies, we physically die. Without God giving us spiritual life and continually sustaining us spiritually, we are spiritually dead. Spiritual life, in Scripture, is often called “eternal life,” and is shown to result from being fully connected, united, with God through faith in Christ – the Bible uses the phrase “in Christ” to describe this. Spiritual death, in Scripture, is shown to be separation from God. And this makes sense when we think about how God is the Source of all life. If we are spiritually separated from Him, we cannot have spiritual life.

Next, God is holy. This means that God is utterly perfect in every way. He is without sin or fault or guilt or wrongdoing of any kind. God has never done or thought or felt anything that was bad or wrong or sinful. God is absolutely, completely pure and good – fully and wholly righteous. God is the very definition of perfection.

God is all good and only good. God is completely and utterly good. God’s character, His very nature, is the definition of true goodness – it’s how we know what is morally good (things that are like Him, things He would do) and what is evil (things that are unlike Him, things He would not do). Without God, no goodness is possible in any way. Without God, we cannot do anything good or even experience anything good – because without Him, good does not exist (and neither do we).

Because God is fully good, God is also fully just.
Justice is good. Anyone who recognizes oppression realizes this. Anyone who has had a crime committed against themselves or a loved one recognizes this. God cannot be good unless He is also just. We see this in our court systems: a good judge, a just judge, does not let crime go unpunished. He cannot just let things slide and still be considered just.

Justice can be defined as morally right treatment based on the behaviors of those being judged. Because God is always morally right and good, He must implement justice.

God, who created all things and therefore is the ultimate authority over all things, is the rightful judge of all, and therefore He must judge all. If He did not, He would be unjust. As the Creator of each person and the One who set the laws of morality (based on His own perfect character), God is the true and proper and rightful judge of everyone. As such, He must administer justice.

Because God is holy, good, just, and the righteous judge of all:
He cannot accept any wrongdoing.
He cannot condone any wrongdoing.
He cannot be in unity with any wrongdoing.

To do any of these would contradict His justice, which would contradict His holiness and goodness. If He’s not fully just, then He’s not fully good. Therefore, refraining from judging and issuing consequence for wrongdoing would be impossible. 

And here’s something I never thought about until recently, and it helps tie all this together:

Holiness cannot be unified with any sin and still be holiness. 
What happens if you take a glass of pure water and add just the tiniest particle of poison? Is it still pure water? No. Perfection cannot be in unity with imperfection and remain perfect. Unity with even a slight imperfection would mar what once was perfect. God (who is holy) cannot be in unity with anyone who is not holy. So God cannot just say, ‘Oh, it’s fine, it doesn’t matter that you did wrong. It wasn’t very wrong. I’ll let it slide, just this once. You can still be in union with Me and have spiritual life.’ 

This is why anyone who has ever done anything wrong – even a “little” thing – has been separated, cut off, disconnected, from relationship with God. This is why sin earns death. Spiritual, eternal life only comes through union with God, the Source of life. And we cannot have that union with Him if we have any tiny little bit of imperfection.

And as I pointed out above, God is the very definition of good. God’s nature is how we know what good is, and anything outside His nature is evil, otherwise known as “sin.” So we know we’re doing something wrong when we do anything that contradicts God’s nature (perfect holiness, goodness, justice, righteousness, love, truth, purity, etc). We are sinning when we do or think or embrace anything that God Himself would not – anything that contradicts His character.

And here’s the thing: everyone has sinned. 

This means that everyone has been cut off from relationship with God. Because of our sin, because we are not holy and pure, we cannot be in unity with God. We cannot be accepted or welcomed into full relationship with Him.

And without being connected with God in unity, we cannot truly have life. The physical life we have is still sustained by Him, but we would have to be pure, holy, perfect in order to have spiritual communion with Him, in order to have spiritual, eternal life. In order to have true spiritual life, we must be in unity with God. In order to have eternal life, we must be able to be in His direct presence for all eternity, welcomed by Him into His eternal kingdom.

This is why sin earns death – because sin is outside of God’s nature, and therefore necessarily separates us from God, who is the only Source of life. Death is the natural consequence of our sin, of our wrongdoing, of our acting against the character of the good and holy God who created us and who sustains us and who wants only good for us and who has made sure we can all tell right from wrong. Death is simply the natural result of our sin, just like getting wet is the natural result of standing out in the rain. There is no way around it. 

Once we’ve sinned, even just once – and we’ve all sinned – that’s it. Our lives are forfeit. Death is our natural penalty. There’s no going back, no undoing the sin. We cannot become free of that sin by anything we could ever possibly do. We cannot take the drop of poison out of the water.

And once we’ve sinned, and therefore earned death, that death sentence must be carried out. The penalty must be paid. As we saw above, justice must be accomplished; holiness cannot be unjust. 

But God! 

In His steadfast love and mercy, God has stepped in on our behalf. We could never rid ourselves of sin, we could never make ourselves holy, we could never survive the penalty of death, and we could never get ourselves into full relationship with God in order to have true life, eternal life. On our own, we are doomed to eternal separation from God – to true death. But God has made a way, through Jesus His Son. Jesus, the second Person of the Trinity, took on human flesh to live the perfect life we could not live, to voluntarily take our place and suffer our consequence and die the death we had earned through our sin, and to give us His own righteousness and life! In this way, through the sacrificial death of the sinless Son of God, God’s justice is satisfied – by His own sacrifice, His own life, His own death. Jesus, truly God and truly human, paid the debt our sin had earned and died the death we deserved. And because of His deity, He conquered that death, and lives forever more! We earned death through our sin, and yet God offers us the gift of eternal life through Christ! What more joyful truth has ever been told?

There is one condition, however. One easy-and-yet-difficult, simple-and-yet-deep, anyone-can-do-it utterly-life-changing requirement. It’s nothing a person can do, though – at least, not in the way we normally think of doing things. It’s not an accomplishment we could ever achieve in our own strength. It’s simply a decision. One life-altering choice that everyone can make, no matter how many times or how horribly they have sinned: the choice to believe what God has said, to acknowledge the truth, to confess (agree with God) that we have sinned, and to put our faith, our trust, in Jesus who died and rose again to rescue us from the death we earned. 

Through faith in Jesus, we are brought into the life of Jesus – we are “in Christ,” fully restored in our relationship with God through Jesus. And when we are in Christ, fully connected to God, we are given His life – eternal life! What a glorious reality! 

I hope this understanding will be as helpful to you as it has to me. 

I know there will always be things about God we do not and cannot understand, and must simply take His Word for. But just like when I learned the value of going to the board in math class or working on drills in basketball, when we can understand things, it can be so helpful to our hearts and minds! We can help answer others’ questions, we can defend the character of our good God better to those who make wrong assumptions, we can be more ready to make a graceful answer to those who don’t know Him yet. 

Scripture References
(NOT an exhaustive list! What others can you find?)

Sin Earns Death

For the wages of sin is death…” (Romans 6:23a NIV)

“…but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for on the day you eat from it, you will certainly die.” (Genesis 2:17 NIV)

“Therefore, just as sin entered the world through one man, and death through sin, in this way death spread to all people, because all sinned.”
(Romans 5:12 NIV) 

God is the Source of All Life

“For by Him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through Him and for Him. And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.” (Colossians 1:16-17 ESV) 

“…He upholds the universe by the word of His power.” (Hebrews 1:3 ESV) 

“In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” (John 1:4 ESV) 

“Neither is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives everyone life and breath and all things.” (Acts 17:25 CSB) 

“And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life.” (1 John 5:11-13 ESV) 

Separated from God by Sin

“but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear.”
(Isaiah 59:2 ESV) 

“Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior.” (Colossians 1:21 NIV) 

“remember that you were at that time separated from Christ…”
(Ephesians 2:12a ESV) 

Spiritual Death

“And you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you previously walked according to the ways of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit now working in the disobedient,”
(Ephesians 2:1-2 CSB) 

“And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh,…” (Colossians 2:13a ESV) 

God is Holy

“And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!”” (Isaiah 6:3 ESV) 

“And the four living creatures, each of them with six wings, are full of eyes all around and within, and day and night they never cease to say, “Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty, who was and is and is to come!””
(Revelation 4:8 ESV) 

“since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”” (1 Peter 1:16 ESV) 

“Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one.” (James 1:13 ESV) 

“This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light, and there is absolutely no darkness in him.” (1 John 1:5 CSB) 

God is All and Only Good

“You are good, and what you do is good…” (Psalm 119:68a NIV) 

“Good and upright is the LORD; therefore he instructs sinners in the way.” (Psalm 25:8 ESV) 

“Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good! Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him!” (Psalm 34:8 ESV) 

“Oh give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever!” (Psalm 107:1 ESV) 

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” (James 1:17 ESV) 

God is Just

“The Rock, his work is perfect, for all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, just and upright is he.” (Deuteronomy 32:4 ESV) 

“Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne; steadfast love and faithfulness go before you.” (Psalm 89:14 ESV) 

“and he judges the world with righteousness; he judges the peoples with uprightness.” (Psalm 9:8 ESV) 

God is Judge

“For he has set a day when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed. He has given proof of this to everyone by raising him from the dead.” (Acts 17:31 NIV) 

“For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.” (Romans 14:10b ESV) 

God Cannot Be in Unity with Sinful People

“Now He fatally struck some of the men of Beth-shemesh because they had looked into the ark of the LORD. … And the men of Beth-shemesh said, “Who is able to stand before the LORD, this holy God?” (1 Samuel 6:19a, 20b NASB) 

“Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord.” (Hebrews 12:14 NIV) 

“since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”” (1 Peter 1:16 ESV) 

Everyone has Sinned

“As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one;” (Romans 3:10 NIV) 

“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,” (Romans 3:23 ESV) 

“If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”
(1 John 1:8 ESV) 

Everyone Knows Right from Wrong

“They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them” (Romans 2:15 ESV) 

“For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.” (Romans 1:19-20 ESV) 

God has Made a Way for Us to Have Life Through Jesus

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23 ESV) 

“I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20 ESV) 

“When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross.” (Colossians 2:13-14 NIV) 

“When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.” (Colossians 3:4 NIV) 

“If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.” (Romans 8:11 ESV) 

“In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.”
(Ephesians 1:7-10 ESV) 

“But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away. Yet who of his generation protested? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished. He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth. Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand.” (Isaiah 53:5-10 NIV) 

More Scripture about Salvation/Life in Christ

“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.” (John 3:16-18 ESV) 

“because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.” (Romans 10:9 ESV) 

“He himself is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours, but also for those of the whole world.” (1 John 2:2 CSB) 

“And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life.” (1 John 5:11-13 ESV) 

“that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith…” (Philippians 3:8b-9 ESV) 

“But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
(Romans 3:21-26 ESV) 

“And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.”
(Ephesians 2:1-10 ESV) 

We Will Not Understand Everything

For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, declares the LORD. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
(Isaiah 55:8-9 ESV) 

We are Called to Help People Understand What We Can

“Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.” (Colossians 4:5-6 ESV) 

“but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,” (1 Peter 3:15 ESV)