God’s sinlessness is inherent to His very nature – He cannot sin because sin, by definition, means going against His will. If you point to an inhabitant of this earth and say he was sinless (how anyone could know that is beyond me) – then it is a happenstance. If a person happened to be sinless – he is still completely and absolutely subject to the Creator of heaven and earth. To point to his alleged sinlessness as a motive for worship is no different than pointing to the alleged beauty of a statue as a motive for worship – one is pointing to physical beauty and one is pointing to spiritual beauty – but both of these beauties are part and parcel of God’s creation – they are gifts from God – the possesors of these beauties are recipients of God’s kindness. And the prohibition against idolatry doesn’t allow us to confuse recipient with the Ultimate Giver.
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Yisroel C. Blumenthal
Jesus told several people “to sin no longer”, suggesting that is not difficult to be “sinless”. 1 John 3:6-7, “…no one who sins has either seen him or known him. Little children, let no one deceive you. Everyone who does what is right is righteous….” So all those who have “seen” or have “known” him are sinless, despite them being human. If they still sin, they have not really “known him”. And anyone who “does what is right” is righteous (“believing” is not the key, but doing “right”, which is possible for humans), is.
Adam and Eve knew G-d even after they had sinned. The Patriarchs were not sinless, but they knew G-d. Moses was not allowed to pass into the Holy Land because he had sinned, but he knew G-d. Similarly, he xtian who doesn’t sin has yet to be found. JC didn’t do a very good job of ‘washing’ away sins. You say ‘believing’ is not the key but ‘doing’. Actually it is ‘knowing’ and ‘doing’ and that is Torah.
I agree. But, according to that NT verse, an ordinary person can be “sinless” and therefore Jesus was not “special”. Jesus was also a “first-born” and had a beginning; so, he was a created being. If a “believer” sins, they deceive themself, if they say that they “know” Jesus or have “seen”. Many Christians admit they still do sin (i.e., they don’t really “know Jesus”), but they are “already forgiven” because of what they “believe”. But they don’t need to “believe” and they didn’t need blood to be righteous. They just needed to do “what was right”.