Unknown or Unconscious Sin

The America of today seems incapable of persecuting people for their religious convictions. But prophecy indicates that multitudes of apparently liberty-loving people of today will tomorrow oppress the consciences of their fellowmen, choosing in principle to revive the horrors of the Dark Ages. This “national apostasy will be followed by national ruin.” (RH Dec. 18, 1888)

Will these multitudes suddenly acquire this terrible sin? Or is it already smoldering undetected beneath the surface of national good will, gaiety and material prosperity, awaiting only the mark of the beast issue to activate it and expose it? Did it exist in principle a hundred years ago in the time of the Blair Sunday Bill and the Tennessee chain gangs?

In the final crisis within the remnant church, “many a star that we have admired for its brilliancy will then go out in darkness. Chaff like a cloud will be become away as the wind” (5T 81). Does the pure wheat suddenly become chaff? Is final apostasy a new development or the disclosure of a buried, perhaps unknown alienation from God that was present all the time in the heart?

Is an outward sin that suddenly appears in the life a new phenomenon or the open expression of a secret sin, such as lust developing into adultery or hatred becoming murder? We agree that such a sin can be cherished in a person’s heart while other people are not aware of however, the real issue here is whether sin can be cherished in the heart when the person himself is not aware of it.

Are our motivations always apparent to us? Can we assume we are righteous when our real motivations are selfish? Are selfish motivations actually sinful? Can a person sincerely think he or she is converted when in reality unknown selfishness is spoiling the character and nullifying one’s assumed witness for Christ? Can we “scatter abroad” while we sincerely think we are “gathering” with Him? Could this be one reason why we fail to attract more young people to the Saviour?

Can a person be genuinely converted, sincerely living up to all the light he or she has, and yet unknown sin lurk beneath the surface that must come to knowledge and be repented of before the seal of God can be applied? Or have God’s people throughout the ages always been sealed when they were first genuinely converted? Is there a final sealing work related to the character development of God’s people, or is it a mere ritual in heaven?

Is it possible that in past ages saints who were genuinely converted did not in their lifetime receive the seal of God because of unknown sin? For example, was John Wesley’s sincere Sunday-keeping and Sabbath-breaking an unknown sin, or was his transgression of the fourth commandment something less than sin?[i]

When can we safely claim to be completely converted or safely feel or say, “I am saved?" On what foundation does a true assurance of salvation rest?

What hinders God’s people from finishing the gospel commission in all the world? Is the real problem the presence of sin “in the camp”? If the answer is yes, what is that sin? Why has it not been overcome during the past 150 years that we have understood the Laodicean message? Is it a sin for God’s people to be lukewarm today, to say or to feel that they are “rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,” yet “know not” that they are “wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked”? Or is this