Most people don't understand the concept of sin. We live in a fairly amoral world that believes each person can decide what is right, what is true, and what is moral--whatever that might mean. Television and movies don't help with their portrayals of happy people blatantly living sinful lives. You will probably need to explain that God has set some standards about right and wrong, and that there is such a thing as sin.

What is sin?

James 4:17
Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.

1 John 3:4
Everyone who sins is breaking God's law, for all sin is contrary to the law of God.

God is holy and perfect; people are sinful. You probably know that for yourself--if you tried to be perfect for a day, you'd quickly discover that you couldn't do it. [Here, you can draw a picture of a chasm, with a stick figure on one side and the word God on the other. Put the word sin in the chasm and explain further.] Sin means not understanding or even caring about what is right. You defy God when you know what is right and then refuse to do it.

Who has sinned?

Romans 3:23
For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God's glorious standard.

Romans 5:17
For the sin of this one man, Adam, caused death to rule over many.

The Bible says everyone has sinned. We simply cannot help it--we're human. When Adam sinned (way back in the Garden of Eden in the book of Genesis), sin entered the human race and sinfulness is part of our natures. You might be asking, So what?

What's so bad about sin?

Romans 6:23
For the wages of sin is death.

Isaiah 59:2
It's your sins that have cut you off from God.

Sin leads to death. That's a big problem! Because God is perfect, he cannot have anything to do with us because we are sinners. He wants to have a personal relationship with us but he can't because of sin! So what did God do?