Are we sinners or are we saints?  There's this debate and contention between two camps.  One camp says that we were, are, and always will be sinners, because of the depravity of our human condition, even if we are [quote]"saved"[unquote] from the wrath of God to come.  The other camp says that we are now saints and therefore not sinners, because of the new creation, our new identity in Christ, and the indwelling and empowering of the Holy Spirit within us.

Actually, a lot of this is just semantics that is easy to resolve in an intuitively obvious way, without going back and forth with proof-texts from the Bible.

But first, we have to define sin.  "Sin" is usually translated from the word αμαρτια, which is the noun form, or αμαρτανω, which is the verb form.  It fundamentally refers to any kind of failure, error, or fault, or to fail or err in some way.  Then there are the other grammatical parts of speech, and some variants of the word, like αμαρτημα, which adds the mu-alpha suffix to denote an effect or consequence of failure, or αμαρτωλος, which is a person who fails or has a record of failure, normally translated "sinner" in the Bible, and so on.

What does this mean to us?  Well, very simply, when you read the word "sin" in the Bible, remember that it fundamentally refers to any kind of failure, error, or fault, or to fail or err in some way.  Obviously, we are talking about the Bible, which is why we have the more religious word "sin."  So, to "sin" is to fail or err in a moral or spiritual way, particularly in a way that God would hold to account in a spiritual or judicial sense.

So then, given this, we can make some intuitively obvious observations. First, all sins that we have committed are in the past.  Since we all have sinned, we all have a criminal record.  If we believe that Jesus paid for sins, and continue in that belief, that faith, then those sins have been, are, and will be pardoned, and we will be exempt from the judgment and wrath of God to come.

Next, there is the question of what we are doing right now.  Probably everyone who is watching this video is not robbing a bank, engaging in illicit sex, or in the process of committing a homicide.  I mean right now.  That's the present moment.  So you aren't sinning right now, unless there's something that you are supposed to be doing that you aren't doing, like forgiving someone, for example, or by watching this video while ignoring that desperate person over there whom you could set free from their bondage.

Then, there is the question of what you will do in the future.  Are you planning on committing some sin, or not doing what you know God requires of you?

For those who have been regenerated, there should be no fundamental motivation to be committing a sin now or in the future.  If that isn't the case, and you are committing sin or planning to, then at best you are walking according to the flesh and not according to the spirit, and at worst, you weren't really ever regenerated and aren't even a believer.

There are two extremes to avoid here.  One is to deny the regenerative work of Christ in us and claim that we are still depraved.  If this is the case, 1 Cor 6:9-10, Gal 5:19-21, and other scriptures declare that we will not inherit the Kingdom of God.  The other extreme is basically the deification of man, which says that, since God is in us and our old nature is dead, that we are little gods.  But that is pretty stupid as well, since there is only one God, and we only have God's nature through the work of Holy Spirit, not us, and that is only by our faith in God, the continual choices we make as men, not as gods.

So then, you can see how this is ultimately resolved.  You are a saint if you are a believer.  If by [quote]"sinner"[unquote] you mean that everyone has a record of having committed sins, then we are all [quote]"sinners"[unquote].  But if by [quote]"sinner"[unquote] you mean that we by our very nature can't help but sin now and continue to sin, then that isn't true at all, since we are regenerated (traditionally phrased "born again") to a new nature in Christ, such that by faith we walk according to the spirit and have no more desire to sin, trusting that the Holy Spirit in us is able to fulfill that desire and guide us in a life that is holy and acceptable to God.