Man does not understand how bad sin is. This is evident in his practice of dividing sin into categories: really bad (like molestors and rapists), medium bad (which God can wink at for a good reason), barely bad (which God usually winks at), and irrelevant bad (which God doesn’t even pay attention to). So long as a man’s medium bads are few and far between, and most of his sins are socially acceptable, he thinks he is okay. God will let him into heaven. He won’t see hell.
This downplaying of sin is not new. In the garden, Adam and Eve were warned, “the soul that sins shall die.” This was clear. The penalty for sin — even one lone act of sin — was death. Things went well until the Serpent asked slimy questions — “Hath God said?” — which undermined God’s Word and preached his slimy message, “Ye shall not surely die.” Eve gave in to the serpentine reasoning, disobeyed God’s command, and introduced death into the world — spiritual death, physical death, and eternal death.
What was Eve’s sin? A piece of fruit. What was wrong with that? Nothing, except the fact that God forbid it. This is the lesson man refuses to learn. All disobedience is sin, and sin always brings death. If we have sinned, however small and insignificant it seems, we are headed for eternal death. The only escape is faith in Jesus.