The Practice of Sinning

 

1 John 3:4-10

Do we, or do we not?   Now that is certainly not good English, but do we make a practice of sinning?  If so we also practice lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.  The apostle John letting the Holy Spirit wiggle his lips and move his hand on the parchment, wrote these words; “No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.” (1John 3:6)  What a dilemma!  Has Jesus given all who have come to him by faith the ability to not sin or to keep from making a practice of sinning?

The answer is 100% yes, we choose to sin and yet why would we make such a foolish choice?  I can only come up with three answers to that question; we are either ignorant of what happen when Christ came into our life, we have no real understanding of how our identity changed forever, or we have been taken captive by an evil person.  And the harsh, bold truth is it matters not which of the three scenarios exist, the bottom line is we are not abiding in Christ.

If you think John is teaching something that is not attainable, pay close attention to the apostle Paul in Romans 6: 6,7, “We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin. For one who has died has been set free from sin. Looking at verses 11-14, “So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.  Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions.  Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness.  For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.”  It is clear that many of us are caught in one of the three circumstances listed above, but it comes down to we have chosen to sin.  (Note: sin is used as a noun, it is not a place, and so it has to be a person or thing.)

If you are making a practice of sinning and the act is not disgusting to your spirit, and I’m not talking about killing someone, nor am I talking about stealing or even adultery, none of the big sins, no it may be food, being a glutton, the Bible has a lot of ink on that, it may be your pleasure, doing what you want, when you want, it may be putting self before your family, it matters not because all of these are the tentacles of the evil one reaching deep into your heart, they are all acts of independent living.  If you find that this rings true and yet you also have no desire to change, maybe it would be wise to pay close attention to verses 9,10, “No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God.  By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.”

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice