Undo? I mean, the wrong ideas and terms.
i.e., Why has the term “sin” been thrown completely out when this is at the very root of our problematic earthly situation? I’m going to what John has to say on this — he can effectively help us with this question.
Go to which John for what? (Lately, I keep returning to, keep goin’ back through those 1, 2, 3 John letters. I love the #Bible and the Author! What beats this intimate relationship of candor? Zip, nada, NULL)!
So who was the last living Apostle? It was John. He fought the good fight of faith ‘til the end and was the only one among them who wasn’t martyred for Jesus Christ.
You remember how back in his day, the Gnostics were pushing their weirdness as fast as they could. They didn’t believe that God created the “evil” material world, but that some distant emanation of Him did that. They believed that Christ was some phantom when Jesus lived here on the Earth and that Jesus didn’t have a body of flesh. The heresy known as Gnosticism was gaining a real foothold in the Church when John wrote this letter. Gnosticism was even further developed by Arias. He was the one who started the Arian heresy. Arias denied the deity of Jesus Christ and claimed that Jesus was only one of among many created beings. The Arian heresy is the basis of the J.W.’s Watchtower Society’s (Jehovah’s Witnesses) off-base belief system. What do you know about this cult? John early sought to correct this heresy by emphasizing the deity of Jesus Christ in his writings. The second person of the Godhead, Jesus, is 100% God, and 100% man as well and there’s never been any evil in Him. He’s never sinned once.
Jesus Christ didn’t have a start in time for his life, he’s existed throughout all eternity and he won’t have an end date either. He was with God from the beginning (see Micah 5:2 for the Hebrew word for “everlasting” means “beyond the vanishing point”).
1 John 4: There’s Joy In Studying The Bible’s Exhortation To Love
I really love these verses from John: “This is the message we heard from Jesus and now declare to you: God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all. 6 So we are lying if we say we have fellowship with God but go on living in spiritual darkness; we are not practicing the truth. 7 But if we are living in the light (phōs Grk), as God is in the light, then we have fellowship with each other, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, cleanses us from all sin. 8 If we claim we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and not living in the truth.” (1 John 1:5–8 nlt. Read through the whole context of his book, it won’t take you long)
One reason for John writing this epistle is so that our joy of fellowship may become full (see John 15:11, 16:24). You know how happiness can be totally related to the circumstances around each of us, but JOY in the Lord is different. It’s a constant that’s based on our relationship as His adopted children.
John’s letter makes it clear that God the Father longs to have a living fellowship with you and me. Yes, He wants us to enjoy (vv. 1–3) fellowship with Him and with His reborn children.
Many people today have a heartbeat inside, but they are walking around spiritually dead. It’s sad (it was so sad when I was that way), but it’s far more sad if they stay that way (that way that I used to be). In Jesus Christ, the Father has revealed the truth to us, and what true life is. You and I here cannot see God or touch Him as the apostles once did many years ago, but He and His great love can still be real to you as His Holy Spirit opens the Word to your heart so to speak. It can happen today.
I can have illumination from God’s word — I can hear His word and respond. He wants me, He wants you to have a joyful fellowship (v. 4). I am not at all talking about the fellowship of a slave with a master per se, but that fellowship of a child with their parent. Sure, God delights in each of His children (See Psalm 18:19) and He longs to share His love with each of His children (John 14:19–24).
What does it mean to be a slave to sin?
How can we experience true freedom from spiritual slavery in Christ?
Who was Onesimus in the Bible?
Why were Paul and other believers in prison?
What is a bondservant? What is the difference between a bondservant and a slave?
You can be JOYFUL, you and I can be totally happy in Jesus and in the middle of the will of God! He loves and has a will, yes, a good plan for you.
He wants you to have an honest fellowship today (vv. 5–10). I’m talking about “walking in the light” cuz that’s what it means. It’s about dealing honestly with sin not mere mistakes of judgment.
Salvation is a serious matter of life or death, but fellowship is a matter of light or darkness. You and I can’t walk in both at the same time.
If you (like many people still do..) lie to God, lie to others, and lie to yourselves, you will lose out on your valuable fellowship with God. Why lose out in the character department as well? A godly character does not develop in the darkness.
In verse 5 the Apostle John describes God the Father as light in a philosophical and moral sense. He is completely fully righteously pure, with no trace of darkness in Him (John 3:19). He’s never for even one second or nano-second been evil. Light is fully opposed to — it exposes and dispels darkness (John 1 :9).
In verse 7 we see that the blood of Jesus Christ (remember Christ’s bloody Cross?).. is what continually cleanses us humans from all our sin.
“For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.” Romans 3:23 nlt
In verse 8 of this text the word “sin” refers to man’s sinful nature, which is dominated by the body’s cravings, needs and appetites. Baby believers and others, we are to eat what’s healthy for them spiritually and physically so that we can grow up. We are to regularly sow to the Spirit for edification, and not sow to the fleshly nature. We are to deny ourselves and struggle with the Word of God’s help to keep our persons.. including ole carnal nature inside under the control of the Spirit who delights to lead us (1 Cor. 9:27).
Sin just gets in the way and wrecks real fellowship upwards and outwards, but ever notice how those of the darkness and corruption of this world system today around us have invented some new words for the term “sin” so that people won’t feel so bad while they’re being distracted away from the Bible and a simple righteous relationship with God?
“Fellowship” in the Greek language is koinonia, and it can be translated “oneness, in common, communion.” Jesus came to address our sinful condition and bring us into koinonia with God the Father. Our fellowship with Him and each other is to remain unbroken.
“Some Christians try to go to heaven alone, in solitude. But believers are not compared to bears or lions or other animals that wander alone. Those who belong to Christ are sheep in this respect, that they love to get together. Sheep go in flocks, and so do God’s people.” ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon
Why has that “sin” term been thrown out? Instead of someone saying they’ve committed a sexual sin of fornication or adultery, they say there has been “a moral failure.” Instead of someone saying they outright lied, they will instead claim that they “misspoke” or offered “alternative facts.” And instead of someone saying they’ve sinned, they say, “Well, I’m not perfect. I blundered, I made a mistake.”
Man, there’s a huge difference between simply blundering and committing a real sin of commission or omission. A mistake is dif from that of sinning.
Merriam-Webster says that a mistake is “a wrong judgment: a misunderstanding”, “a wrong action or statement proceeding from faulty judgment, inadequate knowledge, or inattention.”
If you were told to turn right on a certain street and then you turned left instead. It was a mistake. Perhaps it wasn’t deliberate, but it happened.
A sin, on the other hand, is deliberate. It’s something we do at will. We need to call it what it is. If we have been guilty of doing a sin, then we just need to call it that.. sin.
Have you ever realized that something you said wasn’t quite true —I’ve done that before. Hate that. It wasn’t fully accurate, I later discovered that it just missed being completely true. It was non-factual, not accurate? You and I want to correct the record right? (this is why we each need to do as the Bereans did and test what we hear against the Bible)
“Now the Bereans were more noble-minded than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if these teachings were true. As a result, many of them believed..” Acts 17:11–12a
But listen to this. Telling a lie is another issue thing. God ..the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.. has never told one lie. A lie is when a person knows something is all the way true, but then chooses to tell something false instead of what they know to be factually accurate.
Good idea: Let’s start calling a lie.. a lie. Like many did in the olden days. Let’s start calling a sin.. a sin.. instead of something like a mistake.
What was manifested? God the Father’s light and life was made manifest.
Manifest is one of the Apostle John’s best words. His three letters were inspired. Not written to us, but for us.
And Christ is the way, the truth, and the life ..was manifested.. sent here from the Father. He was manifested that He might reveal God the Father’s life (see 1 John 1:2), that He might take away our sins (3:5, will you let Him do that), that He destroy the works of the devil (3:8), and that He’ll disclose the Father’s great love for sinners (4:9). You can enjoy abundant and eternal life! Don't put it off another day. Come as you are. Clean up yourself and then come to Jesus? No, bad idea, come as you are right now (that's the best idea of all).
Real and meaningful fellowship with God and with saved sinners (like me) can indeed happen! I love real fellowship in God’s family.
When we turn to the Lord and ask for His forgiveness.. when we call our sin just that.. sin.. when we come on His terms instead of on our own.. when we each honestly confess our sins, when we humbly repent (turn away from it), and choose to believe in God the Father’s only Solution for our sin, in His Savior for us (Jesus).. it’ll all be gone.. the sin will be take away. Washed completely away.
When we each as they say.. apply the blood of Jesus Christ by faith we are then clean. You can do this — you’ve got this by His grace. Come to Jesus Christ now and confess your sin.. just repent of your sin while you still can. I urge you to. Accept His free forgiveness because of the blood of His Cross, yes that was shed for all of us. And then drop the life of sin.
We stop going back to it or dredging it up again. Instead, let’s not remember what God has chosen to forget.
Sin can be fun for a season, but the wages of sin are still death. You don’t need that. That doesn’t mean there won’t be ramifications or consequences for past sins, but our personal sin is now covered by the blood of Christ. We thank God that He has forgiven us forever — we can enjoy fellowship upwards and outwards! No charge. Read more…
