I agree 100%. I just wanted your (needed your) input just in case someone drives by the comment and is left confused. Thank you Sir and I love the new site!

My brother that’s why we need to hear 1 John. We do sin but we do not sin habitually as we once did while we lived in darkness. John says if we do remain under the power of sin then we are not children of God. The force of John’s statement in his first epistle is mind blowing. The very reason he washes and cleanses us is because we are his children who walk in his light.

1Jn 1:5 This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. 


So my brother let’s wrestle with your line of thought.

Are you suggesting that you are filled with darkness while at the same time you have a right standing before God? It can’t be. We are children of light. Either we are in one realm or the other. We cannot have one foot in one realm and the other foot in the other. Either you serve the flesh or you serve Christ. You cannot be married to both at the same time. One or the other is your master. I cannot be a slave of sin and a slave to Christ. (Does this sound repetitive? (grin) That’s not to say we do not wander where we have no right to wander. As Bunyan kindly pointed out there is a path called by-path meadow. John’s point is that we are lying if we claim to be sinless. I may sin on occasion but I am still righteous.

My brother, The Joy of which John and the apostolic writers speak, springs from the knowledge that you are no longer under law but are now under grace. You cannot be under the authority of both at the same time. Either you live your life under the Law covenant or you live your life under the Spirit covenant (2 Cor 3).

Much of what is taught by Covenant Theology attempts to bring God’s saints back under the Law yet we know from God’s word that Law could never help a sinner nor can it be of help to his saints. All it can do is demand.

As a preacher I am either a minister of the covenant engraved upon tablets of stone or I am a minister of the covenant of the Spirit engraved upon the heart. Praise God for deliverance from the law that condemned us! You sound as if you remain a condemned man.

Law could never do needy sinners and needy saints an ounce of God except to deepen their condemnation and increase their sense of helplessness. Thankfully his saints know his liberating power! As Paul says in his opening words to Romans 8; “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. (2) For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. (3) For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, (4) in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” Now ain’t that something!

So Lionel you can fret over your remaining sin all you want but don’t you think it is time you surrender yourself to the liberating Spirit of Christ who you say is in you?

Joy sprung, if you indeed possess it, because God is in you and if God is in you sin will not be your master ever again. It is no longer our master. By and through the presence of his indwelling Spirit he has once and for all time set you apart for himself.

Without his indwelling presence you have no justification nor do you have no sanctification. To sum this up we will say it this way; Christ is our Righteousness. Christ brings to Abraham and his children of faith the much longed for right standing before their heavenly Father. Paul has said in Gal 3:3 “Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?” Why did Paul ask that question? Because there is nothing in you or me that adds one measure to standing in God.

Now that we are saved by the blood of Christ do we work to keep this gift? I think not. Paul says in Gal 3:12-14 “But the law is not of faith, rather “The one who does them shall live by them.” (13) Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us–for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree”– (14) so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.”

Note how Abraham longed for the blessing (righteousness/justification/sanctification before God) and how that blessing is fulfilled by the giving of the promised Spirit through faith.

I pray that in my haste I haven’t communicated muddied words.

Grace!
Moe

I am not saying I disagree with your statement, I guess I just need to understand the practicality of your statement Sir.

So what happens when my righteousness fails (I sin)? As a matter of fact in my own life there are things that I did not realize were sinful tendencies that I now realize are, is this qualitaive and progressive and a bit subjective. Or is this quantitative, absolute and objective?

As a brief reply allow me to lean heavily upon this quote from 1st John. Chew on it and digest it.

1Jn 1:5-10 This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all. (6) If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. (7) But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. (8) If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. (9) If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (10) If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

If we contend we remain darkness then we have no fellowship with the brethren and God. This is not merely court declared justification. It is a relational reality. No changed life = no union with God. Listen to Mat 5:20;

“For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Jesus is not speaking of a forensic righteosuness. The work of the Spirit in this age brings covenant faithfulness to God’s saints and it is not simply judicial.

In His love,
Moe