I want to introduce this morning,
by way of guided discussion, grows out of some pastoral dealings,
not only in the past, but in the more recent days. And I believe it's an area where
perhaps all of us need constant reminder of a very fundamental
principle of the Christian life. So I want to introduce our discussion
by asking several questions. First of all, question number
one. Do Christians, and by Christians I mean people who are truly united
to Christ, who have been born of the Spirit, the dominion of
sin has been broken, Christ is the object of their trust and
hope for salvation, they are indwelt by the Spirit, do true
Christians sin each day? Yes or no? If you're prepared
to give an answer. Raise your hand and then support
your answer with Scripture. Do Christians sin each day of
their lives? Belton? Yes, all right. And on what basis would you assert
that Christians sin each day of their lives? All right, in what is clearly
an outline for our daily petitions in Matthew chapter 6, our Lord
Jesus Christ assumes that just as we will daily seek his face
for our physical necessities, our daily bread, as we will daily
be concerned to promote his glory, his kingdom, the sanctifying
of his name, Matthew 6 He assumes that daily Christians will need
to pray, verse 12, forgive us our debts, where sins are here
looked upon as a debt. Now, when you have a debt, you
owe something to someone that you've not yet been able to give
them. So when I do not give to God that perfect obedience to
his law, which his law requires, failing to render what he demands,
Bypassing or transgressing what he forbids, I have incurred a
moral and ethical debt, and therefore our Lord assumes that daily we
will incur such debts, and therefore he says, After this manner, pray
ye, forgive us our debts, as we have forgiven our debtors. Any other passages that would
buttress the assertion our brother Belton has made that Christians,
real, true, earnest Christians, sin each day. All right, Eric? All right, 1 John, and the reference
you quoted from was chapter 1 in verse 8. Was that the one you
had in mind, Eric? All right, 1 John 1.8, having said in verse
7, that if we are walking in the light as he, that is, our
God is in the light, we have fellowship one with another in
the blood of Jesus, his son, continually cleanses us from
all sin. And it's as though someone says,
well, big deal. Why do I need that? He said,
well, if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves
and the truth is not in us. Now, though this passage does
not explicitly state that we sin every single day, it certainly
does indicate that anyone who claims to be very far removed
from the experience of sin for very long is out of touch with
the reality of the Word of God. Certainly it says that much,
does it not? All right, any other passages? All right, yes, Doug? All right, the context of Romans
7, and in particular, what section, Doug? All right, Romans 7, 21 and following. All right, excuse me, go ahead,
Doug. And even before that, he's conscious
that he has these contrary principles presently and powerfully at work
within him at all times. He knows on the one hand that
in his flesh, verse 18, dwells no good thing. to will is present
with me as a regenerate man, he has a regenerate will that
is set in the direction of doing the will of God and doing it
perfectly, but he says, to do that which is good I is not,
for the good which I would I do not, the evil which I would not
that I do. But if what I would, not that
I do, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwells in me,
I find then the law that to me who would do good, evil is present."
And he goes on to describe this conscious conflict between the
principle of his new life in Jesus Christ, which is what he
is as a man. He is a new creature in Christ
with a heart that delights in the law of God, but he's not
a perfect new creature. There's another law yet at work
in him, the law of sin that is in his members, and the parallel
passage, of course, Galatians 5.17, the flesh is lusting or
warring against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh.
These two are contrary, the one to the other. so that you may
not do the things that you would." Now, in responding to that question,
do Christians sin every day? And I believe the general consensus
here would be, yes, they do, and I think you could come forward
with many more scriptures. What is crucial in our thinking
if we are to respond correctly to that question? What is absolutely
crucial? Well, let me try to give you
the hint of what I'm pulling for. By the way, I phrased the question,
do Christians sin every day? What is crucial in our answer
to that question? David? Our understanding of what
sin is. All right. Our definition of
sin. All right. Our definition of
sin is crucial. Now, if we mean by that, do Christians
blow their temper, punch the wall, and cuss someone who cuts
them off at an intersection every day, I hope many of you can say
no. If you mean by sin do Christians
commit adultery and thievery every day, I hope you can say
no. But if by sin we mean, and what
is probably the best uninspired definition of sin that brings
together the biblical witness as to what sin is. Someone want
to venture a guess? All right, the old, shorter catechism
definition. What is sin? Sin is any lack of conformity
unto, that is, anything that is not mathematically parallel
to the standard of God's law, any lack of conformity unto,
or transgression of, cutting across the law of God is sin,
not only in our external deeds, but also in our life. in our
thoughts, in our motives, in the intentions of the heart,
the motions of our spirit. You remember Jesus' definition
and description of the true nature of the law in Matthew chapter
5, that it touches even the springs of thought, whoso looks with
a view to lust has violated the seventh commandment. He who does
not do everything to be reconciled to his brethren, even in worship,
is violating the sixth commandment, thou shalt do no murder. So if
we define sin biblically, and that's crucial, then it is indeed
true that real Christians sin every day. All right? Question
number two. If real Christians sin every
day, many times in the day, by failing to do what the law commands,
which is, in summary, to love God perfectly and to love our
neighbor perfectly, then question number two, what ought Christians
to do with their daily sins? You all acknowledge Christians
sin every day. What ought Christians to do with
their daily sins? All right, Cliff? In 1 John 1,
verse 9, it says, if we confess our sins, it is faithful and
righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we do sin, it is our duty
then to confess our sins before God and seek forgiveness from
God, and then to seek cleansing from God and to put our feet
into the path of righteousness. All right, so if a Christian
sins, and we've said, yes, Christians do sin every day, sin is a constant,
albeit unwelcomed companion in our pilgrimage until we cross
the river in death, or at the coming of Christ are glorified
all at once in body and in spirit, what ought we to do with our
sins? A very fundamental question,
and the answer that Cliff has given to us is we ought to confess
those sins and seek cleansing from them. All right? Any other
dimension of the biblical response to that question? What ought
we to do with our daily sins? All right, John? I'm calling
you by your son's name. Sorry, Paul. Go ahead. All right, here is one of our
responsibilities with respect to those areas of sin. If ye live after the flesh, you
must die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of
the body, you shall live. In other words, we ought not
to be content with any present level of overcoming grace with
regard to a specific sin or sins, but we ought continually to be
making an effort to mortify our sin or our sins. Bring to bear
upon those sins the dynamics of grace by the power of the
Spirit that we may more and more conquer them in the strength
of Christ. All right? What else? Anything
else we ought to do with our daily sins? All right, James
5.16, Confess therefore your sins one to another. Well, wait
a minute. I thought 1 John 1.9 said, I'm
only to confess my sins to God. Did some Roman Catholic priest
write this in here to justify what is called auricular confession,
where you go into the little box and speak through the black
veil into the priest's ear and say, Father, I have sinned? Is
that what this is talking about? How many think that's what it's
talking about? Well, if that isn't what it's talking about,
what is it talking about? It does say, confess your sins one
to another. What's it talking about? Charlie,
you wanted—you quoted it, so you— All right, so what you're
saying is Certain sins are not only a violation
of the law of God, say the first table of the law, we failed to
love God or we have failed to honor his name, his day, etc. But where we have openly sinned,
not just a sin of thought, but where our sin has been a violation
of the second table of the law, we have failed to love our neighbor
and have manifested it by an angry word, an unjust or an dishonest
word, that we must not only confess that to God, to have a conscience
clear before God, But in such instances, confession may need
to be made at a horizontal level. Now, isn't it interesting that
there in that passage that was the first one we turned to in
Matthew 6, Jesus assumes that this will be the common experience
of his people. Remember, he says, When ye pray,
say, or after this manner pray, forgive us our debts, even as
we forgive those who are debtors to us, the indication being that
Jesus views the community of the redeemed not only as those
who confess their sins to God, but to one another. Now, whether
that is precisely what James is driving at in this passage
could be open for discussion, but certainly the principle is
very clearly there and is established in other passages. So, what ought
we to do when we have sinned? We ought to confess those sins
to God. We ought to be making efforts
to mortify them. We must, where necessary, make
confession to our fellow men. Anything else the Bible says
we ought to do with our daily sins? Yes, Jeff? All right, 1 John 2 and verse
1, and the only reason I repeat this is so it gets on the tape.
Jeff has said we ought to bring to mind, that is, into the realm
of present spiritual consciousness and appropriate the present advocacy
of Christ. 1 John 2, verses 1 and 2. My little children, these things
write I unto you that you may not sin. You see, when John says,
all Christians do sin, anyone says he doesn't sin, he's out
of touch with the truth. When we do sin, we must confess
them. Is he writing these things so
that the congregation of God's people become a bunch of people
who treat sin lightly? He said, no. These things I write
unto you that you may not sin, but now here's the realism. And
if any man sin, we have an advocate, a helper. Same word for comforter.
We have one called alongside to help. And who is he? Jesus
Christ, the righteous one, and he is propitiation for our sins. He has turned away the wrath
of God from our sins and on that basis of his once-for-all sacrifice,
he pleads the benefits, he pleads the worth of his own propitiatory
sacrifice on our behalf. That tells us something very,
very critical about a Christian's daily sins, that if he doesn't
understand, he will doubtless err in dealing with his sins
as he ought. What does that tell us about
the nature of those sins that he commits day by day? In and
of themselves, what do those sins deserve? the wrath of God. Is sin any
less sin? Is it any less wrath-provoking
in a Christian than in a non-Christian, as far as God is concerned? Of
course not. But if I am in Christ, does that
sin provoke the judicial anger of God against me? Do I come
back under the frown of an angry judge when I sin as a Christian?
Yes or no? Prove it from the Bible. There's
one text that ought to just leap into your mind, just like that.
That's it, Romans 8.1, all right? What does it tell us? Romans
8 and verse 1, critical text. Romans 8.1, there is therefore
now no condemnation. Now think of it. Here's the man
who's just written. of the great reality of the struggle
with indwelling and remaining sin in chapter 7. And in spite
of all of that foment of the soul about the reality of remaining
indwelling sin, its power, its subtlety, its grievousness, he
says, there is therefore now, here and now, not when we get
glorified, here and now, no condemnation to them that are in Christ Now,
if a Christian thinks that sin is in itself less ugly and less
wrath-deserving because he's in a state of grace, what will
be the attitude that he will subtly develop towards sin? An attitude of what? Hardness,
carelessness, indifference. Oh yeah, I've sinned, but so
what? I'm in Christ. Now, is it ever of God to develop
a hard heart toward sin? No, he warns against it. He says,
beware lest there be in any one of you an evil heart of unbelief
in departing from the living God, but exhort one another daily
lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin. So
any view of our relationship to sin that automatically and
inevitably leads to hardness, carelessness, indifference cannot
be of God. On the other hand, if we believe
that the sin in itself is just as wrath-deserving, just as ugly,
but we do not believe that we don't come under its wrath and
condemning power, what then will happen to us as Christians when
we sin? If we hold this, but fail to hold Romans 8.1, what
will happen? You'll run from God because you'll
be crippled with what? crippled with guilt and fear.
You'll be crippled with guilt and fear. And a person crippled
with guilt and fear does not draw near to God. He has an aversion to God. And
you see, it's precisely at this point that many a Christian gets
hung up, because either He says, I've got to convince myself the
sin is in itself less wrath-deserving and ugly because I'm in grace,
or if I believe it's just as wrath-deserving and ugly, then
how can I draw near to God, reeking with the foul smell of the sin
I committed two minutes ago? There is no condemnation. However
foul that sin smells, It cannot provoke God to pick up the rod
of his justice and strike me, because he struck that sin in
the person of my substitute, and he'll never strike twice
for it. Now he may, with a frown on his
fatherly countenance, say, now my child, I've got to wean you
from that sin, and therefore I've got to put you on my knee
and lovingly discipline you as a father does his child. but
he's not wearing his robes of an angry judge. He's wearing
the garb of a loving father. Now you see, if you don't make
that distinction, you're going to be in all kinds of trouble.
You see that? All right, now I want to move
to the third question to help round out the picture. Do Christians
sin every day? Yes. What ought they to do? They
ought to confess that sin, first of all to God. They ought, in
the language of our brother Jeff, based on 1 John 2, they ought
to bring to remembrance the advocacy of Christ, his once-for-all sacrifice
that is now not repeated in heaven, let alone on Romish altars on
earth. He is the embodiment of all of
its virtue just by sitting there at the right hand of the Father.
What a beautiful biblical perspective. Just by being there, He embodies
all the virtue of His death. He is our advocate by His very
presence. that sin's wrath has been swallowed
up, or the wrath due to sin swallowed up in our advocate. And we need
to remember that, even when we're reeking with the smell of the
sin we've just committed, coming to God for forgiveness, believing
that we do not bear judicial wrath and anger for that sin,
though we may bear fatherly displeasure and the frown on our Father's
face, we come confessing our sin as children to our loving
Father looking to the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ as the ground
of our confidence that it will be forgiven. He is faithful and
righteous to forgive. Righteousness is now behind our
forgiveness because the sin was paid for in the work of the Lord
Jesus. Then where necessary, we must
confess our sin to the person against whom we've sinned. We
must confess our sins one to another. Again, Ephesians 4 clearly
indicates that Paul assumes that the community of believers at
Ephesus will be doing this all the time. He says, be kind, tenderhearted,
forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath
forgiven you. And then, having confessed them,
we will renew our efforts to mortify them, to put them to
death, that we might, in the strength of the Holy Spirit,
make progress in dealing with that sin. Now, $64 question,
why don't we do this? If I were to take a little man
on the street survey, put a bag over your head so I wouldn't
know who you were, and you wouldn't know, you'd have the confidence
that nobody knew who you were when you responded. I believe
there's many a Christian sitting here today who'd say, but alas,
I don't do that as I ought. I don't, the moment I'm conscious
of sin, I don't immediately confess it to the Lord. I don't immediately
bring to remembrance that Christ has turned away the wrath of
God from that sin. And as a child coming to my father,
I can ask his forgiveness. I don't immediately go to the
person I've sinned against and make it right. I don't immediately
take up the spiritual weapons to mortify. Now, why don't I?
Why don't I? What are the reasons when the
biblical answer to the question, what ought we to do with our
daily sins, is so plain? You didn't have to run to commentaries
and concordances, and had we had time, you would have pulled
out many more verses. Now, why don't we do what we
know we ought to? Got any ideas, George? The Spirit
is willing, the flesh is weak. All right. Explain that. What
do you mean, the Spirit is willing, the flesh is weak? And we have
the conviction that we should do it, but our courage to do it and our strength
to do it doesn't lie in ourselves. All right, so at that very point,
remaining sin itself hinders us. Is that what you're saying,
George? Yes. Okay. Remaining sin hinders us. How many of you think that's
the main reason? No takers? All right, Phil? Are
you voting or are you going to make another comment? You're
voting. You think that's the main reason. Very good. There's
one courageous man. All right. Rich? What? Pride. Pride. Pride. How does pride enter into
that? You want to expound a little
bit your response, Rich? All right, what happens to pride
in the presence of sin? Well, first of all, to acknowledge
that we've sinned means we've got to humble ourselves, right?
The acknowledgment of sin itself is an act of humbling. This is
why you'll find in the Bible poverty of spirit and humble
joined in several critical passages. Isaiah 57, 15, to this man will
I look, even to him who is of a poor humility and contrite
spirit. Contrition is what you feel in
the presence of sin. The Beatitudes, blessed are the
poor in spirit, blessed are they who mourn. So there is the pride
that makes us unwilling to acknowledge that we've sinned because the
moment we acknowledge sin, where does that put us in terms of
dependence? We have to look to somebody else
to make it. And right when Adam and Eve listened
to the breathings, or I should say more technically, when Eve
listened to the out-breathings of that foul serpent, that's
been our problem ever since. You're a creature, but do what
I tell you and you will be as God. knowing good and evil, you'll
be as God. You'll be as God. You'll no longer
need your position as a creature. As long as we are sinful creatures,
sin, as long as we are creatures in this fallen state, sin is
going to be our constant companion. There is only one who was holy,
harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and that was our
Lord Jesus. And for us to continue to take
this place is to continue to keep ourselves in a proper perspective. And pride does not want to let
us do that. But then how else does pride
work? When a sinner goes out of himself and looks only to
Christ crucified for forgiveness, what does that do for pride? It withers it. Does any man stand
before the cross of Christ with his chest puffed out, saying,
I'm a pretty good guy, boy, look at that. There's an immolated
God, shrouded heavens, isn't that a great sight? Boy, I'm
something. You say, Pastor, that's almost blasphemous to suggest
it. That's right. There is no place like the cross
to wither your pride. because you go there with the
spirit, not of the Pharisee, who creams himself in the presence
of God. Oh God, look at me. I don't do
this, I don't do that, I do this, I do that. But when the publican
is bent with the sense of his sin, saying, God be propitious,
God be merciful to me, the sinner, pride is shattered. And perhaps
the greatest reason why we believers do not deal with our sin biblically
is because we don't want the pride-withering impact of the
cross to be our constant companion. Now you think about that. It
is not honoring the grace of God to say, Oh, I'm so bad and
I stink so with my sin, I'll wait till I smell a little better
before I go to Christ. Oh, is that right? So you're
going to make yourself a little better so Christ doesn't get
quite the same credit for taking away the stink of your sin. Well,
who's going to take it away? Does time? Your own efforts? You see, one of the old Puritans
stated in the way I've never forgotten, he says, go to Christ
smelling and stinking with the filth of your sin. But where
else can we go? Where else are we going to go?
If He took the whole aggregate of our sin willingly and deliberately,
is there anything with which we can come to Him individually
and specifically that's going to turn Him away? It's pride. under a guise of humility. Oh,
I stink too much with the sin I just committed. I mean, I just
blew my cork at my wife. I said unkind things. I made
her cry. But I can't go and say, Lord
Jesus, forgive me, because my mouth is still stinking with
the foul words I said to my wife, the unkind words, the ungracious
words. So I've got to wait till my breath
smells a little sweeter before I go to Christ. Well, who's going
to make it sweeter? You? Time? That's a delusion. And when you
don't go immediately to Christ, you know what happens? You either
do one of two things. You start to try to rationalize
that the sin wasn't quite so stinking as your immediate spiritual
nose told you it was. And you say, well, my spiritual
olfactory nerves were playing tricks on me. I mean, every man's
got a right to assert himself with his wife, and you begin
to rationalize that the sin really wasn't so bad as your immediate
spiritual instincts told you it was. Or, you develop hardness
of heart. Brethren, those are the two consequences
of not going immediately to the cross whenever you discover sin. The temptation to rationalize
and the temptation to have a hard heart. Now you see the implications
of that, and our time is gone, so we don't have time to draw
it out. But when you're sitting under the word of God, and the
preaching finds you out, don't wait till you go home. Right
then and there, go to the cross, right in the middle of the sermon.
Lord Jesus, in your sacred presence, you found me out. Forgive me
and cleanse me. And Lord, I see that's something
I've got to make right with my kids. You know, Lord, as soon
as I get home today, I'm going to do it. I've got to make it
right with my wife. Lord, the deed is as good as done. Take
the willingness for the deed. And then your heart is open to
receive the Word of God. so that in any given service
there ought to be, on any given Lord's Day, probably hundreds
of invisible trips to the cross, that if we could materialize
them, we'd see a well-worn path to the foot of the cross. And
if you've got to go a hundred times a day for the same sin,
where else are you going to go? Tell me, where else are you going
to go if you don't go there? And you see, when you have a
fellowship of people who increasingly learn that simple lesson, how
can they strut before one another and be proud and self-assertive
when we know we're all living at the same place, sinners at
the foot of the cross? I mean, that's leveling. No room
for any pride there. Because each of us knows, if
you only knew what I had to go to the cross for today, I doubt
you'd even look at me. And the very person you're looking
at says, if you only knew what I had to go to the cross for,
I doubt you'd even look at me. And what happens is a wonderful
fellowship glued together by the brokenness and the humility
and yet the wonder and the joy of knowing we're forgiven sinners. Making sense? Dear people, that's
the only way open to us. If you don't walk that way, you're
in bad shape, bad shape. And that's why the Bible makes
it so clear that your work, though it starts here, if there are
horizontal relationships that aren't right, you've got to go
and humble yourself. And frankly, I find it difficult.
When people have come to me and said, Pastor Martin, how could
you do that? I mean, you're looked upon as a spiritual leader, and
yet you confess your sins before the whole congregation. I said,
look, that's no big deal. You're just a bunch of creatures.
I've gone before my Creator and my Redeemer and confessed my
sin. There's no big deal to confess
it before my fellow creatures. And I really wonder, when people
find it hard to confess their sins to their fellow creatures,
do they really know anything about confessing it before their
Creator? It's a good question, isn't it? But as I said already,
time is gone, we've got to quit. So let's thank the Lord for His
help and pray that this lesson will be burned into our hearts
by the Holy Spirit. Our Father, we're so thankful
for Your Word that addresses itself to our real situation. We're not left at the mercy of
our own thoughts and our own imaginations. But in this ongoing
conflict with sin, we have a sure word from heaven. Thank you for
that word. And oh, may we learn as never
before as your people to live under the shadow of the cross,
there to find again and again the kiss of forgiveness upon
our cheek. Deliver us from our pride that
keeps us from the cross. Deliver us, O Lord, from everything
and anything that keeps us from living in that place. Seal to
our hearts our meditation and discussion together this morning,
and may it be carried over with blessing even into the coming
hour, we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.