By Reese Currie and Harold Kemp, Compass Distributors
We've had a Topic request from one of our readers regarding sin. This person wanted to know the definition of sin and where the author of sin, Satan, came from. Finally, this person wanted to know whether we can live without sin after we have been saved.
Simply put, sin is any transgression of God's law that hurts another person. I realize this is hardly the broad definition of sin most people have come to expect, but logically, this is what sin really is.
1 John 3:4 ends with the statement, "Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law." (KJV) And what is the law? Most people think of the law as the five books that start the Bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. But Jesus summarized this entire set of writings very simply, and His statement is recorded in Matthew 7:12: "Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets." (KJV)
Paul wrote this to the Galatians in accord with Jesus' teaching. "For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'" (Galatians 5:14)
The failure to live in this manner is to sin. As James wrote, "Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin." (James 4:17)
Satan was an angel created by God. In the very beginning, all that existed was God, that is, the Father, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit. Then angels were created in the beginning; perhaps when God created the heavens, He created the angels that dwell in them. We can be certain that angels existed before the first humans.
People wonder why God would create an evil being like Satan, but Satan and other fallen angels were not created as evil beings. In Ezekiel 28:14-15, God is referring to a fallen angel when He says, "You were the anointed cherub who covers; I established you; You were on the holy mountain of God; You walked back and forth in the midst of fiery stones. You were perfect in your ways from the day you were created, Till iniquity was found in you." Angels, like humans, were created with free will and the ability to choose good (obedience to God) or evil (disobedience). The angels had knowledge of good and evil from the beginning, but humans did not, until Satan, inhabiting a serpent, introduced them to disobedience in the garden of Eden.
Satan, then, chose evil of his own free will, and chose to be disobedient and opposed to God. It would seem that his attack against humans, by introducing them to disobedience, is an outgrowth of this desire to oppose God in everything. Humans are extremely important to God, having been made in His image (Genesis 1:26), and Satan has hated humans in particular since the beginning. Witness Satan's attempt to show Job to be unrighteous (see Job 1 for an example). This is really what Satan tries to do with all of us, to show us to be unrighteous.
Indeed, Satan's attempts to destroy humans through sin have had some success. At one time, only one righteous man was to be found in the world! In Genesis 6:5-8, we read, "Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart. So the Lord said, 'I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth, both man and beast, creeping thing and birds of the air, for I am sorry that I have made them.' But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord." Noah and his family survived the flood and thus the human race survives today.
The nature of Satan was described by Jesus as he answered his accusers in John 8:44: "You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it."
The possibility of leading a sin-free existence has been a dream of many religious groups, dating back to times before Christ. I read in an old book called Paul of Tarsus that the Pharisees believed that if just one Pharisee could live just one whole day without sinning, it would bring on the coming of the Messiah. As a result, the Pharisees were eager to attempt to be the one who lived a sin-free day, for the joy of being the one who caused the coming of the Savior. (I don't know for certain if this is true or an embellishment by the book's author.)
The apostles taught that any normal human who claimed to be sin-free was a liar. Truly, this is what the Bible says on the topic. 1 John 1:8 says, "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." This was said in the present tense. John was a saved Christian saying that we all have sin. He was including himself in this statement.
At the same time, we are to strive toward fulfilling all of Christ's commandments. As it says later in the same book, "He who says, 'I know Him,' and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him." (1 John 2:4)
Many people know John Wesley as the founder of Methodism, but modern day Methodists do not pay attention to Wesley's most distinctive belief, the belief in "entire sanctification". Of modern churches, the Church of the Nazarene and the Wesleyan Church most accurately reflect Wesley's beliefs. Some Pentecostal denominations also support holiness doctrines, but go a bit farther than Wesley by believing that speaking in tongues is a necessary sign of entire sanctification.
The belief in entire sanctification, Christian Perfection and holiness doctrine is largely based on a misinterpretation of 1 John 3:9, which reads, "Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God."
Many scriptures teach that nobody is free from sin - some examples are:
"No one is holy like the LORD, For there is none besides You, Nor is there any rock like our God" (1Samuel 2:2)
"There is no one who does not sin" (1 Kings 8:46)
"There is none who does good, No, not one" (Psalms 14:3)
"For there is not a just man on earth who does good and does not sin" (Ecclesiastes 7:20)
"There is none righteous, no, not one" (Romans 3:10)
"For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23)
So it is clear that there is no such thing as sinless perfection. The Bible cannot contradict itself, so 1 John 3:6,9 cannot mean sinless perfection.
When John says that a believer "cannot sin, because he has been born of God" I believe that he is talking about "willful sin". Jesus defined "sin" as an action that hurts another person (Matthew 7:12). A true believer is not capable of willfully setting out to hurt another person.
But we all sin. As we already mentioned, John clearly points out that "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us" (1 John 1:8). So John would hardly contradict himself by later saying that sinless perfection is possible.
A believer might hurt another person in a fit of emotion or anger or by being selfish or thoughtless; but a believer will not willfully hurt another person. And if a believer does sin against another person they will eventually repent for it.
A person who sets out to willfully hurt another person must hate that person. And John goes on to explain "Whoever hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him". (1 John 3:15) and "If someone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? (1 John 4:20)
In the King James Version, 1 John 3:9 reads "Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin". And the word "commit" is a translation of the Greek word "poieo" which means "to do". So John is saying that if a person is a believer, they will not "do sin". He goes on to say that a believer "cannot sin" because he has been born of God. (1 John 3:9) Obviously he is talking about willful sin or else he is contradicting what he said in 1 John 1:8.
Keeping in mind that commit is a translation of the Greek word "poieo", which means "to do", read 1 John 3:4-6. "Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness. And you know that He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him there is no sin. Whoever abides in Him does not sin. Whoever sins has neither seen Him nor known Him."
Our sins are taken away by Jesus, not by any act of our own, certainly not by living in a "holy" or "perfect" manner. We purify ourselves, even as Jesus is pure, by believing in Jesus, who was manifested to take away our sins. That's all we can do! That enables us to abide in Him, and His lack of sin is counted by God as our lack of sin, on account of our belief in Him. John goes on to provide another explanation of this same point.
"Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous. He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil. Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God." (1 John 3:7-9)
Some people don't realize that the Bible was not originally divided into verses. Most of the books in the New Testament were letters written by inspired men to their congregations, without chapter and verse divisions. This division into chapter and verse was done by theologians to be able to quickly make reference to Biblical writings. Verses do not stand alone, they must be interpreted in the context of the entire writing, and that is why I strongly encourage people to always read Bible books from start to finish, rather than picking out verses piecemeal or according to a church appointed lesson plan. The only way you are ever guaranteed of getting the full message is to read the full message.
By believing they live sin-free after salvation, the members of these churches rob themselves of continued repentance after salvation. Paul wrote to saved Christians when he wrote, "Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance?" (Romans 2:4) If they were perfect or holy, why would the goodness of God continue to lead them to repentance after they were saved?
The truth is, repentance is required in our everyday life, on an ongoing basis, as long as we live, because we do make mistakes. None of us are error free, in particular those who might claim to be error free. How much better off we are if we admit that we do sin from time to time, and when we sin, we simply contact God in prayer, apologize, and do our best not to commit the same error again. This is repentance, and it is necessary and ongoing throughout our Christian lives.
Can We Be Free Of Sin? Copyright © 2011 by Compass Distributors.
All Scripture marked KJV taken from the King James Version of the Holy Bible.
All other Scripture quotations taken from The Holy Bible, New King James Version, (Nashville, Tennessee: Thomas Nelson, Inc.) 1982.