I JOHN perfection. This is impiety against Cod. It is so blasphemous that the person who declares it makes God Himself a sinner! We can rejoice daily in our altered and unaltered position in Christ. Yet, we are to remember that we were sinners and that we can stumble again very easily. Our dependence must be on the Lord. We should always ex ercise a spirit of repentance and faith, cultivating holiness. God does not want His children to sin (I John 2:1). The principle and possibility of sin is present, but the practice of sin is prohibi tive. This may seem like a strange paradox to some. If you are obey ing the Lord then you are abiding in His Word. This is a continuous, habitual action which precludes our practice in the past of sinning. You see, the Bible does not deny that a Christian can commit acts of sin. It does deny the fact that a Christian needs to sin habitually. This is when he is abiding in fel lowship with Christ. To continue to abide in Christ and to continue to practice sin are incongruous. We find an interesting thing in I John 3:9 where we read, "Who soever is born of Cod doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him, and he cannot sin, because he is born of Cod." There are two positive things stated here, "doth not commit sin" and "cannot sin." That which is born of God is of the Spirit. When we receive Christ as Saviour we have Cod's nature in us. Christ escaped the sin principle through His supernatural concep tion, apart from a human father. Christ neither did sin, nor could He sin. The nature of Cod so ab horred sin that it is utterly impos sible for Cod to have any partici
pation with sin. You could no more get Christ to sin than you could contaminate the sun by the stag nate water on which it shines. The difference between Christ and the Christian is that our Saviour had only one nature while we have two. When we become partakers of God's nature, then the old man is not eradicated but is unalterable. At the same time the divine nature, God's seed, remains unchanged and cannot sin. Whenever I as a Christian commit an act of sin, it is the prompting of the old nature. This is true of every believer. It is the new nature that does not sin because it cannot. If the believer in Christ had Christ's nature only, then the believer would never sin. I John 3:9 holds no warrant for the erroneous teaching of sinless per fection. We see this, too, in 5:18. A truly begotten one will not pur sue the habit of sinning. There may be an occasional act, but it will not be the course of life for him. Our Lord told us to watch and pray so that we would not enter into temp tation. This enables us, through the power of the indwelling Holy Spir it, to keep ourselves from sinning. While the principle of sin in the believer is admitted, he is prohib ited from sinning. To not sin is the Christian's ideal. It denies the lie which says that sinning is a neces sity to the life of a child of God. We do not have to sin. The question between Cod and the believer about sin has been settled judicially, legally and right eously (I John 2:1-2). Any trans gression which breaks the fellow ship between the Christian and Cod can be ajudicated. We have an immediate Advocate with the Father. He is our Comforter, called
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