Justin Matthew Reid

Bible Teachings - Message Board Post on SIN

Hello again saints,

God led me to post this tonight on the message board I sometimes visit. It's so sad to me to see people buying a lie straight from the devil. My heart goes out to them. Please join me in praying that their eyes will be opened to the Truth and that they'll allow it to set them free. Amen.

Praise the Lord.

Justin

"I believe we are to STRIVE for perfection, realizing that we cannot attain it here on earth, being comforted knowing that in heaven we will be without sin, but realizing that Christ commanded us to do so nonetheless."

Do you strive to cook a meal and then eat it? Do you strive to clean the living room? Do you strive to show affection towards your wife? No, you simply will to do these things. Likewise, you can will not to sin against the God who formed you and made you to serve Him for His glory.

You say that we cannot live without sin in this life. You say that we be without sin in heaven. When you make these statements, you make DEATH your saviour from sin and not Jesus Christ.

Do you believe you have eternal life? Just what is eternal life?:

John 17:3

"And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent."

Here's a direct definition of eternal life, straight from the mouth of Jesus Christ. He says that eternal life is knowing God the Father and God the Son, Jesus Christ. What is knowing? It's not an academic, head knowledge. It's not knowing simply that God exists and that Jesus Christ died for your sins. The "know" in this verse can only mean relationship. How do we have a relationship with God?:

John 14:23-24

"Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love Me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him. He that loveth Me not keepeth not my sayings: and the Word which ye hear is not mine, but the Father's which sent Me."

Complete obedience to the Word of God is how we keep a relationship (or eternal life) with God. God calls obedience love. Emotions don't factor into it. You use the mind and the will the Lord gave you to CHOOSE to obey 100% of the time, thus not sinning against Him. Jesus said IF a man love Me. If is always a verb and always a choice for us to make. Here's how God knows who loves Him and who hates Him: Those that love Him love His Word. They believe and obey it. They don't find excuses for their choice to sin, but rather believe the Word which abundantly says that we don't have to sin against God. Those that hate God use their freewill to CHOOSE to sin against God. They have no love for God's Word, thus they try to excuse their sin while still maintaining enough of a religious form to "feel saved" while sinning all the while against God.

2 Timothy 2:19

"Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are His. And, let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity."

Nobody is fooling God. He knows those who are His. His children love Him enough to stop sinning against Him. If you call yourself a Christian but don't love Christ enough to stop sinning against Him, you don't love Christ at all. In fact, you are of your father the devil. "He that commits sin is of the devil". (1 John 3:8).

You were not born a sinner. God defines sin as a moral choice. A choice requires knowledge. "Therefore to him that knows to do good and doesn't do it, to him it is sin." (James 4:17) A baby cannot be born with a choice he did not yet make. "I was born a sinner" is yet another of the long line of excuses that religious sinners make to attempt to justify their CHOICE to sin against God. You can certainly choose to sin against God so often that sin becomes a habit. A habit you chose. Do you believe God can free you from those deathly habits and help you develop Godly (sin-free) habits? Why not?

Many religious 'Christians' will openly say that their God is all powerful. He's able to do anything, they say. They gladly and selfishly say that God is able to keep them eternally saved with no strings attached. Yet, when it comes to the idea of being freed COMPLETELY from a life of sin against God, God suddenly becomes weak and ineffective. Don't you think that the God that created the universe and all things therein, who sent His Son Jesus Christ to die for your sins so that you could be made free from sin, is powerful enough to empower YOU to LIVE FREE FROM SIN? You say no. You say it's something to strive for but is not obtainable in this life. You make God out to be a liar. You make death to be your savior from sin.

Matthew 1:21

"And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call His name JESUS: for He shall save His people from their sins."

I don't say I'm saved from drowning while I'm gasping for air in the deep waters of sin. It's only after I renounce my former life of sin and ask the Lord Jesus Christ to be my Saviour am I saved. He pulls me out of the waters of sin onto dry ground. I am delivered from sin. IF I jump back into the waters of sin again, I'm certainly not saved while I'm in the water. One cannot be both saved and in sin at the same time. Jesus did not come to save us in our sins. He came to empower us to not be in bondage to the "old man" any longer. Hallelujah! He did it!

Jude 24

"Now unto Him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy,"

You say that Jesus is able to present you faultless. I agree, that's what the Word says. You say that Jesus isn't able to keep you from falling or sinning. The Word of God says otherwise. It says that Jesus is able to keep you from falling. Now, if you keep falling after being Born Again, whose fault is it? Jesus is able, this says. Either He's able but chooses not to (which would make Him guilty of sin, according to James 4:17) OR He's able to but you refuse to let Him keep you from falling because you keep CHOOSING to sin against Him.

Death won't save you from your sins against God. Whatever state you die in, that's how you will remain:

Revelation 22:11

"He that is unjust, let him be unjust still: and he which is filthy, let him be filthy still: and he that is righteous, let him be righteous still: and he that is holy, let him be holy still."

Your eternal life is conditional. You must choose to continue to keep God's Word to have relationship and eternal life with Him. IF (and it is your choice) you choose to sin against God, you break the relationship. You remove yourself from eternal life. Yes, repentance is available in 1 John 1:9. A man who asks God to forgive him while planning the next sin against God is not truly repentant. If you don't believe you can stop committing that sin, why do you ask for forgiveness? Wouldn't Almighty God "know" that it is simply impossible for you to completely stop sinning against Him? You'd be an object of pity if that were the case. God would be unjust and unfair (and a sinner, by His own definition in James 4:17) if he held you responsible for doing something that it was impossible for you to stop doing. Yet, you say that God asks us to stop sinning but yet we cannot. PLEASE. Enough slandering of the Word of God. Simply read it and obey it, if you love God.

John 8:11

"Go and SIN NO MORE."

That's a commandment from Jesus to us.

John 14:15

"If you love Me, keep my commandments."

If we love Jesus, we'll go and sin no more.

For anyone who has been deceived into believing "well, I'm once saved, always saved!". Keep in mind that Jesus has said salvation, eternal life and relationship with God are all the same thing. Keep in mind that relationship is contingent on obedience.

2 Chronicles 15:2

"...the Lord is with you, while ye be with Him; and if ye seek Him, He will be found of you; but if ye forsake Him, He will forsake you."

It's true that the Lord said He would never leave us nor forsake us. It's true that the Word says no man is able to pluck us out of the Father's hand. Implied in these statements is that WE are still able to walk away from God. God did not remove our freewill when we got saved. We are to use it to choose to serve Him from that point on. This scripture is clear: The Lord is only with us while we are with Him. If we walk away, it isn't HE who left us. It was our own selfish choice to sin against Him that caused the separation.

People, wake up to what God is trying to say to you today. Quit playing around in your sin. You are putting your souls in eternal danger, let alone grieving God by your disobedience. Anyone remember Jesus telling us to "count the cost" BEFORE getting saved? That implies that it costs something dear. One doesn't count the cost for something that's simple to do. "well, I said a prayer to Jesus when I was 12.. so I guess I'm still saved.. despite living a life of open rebellion against Him, not reading His Word, not obeying His Word and living exactly like any other sinner who has never gotten 'saved' before. Yep, I'm sure saved. After all, I pay tithes and attend a 'Christian' building on Sundays.. " Christ says to pick up your cross daily and follow Him. A cross is for dying on. When you were Born Again, you agreed (or should have) that your "old man" of sin is DEAD and your new man in Christ is alive and well. Dead men don't do anything, including sin against God. Consider yourself dead to sin and alive to Christ, it's your reasonable service to God.

-Justin

September 8th, 2006