The Christian Attitude Towards Sin

Grace Fellowship Church

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:00

This sermon is from Grace Fellowship Church in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. If you would like to learn more about us, please visit us at our website at graceedmonton .ca.

00:11

You can also find us on Instagram, Grace Church, Y -E -G, all one word, or on Facebook.

00:18

You can also find us on Spotify, YouTube, or wherever else you listen to your favorite podcasts.

00:24

Please enjoy the following sermon. As we begin our time, I want to reflect on a book.

00:32

It was in the year 1680, two years after John Bunyan wrote

00:37

The Pilgrim's Progress, that he published his famous book, or another famous book, entitled

00:43

The Life and Death of Mr. Badman. That's an interesting title, isn't it?

00:49

The Life and Death of Mr. Badman. And in this relatively short book, the copy

00:55

I have is 149 pages long, Bunyan chronicles the life of a man who, unlike Christian in The Pilgrim's Progress, makes not all the right decisions on his pilgrimage to the heavenly city, but makes all of the wrong decisions.

01:12

Unlike Pilgrim's Progress, where Christian feels the of his sin, escapes the city of destruction, and proceeds to the celestial city, here in The Life and Death of Mr.

01:24

Badman, we see the story of one individual who refuses all opportunities at repentance, who persists in his wicked ways until the very end, and then who dies in his sins.

01:41

And if I can share a personal anecdote just about this book, it is a fascinating book.

01:47

I recall one evening reading the opening pages of this book to my children as they were getting ready for bed.

01:54

Now, some of you know I don't always have the best choices of bedtime reading, maybe this is one of those,

01:59

I'm not sure. But my kids were getting ready for bed, and we read the opening chapter of The Life and Death of Mr.

02:05

Badman, and we found ourselves listening in on the conversation between two characters in the book, a man,

02:12

Mr. Wiseman, and another, Mr. Attentive. And they were reflecting together on the tragic death of Mr.

02:20

Badman. And in this conversation, there is one scene where these two characters offer a gripping contrast between Mr.

02:29

Badman and another character, Mr. Goodman. Mr. Goodman is described as an individual who brought light to the world, as they say it.

02:39

He was a man who, if he were to die, would have no reason to fear, for he was right with God.

02:47

But in contrast, the final end of Mr. Badman is described in entirely different terms.

02:54

Mr. Attentive and Mr. Wiseman reflect on this, and the wise man with tears in his eyes describes the fate of this man.

03:05

He says, he was one that never was good. Therefore, such a one is not dead only, but damned.

03:14

He died that he might die. He went from life to death, and then from death to death, and then finally from natural death to eternal death.

03:28

Much of this first chapter is devoted to a vivid portrayal of the tragedy that was the life and ultimate death of Mr.

03:37

Badman. And as I read this section of the book with my children, we all became gripped by this fearful contrast.

03:44

Like I said, it's a perfect bedtime story. There are two kinds of people that are alive today, we reflected on.

03:51

And two final destinations before each of these people. There are those who walk in the light and need not fear the day when

04:00

God calls them home. And then there are those who walk in abject darkness, who ought to fear not just every day, but every moment.

04:11

That not only death, but the second death, that death that they may die, is coming.

04:19

And with it, an eternal lake of fire. And as our family reflected on this profound contrast, the question became, naturally,

04:29

I think, how can I be sure that I am like Mr. Goodman and not like Mr.

04:37

Badman? How can I be certain that I am walking in the light and not in bleak darkness?

04:46

How can I be sure that I am a Christian, a child of God, and not a child of the devil?

04:55

At the most fundamental level, there are few questions as important as these.

05:01

And interestingly enough, in the book of 1 John, we find the apostle seeking to answer many of these questions.

05:11

Last week, our brother Sam introduced us to the book by taking us through the prologue in verses 1 through 4.

05:18

We saw the introduction to this letter. And now as we get to verse 5, and I invite you to open with or turn with me to 1

05:25

John chapter 1 and verse 5. Now that we arrive here, the apostle is transitioning to the substance of his letter.

05:37

He is writing to a church or a collection of churches that have been confronted by a series of difficulties.

05:45

For one, and our brother didn't get into too much depth in this last week, so I'll take that as permission to go a little bit further.

05:53

For one, the church was being assaulted by a new brand of heresy that was growing in its popularity, an early form of Gnosticism that pitted the spiritual against the physical, that saw that the spiritual is all good and the physical as being all bad.

06:13

And as a result of this heresy, this led many to deny the incarnation of Christ.

06:18

That is the bodily appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then the bodily death and resurrection of Christ.

06:28

Others denied not just the bodily death and resurrection of Christ, but to the physical existence of sin.

06:38

And so we see, as our brother pointed out last week in the first three verses of John chapter 1, that John is saying to him, we have heard this

06:48

Christ with our own ears. We have seen him with our eyes. We have touched him with our hands.

06:56

Nevertheless, here's this group denying this Christ in bodily form and even denying sin and its consequences, saying that it is of no consequence ultimately because sin is physical and we are spiritual.

07:12

And so as a result of this, there were many who left the church. In the modern parlance, we could say there was a church split or there was a great departure amongst many of the members of the church.

07:26

We see John make reference to this in 1 John chapter 2 and verse 19, where he says, they went out from us, but they were not of us.

07:36

For if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out that it might become plain that they all are not of us.

07:45

Now it's an interesting little tidbit, but if you are to read a commentary on 1

07:51

John, what you'll find is that many commentators will often refer to these people as the secessionists, as they are called.

08:00

You'll see this movement described in many places, this secession movement where saints or supposed saints were leaving the church.

08:12

And so as John addresses this church, one of his aims is to comfort them in the truth.

08:19

Many had been shaken up by this heresy and division. Maybe even for some of us, we know by experience that when people leave the church, it destabilizes things.

08:33

It makes some ask the question, am I wrong on this? Do I have the right perspective?

08:41

Or even to go further, am I saved? If they're right and I'm wrong, are they safe and am

08:51

I in danger? Do I have eternal life? And John's aim as he goes through this book, dealing with this church and in the midst of at least some measure of crisis, he says in 1

09:05

John 5 .13, I write these things to you who believe in the name of the

09:11

Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.

09:18

John wants the church, he wants you saints, the recipients of this letter, by extension, to know that you are right with God.

09:29

To have assurance that you have eternal life. To the end, as Sam pointed out last week, chapter 1 verse 4, that our joy may be complete.

09:44

But as John comes now in his substance, the substance of his letter, he's going to offer more than shallow verbal affirmation.

09:53

Oh, you're saved. Don't worry about it. But instead he provides them with what

09:59

I'm going to call an inspired test case. In fact, several inspired test cases to help them discern if they are truly saved.

10:10

If they are truly right with God. And this week, as we look at verses 5 through chapter 2 and verse 2, we find one of these test cases dealing with the

10:21

Christian attitude towards sin. Dear friend, what

10:28

John is saying here is this. How you treat sin tells us a great deal about you.

10:38

How your attitude addresses, reflects sin in your life.

10:44

It explains a whole lot. It can reflect a regenerate heart that loves

10:50

God and desires righteousness. Or it can reveal the heart of a lost person who knows nothing of God or the transformation that comes with salvation.

11:03

And today, as we look at this text, I want to ask you this question. What does your attitude concerning sin say about you?

11:14

My aim is that if you are right with God, your joy by the end of today would be complete.

11:22

Or that if you are not right with God, if you do not know these things experientially, that you would be made right with Him and that your joy would be made complete.

11:36

Now our text can be divided several ways. Brother Sam and I were speaking about this yesterday. I said,

11:42

I think it can be divided in three ways. He said, of course it can. It's always a three -point sermon.

11:47

But he'll be happy to know it. In fact, it can be divided up into four parts. And we're going to look at it in four parts.

11:53

And we're first going to consider this. The Christian's walk. In verses 5 through 7, this is what we read.

12:02

John writes, 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.

12:13

If we say we have fellowship with Him, while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.

12:19

But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another.

12:26

And the blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanses us from all sin.

12:33

The Christian's walk. Now as John opens this letter, he builds upon what he has just said in verses 1 through 4.

12:41

You'll remember in verses 1 through 4, he speaks about we have this experiential relationship with Christ.

12:47

We have seen Him. We have heard Him. We have touched Him. We know that He is. We know that He was bodily.

12:54

And as he continues on, he builds on this, not only by saying that we saw this

12:59

Christ, but that we heard this very message from Him. It comes with divine authority.

13:07

It is the inspired letter of John, transmitting the inspired words of Christ.

13:14

And this is the message, John says. God is light.

13:20

And His true people are not those who walk in darkness, but those who walk in a manner consistent with the very nature of God.

13:31

Those who walk in light also. Now there is a lot going on here.

13:37

We're going to look at a little bit of it, bit by bit, through each of the verses, starting with verse 5.

13:45

Now in verse 5, John echoes Christ. He points out that God is light, and in Him, there is no darkness at all.

13:54

Now no doubt, this is familiar language, right? That God is light. But what does it mean?

14:00

This frequent metaphor, when we start to look at it in Scripture, that equates God with light and the absence of God with darkness, is used in aspects of the nature of God and of the world in which we live.

14:15

It's been pointed out. I won't point out all of the references, but this reference to light and darkness, contrastly, can refer to openness and secrecy.

14:26

That is, things that are done in the light, as opposed to those things that are carried out in darkness.

14:33

It can refer to the kingdom of God, or the kingdom of light, and the kingdom of the devil, that is, the kingdom of darkness.

14:41

It can refer to life and to death, the light of the glory of God versus the darkness of eternal punishment.

14:50

And the ones that I really want us to hone in on are these, that it speaks still more to the light of truth and the darkness of falsehood, or the light of righteousness and the darkness of wickedness.

15:07

If we were to summarize just very quickly in verse 5, what it says here, the light of God is reflected in everything that is morally good, pure, righteous, that which accords with life, and is consistent with the knowledge of the truth.

15:26

This is a marvelous statement about the character of God. We should see these little gems in Scripture and rejoice at what it is telling us about the

15:37

God that we worship. Everything that is good and true radiates from God.

15:44

He is truly light of lights, the standard of true perfection, the benchmark for all that is virtuous and pure.

15:53

What a praiseworthy God we serve. And we should note something else, that at the end of verse 5, we can't quite see it in English, but it is there in the

16:06

Greek. John uses a double negation, which is also significant. If you were to translate the end of verse 5 in the most literal possible way, and this is one of the advantages of Greek, for those who wonder, you know, what benefit is there understanding some of the original language.

16:24

If we were to translate it just woodenly, it reads like this, and in him there is no darkness, not one, not at all, nothing, that he is all light, that he is all good, that he is all perfect.

16:40

Oh, that when you come on the Lord's day to worship him, you rightly worship the

16:46

Lord your God, and in him there is no darkness, not a thing.

16:54

So then it only makes sense when we look at verses 6 and 7, that it tells us that those who make the claim to have fellowship with God while walking in darkness, these are liars and do not practice the truth.

17:11

Such a scenario for a God who has no darkness in him, no, not one, such a scenario would require

17:19

God to violate his own perfect character. So then the question becomes, how can one know that he or she has fellowship with God?

17:31

Within this test case, and if you look at these verses together, we see again, if we say we have fellowship, if we walk, if we say, if we confess, if we say, see the test case here with me, how can we know?

17:47

Well, in verse 7, John makes it clear. We can know that we have fellowship with God if we walk in the light as he is in the light.

17:59

And the question that I could ask to you is this, do you walk in the light or do you walk in darkness?

18:11

Now, as we even dig into this, you have to forgive me. I'm just going to keep stirring this up with more questions.

18:18

The next question becomes this, how do I know if I walk in light or how do

18:24

I know if I walk in darkness? What metric does one use? Well, for many, the metric that people use today is entirely subjective.

18:35

One might say, well, I'm a good person, I think. Many of us,

18:41

I think, know that's not true. But for a Christian, you might say, well, I walk in the light because I don't swear like my coworkers.

18:49

I fit in, but I don't fully fit in. Is that what it means to walk in the light?

18:59

Now, numerous scholars have looked at this, and I appreciate where they've gone with it.

19:05

They've seen this as being at least twofold in its application, what it means to walk in the light.

19:13

And the first is this. I pointed out earlier that the difference between light and darkness is sometimes the difference between truth and falsehood, of the knowledge of truth and the ignorance of that truth.

19:27

And the first thing to walk in light then is to possess a knowledge of the truth.

19:35

Colin Cruz, who has written a fantastic commentary on 1 John, he says, walking in the light involves, hear me, a willingness to be open toward God and His revelation in Christ.

19:51

It is a reception of the truths concerning God and concerning Christ.

19:58

R .C. Sproul goes further. He adds, believers face a choice either to walk in the light, that is, coming to Christ in faith alone and opening their hearts to Him in confession of sin, or to walk in darkness, to deny that they are sinners, and I would add, and therefore deny the need for a

20:20

Savior. And we see this when we look at passages like John chapter 3 and verse 19, a famous passage dealing with those who did not, would not receive

20:31

Christ. Our Lord says, and this is the judgment, the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.

20:45

For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not, hear this, and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed.

20:56

But whoever does what is true, hear it again, comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God.

21:07

The principal characteristic, you want to know if you are walking in light or darkness, the principal characteristic of one who is walking in light is that they have seen

21:18

Jesus Christ, the light of the world, and they have, to use the language of John chapter 3, they have come to the light.

21:27

They have exchanged their ignorance and their godlessness that the darkness that they innately possess for the salvation that is found in Jesus Christ alone.

21:40

They no longer grasp around in the darkness, looking for something, for anything, but they have found the light of Christ and they have trusted in him.

21:53

Now let me give you a negative example for a moment. I often give positive examples.

21:58

Let me give you a negative example of what this trusting, this knowledge of the truth does not look like.

22:07

It contrasts for the sake of clarity. When I was a new

22:12

Christian, I was, it would be interesting for modern day me, and this is only by the grace of God, for modern day me to meet year one

22:24

Shane in the Christian faith. I was oblivious, absolutely oblivious to pretty much everything, as new

22:33

Christians often are, but to the distinction between Roman Catholicism and, let's call it,

22:40

Reformed Biblical Christianity, a Reformation theology, a renewed understanding of the

22:48

Bible. And as a result, one day, can you imagine me doing this? I was in a bookstore and I was in chapters, you know, in chapters,

22:57

T .D. Jakes and Joel Osteen and every other bad book that, please do not buy, and there on the shelf was a book on Mother Teresa.

23:06

And I thought, Mother Teresa, she has a good reputation. I'll read a book about her. And so I purchased the book and brought it home.

23:14

And as I began to read the book, I was shocked by the theme that predominated that book.

23:23

What was that theme? Darkness. In fact, the book was so heavy on this theme that I set it down,

23:33

I confess, I set it on the coffee table. It stayed there for months. I never read it again.

23:39

Eventually, we either threw it out or donated it. I can't remember what we did. But as I began to read this book, what

23:46

I found was this, that Mother Teresa, or Teresa of Calcutta, I'll call her, lived in a perpetual state of spiritual darkness for the better part of her life.

23:59

She had the light of the gospel right there in her Bible that she would read and carry around.

24:06

But she found herself completely unable to take hold of this truth.

24:12

And as a result, she lived in darkness, in total ignorance.

24:17

On one occasion, she wrote, and these things are sad. She said, there is so much deep contradiction in my soul.

24:26

Such a deep longing for God, yet not being wanted by God. Repulsed, empty, no faith, no love, no zeal.

24:37

Souls hold no attraction. Heaven means nothing to me. It looks like an empty place.

24:44

The thought of it means nothing. She described her condition, and this is a direct quotation, as untold darkness.

24:54

She told a Catholic priest who was her spiritual director, I'm not sure what exactly what a spiritual director is, but she said, the place of God in my soul is blank.

25:05

There is no God in me. Perhaps her most famous quote was one where she was speaking about the possibility of being canonized as a saint in the

25:17

Roman Catholic Church. And she said, if I ever become a saint, I will surely be one of darkness.

25:23

I will continually be absent from heaven to light the light of those in darkness on earth.

25:31

Teresa would sometimes ask people to pray for her, that God would enable her to smile upon the

25:37

God that she felt abandoned by. Let me just say it.

25:45

If such darkness describes your experience, do not concern yourself with praying that God might enable you to smile at him, though he feels altogether absent from you.

26:03

Concern yourself with crying out to him that he might save you from such wretched darkness.

26:11

And the solution to finding light, to escaping this darkness, is not to look inward.

26:19

It is not to look for some kind of mystical experience in and of yourself.

26:24

It is not looking to your works like Teresa of Kolkata for 45 years in India.

26:30

It is by looking Christward to the light of the world who takes away the sins of the world.

26:39

To walk in the light of Christ is, make no mistake about it, to walk in Jesus Christ.

26:48

To believe that he is not only able to save you, but as it says at the end of verse 7, that he will save you.

26:59

That the blood of Jesus his son cleanses you from all sin.

27:06

And then, you have to forgive me, my first point is a long one. It's like I'm pulling back an elastic band, and then when

27:12

I let it go, the other points will rip in a lot faster. And secondly, to walk in the light is to cast off the works of darkness.

27:26

It is to be free from ignorance, and if I could say it this way, free from dark living.

27:33

It is to increasingly live a life that is reflective of the character of God in his goodness and his holiness.

27:42

And this is not, this is not to say that we earn, as he says at the end of verse 7, we earn the cleansing of our sin by ridding ourselves of sin.

27:53

But this is a consequence of that cleansing from sin. It is to walk.

28:01

That Greek verb is in the present tense, meaning it is ongoing. To live, it is to walk in light of that truth, one commentator says, putting it into practice and avoiding sin.

28:17

In John 8 12, our Lord teaches as much. He says, I am the light of the world.

28:22

Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.

28:30

There's a fascinating little tract, we used to have it on our website, maybe we should put it back up, written by J .C.

28:37

Ryle. And he expounds 1 John in its entirety and separates it into six different tests that he offers the

28:47

Christian, that they might know that they have eternal life. And in one of them, he speaks to this truth exactly.

28:55

And he says this, a person who has been born again or regenerated does not habitually commit sin.

29:06

He no longer sins with his heart and will and whole inclination. There was probably a time, and we can think back to this, can't we?

29:17

When he did not think about whether his actions were sinful or not. And he did not always feel grieved after doing evil.

29:25

There was no quarrel between him and sin, they were friends. But the

29:30

Christian, but the Christian flees from it.

29:35

He hates sin, he fights against it, he considers it his greatest plague, resents the burden of its presence, mourns when he falls under its influence, and longs to be completely delivered from it.

29:52

Sin no longer pleases him, nor is it even a matter of indifference to him.

29:58

It has become a horrible thing in which he hates. However, he cannot eliminate its presence within him.

30:11

Let me ask you, does that describe your experience?

30:17

Not that you are free from sin, we will see that in just a moment's time, but that you can say in your heart of hearts,

30:24

I hate sin. Not just its consequences, not just its ruinous effects on my life, but the act itself of rebellion, of treason, of transgression against God, I hate it.

30:47

Dear saints, that is what it means to walk in the light.

30:56

But John goes on. Number two, the second truth that he shows us is this, not just the

31:05

Christian's walk, but the Christian's acknowledgement. And we see this in verses eight and then verse ten.

31:13

If you allow me, I'm going to skip over verse nine, we will come back to it. In verse eight, if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.

31:26

If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us.

31:35

It's interesting here that in verse eight, he says, if we have no sin presently, we possess no sin that we are deceiving ourselves.

31:44

And then in verse ten, it looks backward. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us.

31:55

Not only does a Christian hate sin, not only does a Christian have a renewed or new relationship with God and a knowledge of the truth, but a true

32:09

Christian is prepared to acknowledge his tremendous need before man and before God that we have sinned.

32:19

Now, as I mentioned, John's audience, amongst some in John's audience, at least there were those who denied sin.

32:26

They said, the spiritual part of us is not touched by that sin.

32:32

And so we need not concern ourselves with it. It is so distant from us, it is as if it does not exist.

32:40

Now, the question might be, who today would be inclined to say that? I think most people, at least in maybe our realm of the

32:50

Christian world, would say, of course we are sinners. But not everyone thinks this way.

32:56

There are, for instance, groups today that deny the doctrine of original sin, that say, no, we are not corrupted by indwelling sin.

33:06

You might think that I'm taking shots at this group. I am not. But Eastern Orthodoxy falls into that category, denying original sin and specifically original guilt.

33:18

Moreover, if you were to go, I recall we lived near one, not too far from our previous home.

33:23

We could walk a couple minutes north of the stadium area downtown and find a

33:29

Wesleyan church where there they would believe in sinless perfectionism, that one can, through a process of sanctification and then an eventual second blessing, come to a place where they can say,

33:42

I do not sin any longer. I recall a brother telling a story about a man who said, it has been nine years since I last sinned.

33:54

And he said, really? So you're telling me, and he put the question to him, that you have loved the

34:01

Lord your God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all of your mind, for the last

34:07

X number of years, that even when you drink a glass of water, you have done even that to the glory of God.

34:15

There's a humorous story about one man who said very similar, something to the same effect. And the person that he was communicating with said, and you must be very, very proud of that fact, aren't you?

34:26

And he said, in fact, I am. At which we would say that the run was over.

34:35

Brethren, when we come together, when we confess our sin together, in our time of corporate prayer, some of you might think, this is, boy, we do this every single week.

34:47

Why is it that we do this? Well, one of the reasons is that us before God, us before man, we can have a visitor come into this room at any moment, and we can say to anyone in the world, without fear, without shame even, that I am a sinner.

35:10

It is my greatest problem, as you heard me say a few weeks ago, and Christ has fulfilled my greatest need in that.

35:20

So dear saints, we must own this. I don't think I have to convince you too much of this, but I'm mindful, for instance, of one story where we see this attitude in Matthew chapter 19, in verse 16, where the rich man, a rich young ruler, came to our

35:41

Lord and said, Lord, teacher, what must I do to have eternal life?

35:49

And he said, why do you ask me what is good? There's only one who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments.

35:56

He said to him, which ones? And Jesus said, you shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, honor your father and mother.

36:05

You see, he's taking him through many of the 10 commandments. You shall not bear false witness, honor your father and mother, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

36:14

The young man said, all these I have kept, what do I lack still? Jesus said to him, if you would be perfect, go sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven, and come follow me.

36:28

When the young man heard this, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

36:34

Now, some have looked at this. Our friend John MacArthur has looked at this and said, this is simply

36:40

Christ laying out the cost of following him. That might be true. I'm more inclined to another view where what our

36:48

Lord is doing is he is saying, you say you're righteous, let me give you the law. And when he says, oh,

36:53

I have kept the law, he goes, well, let me apply it then. Let's see your love for neighbor in this.

37:00

And at which point the man fails. We are, every single one of us, inclined to minimizing our own sin.

37:10

For us, the greatest danger is not saying that we have no sin, but in fact maybe taking a little bit of this gnostic view of sin.

37:21

That I am saved, that the Lord has dealt with my soul, and therefore sin is not a problem.

37:29

That it is perhaps a small thing. And brethren, I have to say to you that such an attitude betrays what

37:39

I'm going to call a sin drunkenness. In the life and death of Mr.

37:46

Badman, John Bunyan describes it this way. He tells me what I should be doing before you.

37:52

He said, it is the duty of those who can to cry out against the deadly plague, yea, to lift up their voice as with a trumpet against it, that men may be awakened about it, to fly from it, this is sin, as from that which is the greatest of evils.

38:13

He says, sin pulled angels out of heaven. Sin pulls men down to hell.

38:20

Sin overthrows kingdoms. Who sees a house on fire and will not give the alarm to them that dwell therein?

38:29

Who sees the land invaded who will not set the beacons on a fame?

38:35

Who that sees the devils as roaring lions continually devouring souls will not make an outcry?

38:43

He says, but above all, when we see sin, sinful sin, the swallowing up of a nation, the sinking of a nation, the bringing its inhabitants to temporal spiritual and eternal ruin, shall we not cry out and cry out, they are drunk, but not with wine.

39:05

They stagger, but not with strong drink. They are intoxicated with the deadly poison of sin, which will, if its malignity be not by wholesome means allayed, bring soul, body, and state, even country and all to ruin and destruction.

39:30

We must be prepared, brethren, to see the sinfulness of our sin, to acknowledge it.

39:38

But John goes further. We see the Christians' acknowledgment.

39:45

We see the Christians. I always try to do these surveys and I never write them down and I lose my place.

39:51

The Christians walk. There it is, the Christians' acknowledgement. And then point number three, I want to show you this, the

39:58

Christians' confession. In verse nine, we read, if we confess our sin,

40:07

He is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

40:17

It is a marvelous thing that this verse could read, if we confess our sin,

40:24

He will likely forgive our sin. Or even if it were to read, if we confess our sin,

40:31

He will forgive our sin. But that's not how it reads. In verse nine, it reads, if we confess our sin,

40:39

He is faithful and just to forgive our sin. Now, we will see why that is in a moment, but I will just give you a brief peek behind the curtain that God, when

40:53

He sent His Son to be the propitiation for sins, He did in fact deal with the sins of His people who believe.

41:02

And He is, because He is faithful and just even to His own works, to His covenant,

41:09

He will, when we bring our sins to Him, He binds Himself by Himself that He must,

41:17

He will forgive our sins. This ought to bring about a renaissance of confession for those who understand.

41:29

Brethren, that we are to walk in the light, we are to acknowledge our sin, but more than that, we are to confess it.

41:40

And that is the line between acknowledgement and confession, that is truly the line between an unbeliever and a believer.

41:51

There are many people in the world today, there are some in this room, I expect, who would say wholeheartedly, yes,

42:02

I am a sinner. But if you were to ask them, have you taken that sin and have you brought it to God?

42:11

They would say, well, I haven't done that. Why would I need to do that? I know

42:17

I'm a sinner. Yes, but what does the word say? But you must confess that sin.

42:24

You must bring that sin to Him. And I ask you, all of you, when was the last time you confessed your sins to God?

42:38

Not just in a general way either, but with specificity, listing as best you can every known sin by name and by detail to God.

42:52

Outside of our confession time here, when we confess our sins generally as a church, when was the last time you went to God and said,

43:02

Lord, I have sinned, and these are the sins, and I know that you are faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us, cleanse me of all unrighteousness.

43:17

Matthew Henry says on this verse, he says, let us plead guilty before God. Oh, there are some of you here that is your need at this hour is to plead guilty, not simply to acknowledge inside that you have sinned, but to plead guilty before God.

43:35

He says, be humble and willing to know the worst of our case. Let us honestly confess all our sins in their full extent, relying wholly on His mercy and truth through the righteousness of Christ for a free and full forgiveness and our deliverance from the power and practice of sin.

43:59

What a marvel that He is not only faithful and just to forgive us our sins, but to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

44:09

Perhaps it is that you are not experiencing the cleansing of that unrighteousness because you are not engaged in the confessing of that unrighteousness.

44:21

There's so many vivid portrayals of this. I think of the publican in the temple.

44:29

When he comes, he and the Pharisee come before God. The Pharisee stands before God.

44:35

He stands by himself in Luke 18 and prayed, God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust adulterers, or even like this tax collector.

44:46

I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get. But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast saying,

45:00

God, be merciful to me, a sinner. If we stop there just for a second, this is a verse

45:10

I love to use in evangelism, because so often people come and they say, you just think yourself righteous.

45:20

You think this, you think that. You look down on me. You think you're better than me. And I can come to them in truth from Luke 18 and say, no.

45:29

In fact, if what you are preaching is that we should acknowledge our sin, I'm going to, I'll back you up on that.

45:36

This is what God wants for us, not to come before him saying, I thank you that I am this good, but to come before him and to say, oh

45:44

God, have mercy on me, a sinner. And Jesus, our

45:49

Lord says, I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other.

45:56

For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.

46:06

Some of you, moreover, have been made weak, have been made ineffective, have been made unfruitful in your labors before the

46:18

Lord because of a lack of confession of your sin. Now, how can

46:25

I say this? In Psalm 32, Psalm 32 is a fantastic chapter on confession, but in Psalm 32, we see the account of one who withheld his sin.

46:41

In 32 and verse three, he said, for when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.

46:51

For day and night, your hand was heavy upon me. My strength was dried up as by the heat of the summer.

46:58

Selah. How many of you sometimes feel that way? I feel like I am going about my day groaning all the day long.

47:08

Oh Lord, it feels as if your hand is heavy upon me. Could it be that you are walking around with a conscience weighed down by sin?

47:22

The psalmist says, I acknowledged my sin to you. I did not cover my iniquity.

47:29

I said, I will confess my transgression to the Lord and you forgave the iniquity of my sin.

47:40

Just examine for a moment your own conscience now and think, are there things, are there actions, omissions, sins, even now that are weighed down, weighing down your conscience?

47:55

That only you in this world, apart from the Holy Spirit, no.

48:00

Only you apart from our triune God. What does the

48:06

Lord say? That in this very moment, you can be sure that the

48:11

God who is faithful and just, that he will forgive even that sin. That in fact, that the price has been paid already.

48:20

You need only, to use the words of the psalmist, not cover that iniquity, but can confess that transgression to the

48:28

Lord. A woman once came to D .L. Moody and said,

48:33

Mr. Moody, I would like to be a Christian, but I am hard hearted. He replied, my good woman, did the master say you soft hearted people come to me?

48:46

Nothing of the kind. He said, come unto me, all black hearts, vile hearts, corrupt hearts, deceitful hearts, all.

48:55

If your heart is hard, who will soften it? You cannot. The harder the heart, the more need there is for the

49:02

Savior. So come along and get rest. If you can't come as a saint, come as a sinner.

49:10

If you can't run, walk. If you can't walk, creep, but come.

49:17

And some of you will say, but I have tried. I have tried and it has changed nothing.

49:27

There's the danger of meeting a violent man in the streets. And then there is a whole other danger of meeting a drowning man in the water.

49:39

The drowning people are, I think of our sister as a lifeguard. I'm not even sure the things you need to learn to deal with the franticness of drowning people, to bring them, to save them, sometimes from themselves.

49:51

And they will take you down and drown you with them. Come with the urgency of a drowning sinner to Christ and to his cross.

50:05

When I grew up, some of you had swimming lessons. You went to the pool, you changed into your bathing suit, you did various activities, you did lanes, you did all of those things.

50:18

When I was growing up, I didn't have swimming lessons. I had a swimming lesson. And what it looked like was this.

50:24

We had a 20 -foot dugout in our yard that my brother and I would, it was stocked with fish.

50:29

We would go there and fish. And from time to time, we'd put our life jackets on, jump off the dock and swim in the water.

50:35

And one day during dinner time, my father decided, you're going to learn to swim tonight.

50:41

I remember the terror that I felt in that moment. I finished my supper as fast as I could.

50:48

We grew up on an acreage. I hid in the trees and waited for his interest in my learning to swim to die.

50:56

But he came out into the yard. He found me. He grabbed me by an arm and a leg.

51:02

He walked me to the end of the dock and he threw me in. And as I came into that water,

51:10

I knew only one skill. It was the doggie paddle. And I doggie paddled with all of my life.

51:17

For my life, in fact. And making my way to the little dock that we had, a homemade dock with these big oil tank pontoons,

51:27

I grabbed a hold of one of those pontoons and I held on for dear life. And there was not anyone in the world that was going to get me off of that pontoon.

51:38

Now, I'm not saying that your salvation depends upon you hanging onto Christ like I was hanging to that pontoon.

51:48

But instead, let me say this. If you do not have that assurance of salvation, if you do not have the certainty that you have confessed your sins and they have, in fact, been forgiven, then with the urgency of a shame, learning to swim, grab hold of Christ and like Jacob say,

52:06

I will not let you go until you bless me, until you give me this assurance, until I have this certainty that I am, that I have been forgiven to look to, to hold on to, to say,

52:23

Christ, it must be you. It must be you or nothing else. And then the last point

52:35

I want to make, not just the Christian's confession, but lastly, the number four, the

52:43

Christian's confidence. In chapter two and verses one and two, my little children,

52:51

I'm writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the

52:59

Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins and not for our sins only, but also for the sins of the whole world.

53:14

I'm reminded of a scene that Paul Washer shares where he went into a school and he frames it this way.

53:24

He says that in most churches that he visits, probably that has changed. I think the churches he visit maybe look a little bit different than they did when he told the story.

53:35

But he would say that the churches that he visited most frequently, he could go up to any adult in the room and ask them, what does propitiation mean?

53:45

And in almost in every situation, he would come across a blank stare. What if we were to, if I were to have you line up like we do at the

53:54

Lord's Supper, but line up behind the pulpit and just provide a quick definition of propitiation?

54:01

What answer would you provide? I can see some of your eyes. What would

54:06

I describe as propitiation? Let me suggest to you that if you don't have just a laser focused, airtight, well -defined or sound definition of propitiation, you are missing so much from 1

54:25

John 2, in verse 2, where it says that he is the propitiation for our sins.

54:34

But Paul Washer, as he tells the story, went into a variety of churches, asked this question, found blank stares, and then he went into a,

54:43

I believe it was a classical Christian school. One of those really robust private Christian schools and asked a group of children, boys and girls, what does propitiation mean?

54:54

And a little girl in the early years of elementary raised her hand. When she was called upon, she stood up and she said, when

55:04

Christ was our propitiation, it means that he was our atoning sacrifice.

55:12

To which Paul Washer rejoiced that this little girl had the correct answer.

55:19

Dear brothers and sisters, our confidence is not in our walk in light.

55:27

Our confidence is not, we don't place our faith in our knowledge of the truth.

55:33

We don't place our faith in our acknowledgement of sin. We do not place our faith in our confession of sin.

55:40

We place our faith in this, that Jesus Christ the righteous is the advocate of sinners and he is the propitiation of our sins or for our sins.

55:58

He is the one who paid, who made that atoning sacrifice on our behalf.

56:04

That he propitiated us means that he has appeased the wrath of God. That he has satisfied divine justice.

56:13

That he has made expiation for our sins. One commentator writes the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross satisfied the demands of God's holiness for the punishment of sin.

56:28

So Jesus propitiated or satisfied God. He atoned for our sins.

56:34

Hebrews 10 .10, and by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of Jesus Christ once for all.

56:45

Our confidence, dear saints, the reason that we can have joy, that our joy can be complete, that we can know that we have eternal life is because our attitude with sin is one of hatred, one of acknowledgement, one of confession, and one of abandonment.

57:02

Abandoning all self -righteousness and looking to Christ and his atonement alone. I could bring,

57:12

I want to bring, oh I want to bring so many verses to demonstrate this.

57:20

It is that same thing kind of message that we want to preach every week. That our confidence must be in Christ.

57:27

That it meant something. That Jesus went to that cross as it goes in the song that we were singing today.

57:37

Behold him there. He says, I'll find the right verse.

57:46

Verse two, before the throne of God above, when Satan tempts me to despair and tells me of the guilt within.

57:55

Upward I look him there, or I see him there, who made an end to all my sin.

58:02

Oh how did he do this? Because the sinless Savior died, my sinful soul is counted free.

58:11

For God the just, oh that God who is light, and in him there is no darkness, no not one.

58:18

For God the just is satisfied. He is propitiated to look on him and to pardon me.

58:28

To look on him and to pardon me. And John expands it.

58:35

And I think I need to clarify this point. He says not only for us, not only for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.

58:49

Now does this just explode, nullify the doctrine of particular redemption?

58:56

Not at all. What Paul is doing here is he's writing likely to the seven churches that we read about in Revelation two and three.

59:03

That's I think a sound guess by many. And what he is saying is that he has not just died for you churches in Laodicea and in Asia, but he has died as it says in Revelation 5 -9.

59:23

That he has been slain and that by his blood he has ransomed a people for God from every tribe, tongue, people, and nation.

59:34

And you have made them, he says, a kingdom and priest to our God and they shall reign on the earth.

59:43

That we can live here in 2025 in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada and we can say that Christ not didn't just die for the

59:53

Jews. He didn't just die for the first century believers in that geographical area, but he died even for me.

01:00:11

So then I put the question to you that I asked at the beginning. What is your attitude concerning sin?

01:00:21

What does your relationship with sin tell us about you?

01:00:29

If you are, I want to speak so directly to you.

01:00:40

If you would say today that you are not a Christian or you're not sure if you're a Christian, you're not sure if you're a believer, this is exactly for you.

01:00:50

If you are walking in darkness, if either you refuse to acknowledge your sin or not that you would refuse to confess your sin, but you are delaying every opportunity to confess that sin.

01:01:08

If you are walking in darkness in the daily decisions of your life, not walking at all in a manner that accords with the very character of our holy and good

01:01:19

God, if that describes you, unless you come to Christ and believe on him, you will, if I can lean on that early illustration in our introduction, like Mr.

01:01:35

Badman, you will die in your sins. And the wise and the attentive, they will say of you as they said to that man, you will die that you may die.

01:01:48

You will know not only natural death, but you will know eternal death.

01:01:55

I don't want that for a single person in this room. And the way to escape that is to come to this

01:02:07

God that we have just been reading about and expounding upon. And two, as we have just seen to acknowledge your sin, to confess it, to say,

01:02:18

Lord, I not only want to be freed from its consequences, but freed from its power.

01:02:23

And I look to Jesus Christ as the propitiation, even for my sin to believe on him, to trust on him.

01:02:31

If that is you in this room, if you are outside of the kingdom of heaven,

01:02:37

I do not want you to leave until you and I have had a sound conversation, until we have prayed together, until we have cried out together that you may know this joy that John speaks of.

01:02:54

If you are a man or woman who has come out of darkness and into the light of Christ, friend,

01:03:02

Christian, if you are trusting him, even as you seek to follow him, walking in the light, if you have acknowledged your many, many sins and you confess them to him as often as they come to mind or having forgotten until now, you confess them now.

01:03:25

You can be confident before God on the authority of his word.

01:03:32

You can be sure today that if you were to die even now, you have nothing left to fear, that this letter was written for you, that you may know that you have eternal life and knowing that you have eternal life, your joy may be complete.

01:03:52

Let's pray. Thank you for listening to another sermon from Grace Fellowship Church.

01:03:59

If you would like to keep up with us, you can find us at Facebook at Grace Fellowship Church or our

01:04:06

Instagram at Grace Church, Y -E -G, all one word. Finally, you can visit us at our website, graceedmonton .ca.