3 Question 4

First, it would be good to read Romans 6:1-2 – “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid. How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?”  In the true believer there should be the desire and power to no longer live habitually in sin.  In this portion, some had begun to abuse God’s grace, thinking that the more they sinned, the more the Lord could show His grace.  To this, the scripture says, “God forbid.”  This is not the proper attitude of a believer in Christ.  Our attitude should be that we will resist sin so that we might glorify our blessed savior.

However, in the believer, there may be habitual sins that we have not given over entirely to the Lord, so we find ourselves often committing the same sin over and over.  To this, we should confess our hesitancy to allow the Lord to be Lord of all our lives.  Instead of only looking at and confessing our sin, we should prayerfully look at the root cause of this sin…why do we continue to allow this sin in our lives?  1 Peter 5:7 says, “Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.”  If you are burdened with the care of struggling with ongoing sin, cast this upon the Lord, asking Him to work in you so that you might overcome this sin.  There is no need to continue to struggle to control your sinful urges, commit it to the Lord and let Him overcome this for you.

Now, let’s read 1 John 1:9 – “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”  The promise of the Lord here is that He will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  To confess our sins means to acknowledge to the Lord that we have committed sin.  I’m reminded of the words of Joseph when he was tempted by Potipher’s wife, “how then can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God?” (Genesis 39:9).  We learn from this that all sin is sin against God, and so we need to confess to the Lord All our sins.  The wording of 1 John 1:9 shows us that we actually need to tell the Lord what sin we have committed.  We need to put into words our sins.  To describe to the Lord what we have done can be embarrassing and distasteful, but this is what he tells us to do.  Sometimes, this in itself has a convicting impact on us.  Just to hear our own words, describing our sins to the Lord, has a great impact on the tender conscience of the believer.  Then, we are assured that with this confession of sin, the Lord will forgive us and cleanse us.  We are not given any limits to this promise.  Each time that we confess our sins, and to truly confess assumes a contrite and broken spirit, the Lord will forgive us.

The Word is full of examples of saints who fell into sin.  These can teach us and warn us that we can also fall into sin if we are not following the Lord closely.  However, if we confess our sins to the Lord, He is faithful and just…He will forgive and cleanse us.  (3.4)