Well, my dear friend, the sad truth of the matter is that we sin because we are sinners by nature and by choice, carrying forth our fleshly nature from birth. This old nature, sometimes called simply the flesh, was inherited by all mankind from our father Adam who is the head of our human family according to the flesh. We cannot rid ourselves of our fleshly nature while upon this earth, and the flesh cannot be improved even through teaching and our best efforts. The flesh can only be condemned, and what is needed is new birth, a spiritual rebirth of the Holy Spirit. The good news for true Christians is that the moment we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, we are not only saved from the punishment we have coming due to our sins (see John 5:24; Romans 8:1; 1 John 4:10), but we also are born again, which means that we receive, via the Holy Spirit working in us by a spiritual washing of the Word of God, a new birth…a new nature (see John 3:3 and 5; 1 peter 1:23; and Titus 3:5).

Being born again of the Spirit means that Christians are now made fit for heaven, and there can be no doubt that Christ Jesus will someday come to the clouds to take us there. And yet, while we are yet in this scene, we still have that old sinful nature within us, and the old nature cannot please God. This is the reason that we do still sometimes sin. Having the old nature within us along with our new nature does pose a bit of a spiritual conflict within us, but thankfully, we do have the new, heavenly nature which only desires to please God and which alone is able to please God. We therefore must reckon the old man to be dead, and thus we resist its promptings which seek to carry us back to the works of the flesh. Through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, our new birth in Christ, we do have the power to resist sin and to live in the knowledge that we are alive in Christ. We can, by faith, consider ourselves to be dead to sin and alive to God in Christ. We can read all about this in Romans 7. Still, we have the assurance that once we are saved, we do have the ability to resist the sinful impulses that we yet have due to the presence of that old nature. And it is God’s purpose that through the work of the Spirit by God’s Word, we are being changed to be more like Christ Jesus. Romans 8:29 says: “For whom He did foreknow, He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.”

My dear friend, I want to assure you that once we are saved, the struggle with resisting sinful thoughts and actions is never hopeless, because Christ Jesus has delivered us from bondage to the law and to sin. We read in 1 John 2:1: “My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous….” So, it is not a given that we must sin, because the Scriptures say, “IF any man sin”, not “WHEN any man sins”. And yet, if we should in fact sin after being saved and forgiven, we do have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous. He is the One who has delivered us from bondage by His work on the cross at Calvary. In 1 John 2:2 we read: “And He is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.” By the daily washing of the Word, in other words, reading the Bible, and by the work of the Holy Spirit, we are transformed day by day more to the image of Christ Jesus. I believe that the following verses might be helpful. We read in Romans 12:1-2: “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God.”  (SF)  (691.3)