Those who fear that "too much preaching on grace" will result in Antinomianism--the view that "Christians are released by grace from the obligation of observing the moral law" (Oxford Languages)--is an unwarranted fear (and this should be inherently true for any individual regenerated by the grace of God and indwelt by the Holy Spirit), for, as Paul himself confesses, "How shall we," we who believe in Christ, we who "died to sin," "still live in it?" (Rom. 6:2). The answer is: We cannot. Why does Paul even begin this discussion at this point in Romans? Because he anticipates that the reaction to God justifying sinners by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, and imputing the righteousness of Christ to the spiritual account of the believer, is going to result in the believer living in sin because he is relying on grace. But this is to completely misunderstand and even misrepresent the very notion of grace. Grace is given not for living in sin but for dying to sin.
The purposes of the Law include but may not be limited to
THE PROBLEM WITH THE LAW
What should be obvious to the believer in Christ is that there is at least a two-fold problem with the Law: 1) a sinner cannot--is not even remotely capable of--perfectly keeping God's Law (Rom. 7:7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12; 8:6, 7, 8); and 2) even if a sinner, who is also a slave to sin (John 8:34), could perfectly keep the Law--and the mere fact that all sinners are innate slaves to sin (Rom. 6:16), and therefore cannot refrain from sinning (Rom. 6:20, 21, 22, 23; 8:7), so, then, a sinner cannot attain perfection with regard to the Law--the Law still cannot grant regeneration and, hence, salvation (Titus 3:5): "For if a Law had been given [by God to us] which was able to impart life [ζῳοποιῆσαι, zōopoiēsai, make alive, quicken, revive or to cause to live], then righteousness would indeed have been based on [keeping the] Law" (Gal. 3:21). BibleHub explains that the verb ζῳοποιέω is "used in the New Testament to describe the act of giving life or making alive. It is often used in a spiritual or metaphorical sense, referring to the life-giving power of God, particularly through the Holy Spirit (John 1:11, 12, 13; 3:3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8). This term emphasizes the transformative power of God to bring spiritual life to those who are spiritually dead" (2 Cor. 5:17; Eph. 2:1, 2, 3; Titus 3:4, 5).
The act of regeneration that the Holy Spirit effects within someone is directly related to salvation: "But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for [humanity] appeared, He saved us," writes Paul (Titus 3:4), and how? "He saved us ... by the washing of regeneration [making someone born-again or spiritually alive] and renewing by the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5). When did God save us by spiritual regeneration? God regenerates someone when, while still being, during the time of one's spiritual death: "even when we were dead in our transgressions," God "made us alive [συνεζωοποίησεν, cf. ζῳοποιῆσαι at Gal. 3:21] together with Christ (by grace you have been saved [cf. Eph. 2:8, 9]), and raised us up with Him [cf. Eph. 1:20], and seated us with Him [cf. Eph. 1:20] in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus" (Eph. 2:5-7; cf. Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 14). This is all His work.
GRACE FOR LIFE, NOT FOR SIN
The person who experiences the miraculous regenerative grace of God in Christ Jesus by the work of the Holy Spirit is renewed ("the washing of regeneration and renewal," Titus 3:5): the one thusly graced has been renewed on the inside. "Therefore if anyone is in Christ [cf. Eph. 1:4, 5], this person is a new creation; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come" (2 Cor. 5:17 NASB '20). Did we instrumentally bring this to pass by faith? No. "Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ" (2 Cor. 5:18). Salvation (Titus 3:4), regeneration (John 3:8; Titus 3:5), propitiation (Rom. 3:25; 1 John 2:2), predestination (Rom. 8:29; Eph. 1:5), justification (Rom. 5:1; 8:30), sanctification (Rom. 8:30), preservation (Jude 1:24), glorification (Rom. 8:30)--all these spiritual works are from God and God alone.
We were not graced by God for a life of sin but a life of freedom from sin (Rom. 6:14): "Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life" (Rom. 6:4). "No one who has been born of God practices sin because His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin continually because he has been born of God" (1 John 3:9). This does not mean that the born-again believer will live sinlessly. What this does mean, however, is that the born-again believer will aim to live his or her life in Christ in a manner consistent with the new nature born within them. "Therefore I," the apostle Paul, "urge you to walk [live your life] in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, being diligent to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Eph. 4:1-3).
GRACE FOR HOLINESS | GRACE FOR FAILURE
I remember first reading Hebrews with anxiety when I read: "Pursue peace with all people and the holiness without which no one will see the Lord" (Heb. 12:14). The Greek word for "pursue," διώκετε, refers to chasing down and tackling, to persecute, to hunt. This primary verb is a present active imperative: an imperative is a command and the present active tense refers to a continuous action: pursue and keep pursuing peace with all people and pursue and keep pursuing the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. The tense of the verb should bring a comfort to us: the tense implies an on-going action throughout the entire lifetime of the believer; so that, when a believer fails, the person picks up where he or she left off and continues in the pursuit of peace and holiness. Do not ever think that you will ever arrive at perfect holiness, my brother and sister in Christ, for, if you do, you have even surpassed the apostle Paul himself (Phil. 3:12; cf. Phil. 3:7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15). Yet, do not forget that God is working in us, giving us the desire to do what He has called us in Christ to do (cf. Phil. 2:12, 13).
When we read passages that call us to live lives of holiness, we tend to panic, as we know absolutely that we will never measure up to the sinless and perfect standard of Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. Pastor Douglas Sean O'Donnell is helpful here: "I think we all understand that, if someone professes to be a child of Heaven but lives like the offspring of Hell, his Christianity is a charade. What we struggle with, however, is grasping how holy we need to be to receive the assurance of our salvation."1 That is it right there! He highlights our problem.
GRACE FOR ASSURANCE OF SALVATION
If you are looking to your state of personal holiness or righteousness for assurance of salvation then you are one pitiable creature. You must look to Christ! God the Father is the cause, the reason, why you are in Christ Jesus--and Christ Jesus "has become for us wisdom from God--that is, our righteousness, [our] holiness and [our] redemption" (1 Cor. 1:30 NIV). The righteousness of Jesus Christ is a gift given by God to the believer so that He, that is, God the Father, can consider you righteous (2 Cor. 5:21). You, in yourself, are not righteous. You, in Christ Jesus, are righteous--you are reckoned righteous because God the Father imputed the righteousness of Christ Jesus to your spiritual account.
THE HOLINESS WITHOUT WHICH
Do you, my brother or sister in Christ, born again by the work of the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5), caused by grace to exercise faith in Christ (2 Pet. 1:1), do you still sin? How many times a day do you sin? How many sins do you allow yourself? Do you know every single sin that you commit? Or, asked another way, do you imagine that you commit sins of which you are entirely unaware? God is purely holy and righteous, after all, so He knows all types of sin, all measures or degrees of sin (a "white lie" to spare someone's feelings vs. a vicious and spiteful lie that hurts another); He knows sins we commit in defiance (Gal. 5:19, 20, 21), sins we commit in ignorance (Num. 15:27, 28), sins we might commit because of habit (Rom. 7:5), and sins we commit by failing to do what we ought to do, what we were commanded to do (James 4:17).
So, do you still sin, my brother or sister? "If we," meaning born-again believers, "say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us" (1 John 1:8). So born-again believers still sin? But we are told in Scripture that born-again believers do not live a life of sin (Rom. 6:1, 2, 3, 4) and that, if someone does, then that person is not a true believer (1 John 1:6). What is going on? Do we sin or not?Are we "allowed" to sin? God forbid! "For sin shall not be master [exerting dominion] over you [controlling you], for [because] you are not under [ruled, led, governed by] the Law, but under [ruled, led, governed by] grace" (Rom. 6:14); cf. "Sin will no longer have authority over you. You do not have a new life because you obey the Law which God gave to Moses. You have a new life because God is very kind to you" (EEB).
Yet John also writes: "I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin" (1 John 2:1a). There is the goal: to live in Christ so as not to sin. But John adds that, "if anyone sins then we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous" (1 John 2:1b). Taking New Testament scriptures as a whole we conclude: born-again believers have been given spiritual life from spiritual death by the grace and work of our triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Isa. 55:1, 2, 3; Jer. 13:23; 24:7; 31:34; 32:38, 39, 40; Ezek. 11:19, 20; 36:26; John 1:11, 12, 13; 3:3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8; 5:24; 6:63; Rom. 6:6; 8:15; 1 Cor. 1:18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31; 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16; 6:11; 2 Cor. 5:5, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21; Gal. 2:20; 4:6; 6:15; Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14; 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; 4:21, 22, 23, 24; Col. 3:10; Titus 3:4, 5; Heb. 8:10; James 1:18; 1 Pet. 1:2, 3, 23; 3:18; 2 Pet. 1:1, 4; 1 John 2:29; 3:9, 10, 14; 4:7; 5:1, 18); God has recreated us in Christ Jesus for good works (Eph. 2:10), and to fulfill His will (Phil. 2:12, 13), for the ultimate praise of the glory of God's grace (Eph. 1:6) in Christ Jesus.
Will the born-again Christian sin? Yes. How do we know? Because the work of sanctification, being made more and more holy and to be conformed to the image of Christ, is an on-going work that occurs throughout the entire life of the redeemed believer:
Again, pastor O'Donnell reminds us that, "While we are freed from the dominion of sin [Rom. 6:14], we are not free from the corruption of sin [Rom. 7:14, 15, 16, 17]."2 How are we, then, any different from the unbeliever? We exist in Christ, as God imputed His righteousness to our spiritual account, even though we are not in ourselves righteous (Rom. 3:21-26). We are both sinner and saint. But we are most distinct from the unbeliever not only by means of our position in Christ but also in the fact that we hate our sin. We want to be made perfect, holy, sinless. We despise our sin, we are grieved by our own sin, and we agree with God when we sin that He is righteous, that we are unrighteous, and that without His saving and effectual grace we would all be cast into Hell. We love God and hate sin. Unregenerate unbelievers do not hate their sin. They love their sin and hate God. They glory or relish in their sin. They are still slaves to sin and they love being slaves to sin.
We, however, are relying / trusting / exercising faith in God, who imputed the righteousness of Jesus Christ to us, as we by trial and error surrender ourselves more and more through the years to the sanctifying work of God the Father in God the Son by the ministry of God the Holy Spirit. There is always an on-going struggle within the believer: the new / renewed inner person wants holiness and continually pursues it (Heb. 12:14) while the old / fallen inner person wants to keep sinning (Gal. 5:17). But Christ has won the war over our souls. We are only engaged in battles. But if we look to our own lives, our good deeds or our attempts at being good for assurance of salvation, we will be shaken.
If you fear that your faith is not strong enough, or that you feel you play the hypocrite within you because you confess to love Christ but fail to measure up to the standards of Christ (Eph. 4:13), then you can still rejoice and have assurance of salvation because the unbeliever does not confess love of Christ and is not concerned about any measure of hypocrisy. "Having begun [your life in Christ] by the Spirit," since He is the One who began the spiritual work within you (Titus 3:5), "are you now being perfected by the flesh?" (Gal. 3:3). No. Look to Christ!
You will never sanctify the old inner you that wants to sin. Never. Just settle that in your heart right now. The old nature is not yet dead. He still wants to control you the way he or she used to--but the old you is being confronted not only by the new you but also by the indwelling Holy Spirit. When you fail--not if you fail but when you fail--agree with God that you failed, that you sinned, ask for forgiveness and continue the lifelong battle in Christ. The war is over through Christ. But the battles ahead still await. Don't be discouraged (Heb. 11:1-40). These battles will soon be over, and Christ will return, and will finally and once-for-all bring an end to sin. You are the victor in Christ (John 16:33)!
__________
1 Douglas Sean O'Donnell, 1-3 John (Reformed Expository Commentary) (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2015), 96.
2 Ibid.
The purposes of the Law include but may not be limited to
- the revealing of the righteousness and holiness of the character and nature of God (Rom. 1:17 NIV; 3:21)--that the eternal triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, exist in such a state that to sin never entered the pure and holy mind of God (cf. Jer. 7:31; 19:5; 32:35; Hab. 1:13);
- helping sinners understand just how horrifying and destructive is the nature of, the desire for, and the compulsion to sin (Rom. 5:20, 21);
- informing humanity that the standards set forth in the Law are required in absolute perfection of any mortal who is to approach God in His Heavenly Kingdom for eternal life and everlasting relationship with Him (Matt. 19:16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21; James 2:10);
- looking in the Law as a mirror by which we compare our fallen state to the holy character of God (James 1:22, 23)--so that we see ourselves as God sees us in our fallenness and apart from union with and clothed in the righteousness of Christ (Rom. 5:6, 8, 10; 3:21-28); and
- changing our perspective of the nature of God and the fallen nature of humanity: if we are to be redeemed, forgiven of sin and reconciled to a right relationship with God (Isa. 59:2), then all of that activity must be accomplished by God the Father, in His Son Jesus Christ and through the inward application of the Holy Spirit within us, so that we rely entirely on His grace, His work, and His preservation for our justification (Rom. 5:1, 2), sanctification (Acts 26:18), and glorification (Rom. 8:29, 30); and we rest entirely in God's atoning work alone and not ours.
THE PROBLEM WITH THE LAW
What should be obvious to the believer in Christ is that there is at least a two-fold problem with the Law: 1) a sinner cannot--is not even remotely capable of--perfectly keeping God's Law (Rom. 7:7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12; 8:6, 7, 8); and 2) even if a sinner, who is also a slave to sin (John 8:34), could perfectly keep the Law--and the mere fact that all sinners are innate slaves to sin (Rom. 6:16), and therefore cannot refrain from sinning (Rom. 6:20, 21, 22, 23; 8:7), so, then, a sinner cannot attain perfection with regard to the Law--the Law still cannot grant regeneration and, hence, salvation (Titus 3:5): "For if a Law had been given [by God to us] which was able to impart life [ζῳοποιῆσαι, zōopoiēsai, make alive, quicken, revive or to cause to live], then righteousness would indeed have been based on [keeping the] Law" (Gal. 3:21). BibleHub explains that the verb ζῳοποιέω is "used in the New Testament to describe the act of giving life or making alive. It is often used in a spiritual or metaphorical sense, referring to the life-giving power of God, particularly through the Holy Spirit (John 1:11, 12, 13; 3:3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8). This term emphasizes the transformative power of God to bring spiritual life to those who are spiritually dead" (2 Cor. 5:17; Eph. 2:1, 2, 3; Titus 3:4, 5).
The act of regeneration that the Holy Spirit effects within someone is directly related to salvation: "But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for [humanity] appeared, He saved us," writes Paul (Titus 3:4), and how? "He saved us ... by the washing of regeneration [making someone born-again or spiritually alive] and renewing by the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5). When did God save us by spiritual regeneration? God regenerates someone when, while still being, during the time of one's spiritual death: "even when we were dead in our transgressions," God "made us alive [συνεζωοποίησεν, cf. ζῳοποιῆσαι at Gal. 3:21] together with Christ (by grace you have been saved [cf. Eph. 2:8, 9]), and raised us up with Him [cf. Eph. 1:20], and seated us with Him [cf. Eph. 1:20] in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus" (Eph. 2:5-7; cf. Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 14). This is all His work.
GRACE FOR LIFE, NOT FOR SIN
The person who experiences the miraculous regenerative grace of God in Christ Jesus by the work of the Holy Spirit is renewed ("the washing of regeneration and renewal," Titus 3:5): the one thusly graced has been renewed on the inside. "Therefore if anyone is in Christ [cf. Eph. 1:4, 5], this person is a new creation; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come" (2 Cor. 5:17 NASB '20). Did we instrumentally bring this to pass by faith? No. "Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to Himself through Christ" (2 Cor. 5:18). Salvation (Titus 3:4), regeneration (John 3:8; Titus 3:5), propitiation (Rom. 3:25; 1 John 2:2), predestination (Rom. 8:29; Eph. 1:5), justification (Rom. 5:1; 8:30), sanctification (Rom. 8:30), preservation (Jude 1:24), glorification (Rom. 8:30)--all these spiritual works are from God and God alone.
We were not graced by God for a life of sin but a life of freedom from sin (Rom. 6:14): "Therefore we have been buried with Him through baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life" (Rom. 6:4). "No one who has been born of God practices sin because His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin continually because he has been born of God" (1 John 3:9). This does not mean that the born-again believer will live sinlessly. What this does mean, however, is that the born-again believer will aim to live his or her life in Christ in a manner consistent with the new nature born within them. "Therefore I," the apostle Paul, "urge you to walk [live your life] in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, being diligent to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace" (Eph. 4:1-3).
GRACE FOR HOLINESS | GRACE FOR FAILURE
I remember first reading Hebrews with anxiety when I read: "Pursue peace with all people and the holiness without which no one will see the Lord" (Heb. 12:14). The Greek word for "pursue," διώκετε, refers to chasing down and tackling, to persecute, to hunt. This primary verb is a present active imperative: an imperative is a command and the present active tense refers to a continuous action: pursue and keep pursuing peace with all people and pursue and keep pursuing the holiness without which no one will see the Lord. The tense of the verb should bring a comfort to us: the tense implies an on-going action throughout the entire lifetime of the believer; so that, when a believer fails, the person picks up where he or she left off and continues in the pursuit of peace and holiness. Do not ever think that you will ever arrive at perfect holiness, my brother and sister in Christ, for, if you do, you have even surpassed the apostle Paul himself (Phil. 3:12; cf. Phil. 3:7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15). Yet, do not forget that God is working in us, giving us the desire to do what He has called us in Christ to do (cf. Phil. 2:12, 13).
When we read passages that call us to live lives of holiness, we tend to panic, as we know absolutely that we will never measure up to the sinless and perfect standard of Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. Pastor Douglas Sean O'Donnell is helpful here: "I think we all understand that, if someone professes to be a child of Heaven but lives like the offspring of Hell, his Christianity is a charade. What we struggle with, however, is grasping how holy we need to be to receive the assurance of our salvation."1 That is it right there! He highlights our problem.
GRACE FOR ASSURANCE OF SALVATION
If you are looking to your state of personal holiness or righteousness for assurance of salvation then you are one pitiable creature. You must look to Christ! God the Father is the cause, the reason, why you are in Christ Jesus--and Christ Jesus "has become for us wisdom from God--that is, our righteousness, [our] holiness and [our] redemption" (1 Cor. 1:30 NIV). The righteousness of Jesus Christ is a gift given by God to the believer so that He, that is, God the Father, can consider you righteous (2 Cor. 5:21). You, in yourself, are not righteous. You, in Christ Jesus, are righteous--you are reckoned righteous because God the Father imputed the righteousness of Christ Jesus to your spiritual account.
But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference between Jew and Gentile, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of His blood, to be received by faith. He did this [in order] to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance He had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished--He did it to demonstrate His righteousness at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus (Rom. 3:21-26 NIV).This is one of the most remarkable, gracious, awe-inspiring passages in all of God's Word. God did for us what we could not accomplish for ourselves. In our everyday language: God took all of our disgusting and filthy sins and laid them upon Jesus Christ on the Cross; and He then took all of Christ's righteousness and holiness and purity and laid it upon us by His grace through faith in Jesus our Savior and King. This is how a person is saved. You must have reckoned to your spiritual account before God Almighty the very righteousness of Christ Jesus upon your soul. You cannot acquire this righteousness, this grace, by trying to be a good and decent human being or by trying to keep God's Law. You can only acquire the righteousness of Christ by which God accounts you to be holy (1 Cor. 1:30) by the free grace of God through faith in Christ (Phil. 3:9). This is your salvation and assurance! This is "the holiness without which no one will see the Lord" (Heb. 12:14).
THE HOLINESS WITHOUT WHICH
Do you, my brother or sister in Christ, born again by the work of the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5), caused by grace to exercise faith in Christ (2 Pet. 1:1), do you still sin? How many times a day do you sin? How many sins do you allow yourself? Do you know every single sin that you commit? Or, asked another way, do you imagine that you commit sins of which you are entirely unaware? God is purely holy and righteous, after all, so He knows all types of sin, all measures or degrees of sin (a "white lie" to spare someone's feelings vs. a vicious and spiteful lie that hurts another); He knows sins we commit in defiance (Gal. 5:19, 20, 21), sins we commit in ignorance (Num. 15:27, 28), sins we might commit because of habit (Rom. 7:5), and sins we commit by failing to do what we ought to do, what we were commanded to do (James 4:17).
So, do you still sin, my brother or sister? "If we," meaning born-again believers, "say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us" (1 John 1:8). So born-again believers still sin? But we are told in Scripture that born-again believers do not live a life of sin (Rom. 6:1, 2, 3, 4) and that, if someone does, then that person is not a true believer (1 John 1:6). What is going on? Do we sin or not?Are we "allowed" to sin? God forbid! "For sin shall not be master [exerting dominion] over you [controlling you], for [because] you are not under [ruled, led, governed by] the Law, but under [ruled, led, governed by] grace" (Rom. 6:14); cf. "Sin will no longer have authority over you. You do not have a new life because you obey the Law which God gave to Moses. You have a new life because God is very kind to you" (EEB).
Yet John also writes: "I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin" (1 John 2:1a). There is the goal: to live in Christ so as not to sin. But John adds that, "if anyone sins then we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous" (1 John 2:1b). Taking New Testament scriptures as a whole we conclude: born-again believers have been given spiritual life from spiritual death by the grace and work of our triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (Isa. 55:1, 2, 3; Jer. 13:23; 24:7; 31:34; 32:38, 39, 40; Ezek. 11:19, 20; 36:26; John 1:11, 12, 13; 3:3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8; 5:24; 6:63; Rom. 6:6; 8:15; 1 Cor. 1:18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31; 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16; 6:11; 2 Cor. 5:5, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21; Gal. 2:20; 4:6; 6:15; Eph. 1:4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14; 2:1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; 4:21, 22, 23, 24; Col. 3:10; Titus 3:4, 5; Heb. 8:10; James 1:18; 1 Pet. 1:2, 3, 23; 3:18; 2 Pet. 1:1, 4; 1 John 2:29; 3:9, 10, 14; 4:7; 5:1, 18); God has recreated us in Christ Jesus for good works (Eph. 2:10), and to fulfill His will (Phil. 2:12, 13), for the ultimate praise of the glory of God's grace (Eph. 1:6) in Christ Jesus.
Will the born-again Christian sin? Yes. How do we know? Because the work of sanctification, being made more and more holy and to be conformed to the image of Christ, is an on-going work that occurs throughout the entire life of the redeemed believer:
- But now that you have been set free from sin [past tense] and have become slaves of God [past tense], the fruit [the result] you get leads to sanctification [present, progressive holiness] and its end [in the future], eternal life (Rom. 6:22 ESV);
- And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed [present passive indicative: being more and more and more transformed progressively in time, and that passively, meaning by the work of the Holy Spirit within you; cf. 1 Cor. 6:11; 1 Pet. 1:2] into the same image [the glory of Jesus Christ] from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit (2 Cor. 3:18);
- Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing [an act that will be continuous in the life of the believer] holiness [sanctification] to completion in the fear of God (2 Cor. 7:1);
- To put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness (Eph. 4:22-24);
- For this is the will of God, your sanctification (1 Thess. 4:3);
- Now may the God of peace Himself sanctify you [plural: you all] completely [a work at which God is always busy: 2 Cor. 3:18] --and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ (1 Thess. 5:23);
- For He [that is, Jesus] who sanctifies [present active participle: "He who is sanctifying"] and those who are sanctified [also present active participle: "those whom He is sanctifying"] all have one source (ESV) [or are all one; cf. John 17:21, 22; or all have one Father (CSB, EHV, GW, ISV, NASB, NLT, NRSV); or are of the same family (CEV, ERV, ICB, NCV, NIV)]. That is why He [Jesus] is not ashamed to call them brothers (Heb. 2:11);
- For by a single offering He [Jesus] has perfected for all time [past action] those who are being sanctified [on-going action] (Heb. 10:14);
- And everyone who thus hopes in Him [Jesus] purifies [present active indicative: continually purifies] himself as He [Jesus] is pure (1 John 3:3);
- Now to Him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you blameless before the presence of His glory (Jude 1:24).
Again, pastor O'Donnell reminds us that, "While we are freed from the dominion of sin [Rom. 6:14], we are not free from the corruption of sin [Rom. 7:14, 15, 16, 17]."2 How are we, then, any different from the unbeliever? We exist in Christ, as God imputed His righteousness to our spiritual account, even though we are not in ourselves righteous (Rom. 3:21-26). We are both sinner and saint. But we are most distinct from the unbeliever not only by means of our position in Christ but also in the fact that we hate our sin. We want to be made perfect, holy, sinless. We despise our sin, we are grieved by our own sin, and we agree with God when we sin that He is righteous, that we are unrighteous, and that without His saving and effectual grace we would all be cast into Hell. We love God and hate sin. Unregenerate unbelievers do not hate their sin. They love their sin and hate God. They glory or relish in their sin. They are still slaves to sin and they love being slaves to sin.
We, however, are relying / trusting / exercising faith in God, who imputed the righteousness of Jesus Christ to us, as we by trial and error surrender ourselves more and more through the years to the sanctifying work of God the Father in God the Son by the ministry of God the Holy Spirit. There is always an on-going struggle within the believer: the new / renewed inner person wants holiness and continually pursues it (Heb. 12:14) while the old / fallen inner person wants to keep sinning (Gal. 5:17). But Christ has won the war over our souls. We are only engaged in battles. But if we look to our own lives, our good deeds or our attempts at being good for assurance of salvation, we will be shaken.
If you fear that your faith is not strong enough, or that you feel you play the hypocrite within you because you confess to love Christ but fail to measure up to the standards of Christ (Eph. 4:13), then you can still rejoice and have assurance of salvation because the unbeliever does not confess love of Christ and is not concerned about any measure of hypocrisy. "Having begun [your life in Christ] by the Spirit," since He is the One who began the spiritual work within you (Titus 3:5), "are you now being perfected by the flesh?" (Gal. 3:3). No. Look to Christ!
You will never sanctify the old inner you that wants to sin. Never. Just settle that in your heart right now. The old nature is not yet dead. He still wants to control you the way he or she used to--but the old you is being confronted not only by the new you but also by the indwelling Holy Spirit. When you fail--not if you fail but when you fail--agree with God that you failed, that you sinned, ask for forgiveness and continue the lifelong battle in Christ. The war is over through Christ. But the battles ahead still await. Don't be discouraged (Heb. 11:1-40). These battles will soon be over, and Christ will return, and will finally and once-for-all bring an end to sin. You are the victor in Christ (John 16:33)!
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1 Douglas Sean O'Donnell, 1-3 John (Reformed Expository Commentary) (Phillipsburg: P&R Publishing, 2015), 96.
2 Ibid.
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