SCRIPTURE: James 2:10 "For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in ONE point, he is guilty of all."
Romans 3:20 "Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin."
PROPOSITION: To use these texts and others to show that all sin has earned a wage of infinite loss and that this loss cannot be undone, even if we dedicated our entire life as an effort to undo it. and also to show that Christ has made an atonement for all sin and anyone can be forgiven and pardoned of all sin through the shed blood of Christ.
1.How is one sin so costly that no amount of good works can offset it?
A. One day our young nephew was at our house, I had a glass cup on the concrete patio and his foot accidentally kicked it, when this happened the cup broke around the brim leaving a sharp jaged edge, he than said "at least I didn't break the whole thing", I said that's the way many look at Gods law, because they have not committed murder they think that this will in some way annul the offences that they have committed, but when the law is broken in one point it is broken all together, and it cannot be repaired by a sinner.
James 2:10 "For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.
B. The wages of even one sin is death, when Adam and Eve sinned they were driven out of their garden of paradise. if we were only guilty of one sin God whose eyes are too pure to behold iniquity would be compelled by his very nature to drive us from his presence into a place fit for the punishment of that one sin, and there the sinner would wrestle with the wrath of that great God throughout the ceaseless ages of eternity. and we would not be surprised at the severity of the punishment because we would have an understand of our depravity in that one sin, as Pharaoh did so many years ago with his evil obstinance. Exodus 9:27 "And Pharaoh sent, and called for Moses and Aaron, and said unto them, I have sinned this time: the LORD is righteous, and I and my people are wicked."
C. One sin carries with it an incredible power to stain the soul, the soul is immaterial so it cannot be seen by physical eyes but if we could with bodily eyes see the soul we would see a stain of deepest dye, and no amount of good works could create a cleansing agent to remove this stain. the scripture has declared that only the blood of Christ has the cleansing power to remove this crimson stain.
1 John 1:7 "...the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin."
D. One sin has the power to fill the soul with contempt for God so that if we were to multiply to ourselves righteous acts, we would only be multiplying to ourselves a large pile of dung, those righteous acts would be springing forth from a heart filled with enmity and contempt for God contaminating our very deeds. Romans 8:7 "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be."
E. One sin makes such a cry unto God that it brings down his wrath, this happens in the same way that the blood of Abel cried unto God, and incurred Gods wath. Cain went out from the presence of the Lord and there was no amount of righteousness that he could have done to placate, or lesson Gods wrath.
F. If you only had to give account of one sin all your churchianity and all your religiosity and piety and all your righteousness would have no more influence to keep you out of the lake of fire then you would have to stop a traveling locomotive that is coming at you at full speed. you will be crushed by Divine wrath and ground into powder and all of your righteousness will have no strength to deliver you.
Matthew 21:44 "And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder."
2. Instead of one fleeting sin how many sins is it likely that each one of us have committed?
A. We have multiplied to ourselves iniquity and added sin to sin, but it takes just as much of the grace of God to save the least of sinners as well as the greatest of sinners, so if all your dead works and filthy rags of righteousness have no redemptive value against one sin how could they ever profit against a multitude of sins? 1 Timothy 1:15 "This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief."
3.) Only the righteousness of Christ can provide us with redeeming merit.
A. This redeeming merit is freely given to repentant sinners the moment they believe, this is the case in the old and new testament. "Abraham believed God and it was counted unto him for righteousness", if the sinner is not saved by faith alone, in Christ alone, he is all together lost. anyone who is not in Christ is alienated from the Commonwealth of Israel and are strangers from the Covenants of promise, they have no hope and are without God in the world.
4.) After a person is justified by faith not one sin is ever imputed to his account.
A. Years ago I showed some scripture verses to a man who lived south of my home town who had a form of godliness. I showed him that God never imputes sin to the beilever, I explained to him that if God imputed even one sin to the believer he would be forever lost. this man apparently had not ever understood those texts, because when he looked at them he became a little angry and said "God writes down your sins after you are saved, he writes them down!!", but he could not show me one scripture to back up his twisted statement. The reason this wicked religionist became so angry was because he had more than a little confidence in his filthy rags of righteousness, and could not indure the thought of Christ being his only saviour.
Romans 4:8 "Blessed is the man to whom the Lord WILL NOT IMPUTE SIN."
CONCLUSION: One sin seems so small to the natural man and a lifetime of righteousness seems like so much to carnal man, but on the contrary one sin is so henious, and so vile, and a lifetime of righteousness that comes forth from the hearts of wicked men is nothing more than a sewage of corruption. The Lord Jesus Christ is the ONLY hope for one sin or ten thousand sins. mercy is as ready to pardon the greatest sins as well as the least, if men will come to God through Christ.
Isaiah 55:6-7 "Seek ye the LORD while he may be found, call ye upon him while he is near: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts: and let him return unto the LORD, and he will have mercy upon him; and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon."
