In 1969, the year I graduated from high school, 500,000 young people made a trip to Sullivan County and set up camp in Max Yasgur’s pasture. The Woodstock Music and Art Festival was billed as “three days of peace and music.” True believers see it as an era devoted to human advancement. Cynics and sceptics adamantly claim it was a demonstration of the lawlessness and naiveté of the day.
It was a countercultural movement. The utter chaos and mayhem brought about local and state laws to ensure that nothing like it would ever happen again. (The backlash kept a similar festival from happening in Kurthwood, LA). The theme, Three Days of Peace and Music, was more idealistic than the actual occurrence–abolition of laws, overt indulgence in drugs, free sex, and rebellion. Promoters failed to see that this could never bring about peace.
Woodstock ‘99 was another attempt at the same theme; it too ended in mayhem and violence. Teenagers faced off against the police, destroying trust, overturning cars, trashing equipment, looting, and setting fires while chanting, “I won’t do what you tell me.”
Even MTV commentators were stunned with what took place. Why? Were they not the parents who started the whole thing in the ‘60s?
Someone said, “Woodstock illustrates the complete failure of humanity’s attempt to achieve peace and love apart from God.” (Mike Hays) Many people have pushed the doctrine of sin to the edge, viewing it as too pessimistic.
Unfortunately, John saw the need to address the issue of sin among Christians; he saw the warning signs of lawlessness. Even today many appeals to grace and have no place for godly principles. John draws a contrast between the father of righteousness and the father of sin.
4 Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. 5 But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. 6 No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.
7 Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. The one who does what is right is righteous, just as he is righteous. 8 The one who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work. 9 No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God. 10 This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister. I John 3:4-10
God’s nature is one of righteousness. He loves us and wants to bless us. Righteousness, forgiveness, and reconciliation are on His agenda. As children of God our character and conduct should reflect the heart of our Father.
Satan’s nature is one of lies and deception. He attempts to lead away from the love of God. He will tempt us to believe we are our own lawmaker. John says if we are children of the Devil our character and conduct will reflect the heart of our father.
It is sad how many children who grow up without a loving father. More critical are those who are traumatically abused by their fathers. John, this beloved pastor, is sensitive to how sin creeps in and eventually consumes a person to the point they live with incredible shame.
Let us be honest, John is genuinely concerned and wants the believers to understand that sin is a real problem that is incompatible with devotion to God. Gnosticism had a way of causing believers to become blinded to the reality of sin. The allure to follow philosophical teachings that pull us away from God is a powerful force; it leads us to believe this pseudo paths will lead to enlightenment and fulfillment.
John wants the believers to understand that one of the goals of God is holiness: God is passionate about purifying us.
And now, dear children, continue in him, so that when he appears we may be confident and unashamed before him at his coming. . . Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure. 1 John 2:28, 3:1
God’s primary mission in the world is to help people know Him and worship him in truth and spirit. John sees how the vision of God is becoming distorted. This would fall under the category of heresies he discussed in chapter two.
I. CHILDREN OF GOD DO NOT REBEL BY REDEFINING SIN TO MAKE IT MORE COMFORTABLE TO LIVE LIFE–IMPEDING OUR ABILITY TO LIVE LIVES THAT ARE PLEASING TO GOD
John says that “sin is lawlessness.” He uses an extraordinarily strong word; lawlessness is translated transgression. The typical Christian admits that he/she is a sinner. When asked in Sunday School, this is the polite and safe doctrinal answer to give.
Honesty is a buzz word in our society. I like to make a distinction between honest and truthful. Honesty is responding by not lying about things. Truthfulness is responding from the heart, confessing thing that is not hidden behind a façade of honest responses. It is not just a religious word; it is a word that all of culture understands. Yet, I wonder how easy it is for us to be truthful with God about our sin? Are we really willing to characterize our own specific actions and reactions as sinful?
One day, while working at Rose Rock Recovery Center, was moving into a larger office; I have been in the present one for about 3 ½ years. As I took down a large picture, I noticed the top of it was covered with dust. I did not recall a major dust storm blowing through my office. How did so much dust collect on it? One speck at a time.
I talk with lots of people about all kinds of things. Those who are going through difficult relationships. Some with marital issues. Some facing legal and financial problems. Some who harbor anger.
Yet, it is a rare thing to have someone share openly and truthfully about their own sin. John is not advocating setting up a confessional booth in the church; however, he is talking about the danger of failing to recognize our sin.
We had a young lady in our church at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Florein, LA. I recall one Sunday night she came down the aisle weeping. She said, “I listen to the sermons and I pray, asking God to reveal my sin to me but I can’t see it.” Her faith tradition, which assumed you would go to Hell if you died with any unconfessed sin, had taught her how to craft her view of sin to exclude her from sinning.
Truthfulness with God starts with honesty with self. It is rare to hear people confess their faults, their sins. Scripture holds before us the vertical and horizontal dimension of confession.
If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.
If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word has no place in our lives. I John 1:8-10
Therefore, confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. James 5:16
Remember, John is writing to believers. Can you say:
Hold it! I’ve been wrong in this area of my life, I’ve sinned. I’ve just been flat out disobedient and sinful in the way I’ve handled this situation. Even if the other person was wrong as well, that doesn’t justify my actions, I’ve just been stubbornly rebelling against God and His Word in this whole thing. Cedarview Community
There is great spiritual value in having the ability to identify and confess the very sin that may be hindering our spiritual growth. First, it allows us to determine that holiness, godliness, righteousness is of utmost importance in our lives. Second, it permits us to see the value we place upon maintaining a healthy relationship with other people.
This is what I perceive that the Gospel’s emphasis on confession of sin is attempted to help us see: Without coming face-to-face with our sin problem we will have an inflated ego and lose the ability to understand how dependent upon God we really are. Without acknowledgement of our sinful condition, we will have a deflated image of God’s redeeming power. John of the Cross, writing about the “Dark Night of the Soul”, suggest we come to a place where we feel as if we are totally without God. It is in our dark moments of life that we see ourselves as we are and Jesus as He truly is.
“The essence of spirituality is an enlargement of vision. The experience may only last a moment, but in these matters a moment is enough. You need a transcendent sense of things, not one that lets you escape from your situation but one that gives you an added perspective. In this, beauty and religion serve similar purposes, and so it's no wonder that they are so often allied.”
Psychology reduces experience too far. Its mission is to relive you of suffering. “It is not philosophically or theologically attuned for helping you find meaning in the dark. And so it isn’t sufficient…. Religion, too, often avoids the dark by hiding behind platitudes and false assurances…. sentimentalize the light and demonize the dark.” p. 15
“The spiritual life is both deep and transcendent. It shouldn’t whisk you away from your daily challenges but should offer you an intelligent way of dealing with all the complexity involved. It should make you a person of character and discernment, emotionally tough and intelligently demanding, as well as loving and compassionate. It should give you insight into the deepest of your questions and problems, and give you a vision that extends beyond the everyday issues. Religion often fails to explore the depths and only offers the vision, but then the transcendent possibilities lack depth and the end hurt more than help.” P. 15
God’s mercy and grace transcends our sinful condition:
CHILDREN OF GOD DO NOT REBEL BY REDEFINING SIN TO MAKE IT MORE COMFORTABLE TO LIVE WITH–IMPEDING OUR ABILITY LIVE LIVES THAT ARE PLEASING TO GOD.
II. CHILDREN OF GOD REMEMBER JESUS CAME TO TAKE AWAY OUR SINS–EMPOWERING US TO EXPERIENCE CHANGED LIVES
John uses the present tense verb for “sins” in verse 6. It implies ongoing, continuous action. This is confusing for John. How does a believer inner peace living a life of sin as if he/she were not born of God?
I think John would ask us several probing questions: “Why do you insist upon playing tug-o-war with God? It’s like we say, “No! I am not going to let you take my pet sins away from me.” For John, that is inconsistent with the plan of God. Don’t you realize that Jesus died on the cross because he wants to “take away our sins”? Why then do we insist holding onto them? To confess our sins means to get them out of the way as we seek to follow Jesus.
Believers should quickly recognize sin, hate it, confess it, and lean upon Holy Spirit to keep it from rendering them powerless and ineffective. Yet, believers often cover it up, camouflage it, and redefine it to make it culturally acceptable.
Let us ask the text a question: Why does Jesus desire to remove sins from our lives? Growing up we often heard sermons against smoking, drinking, promiscuous living, and many other things considered sin. Many in Christendom have overreacted and we do not talk about sin–coping out by saying it is between the individual and God. It is between the individual and God; however, God looks at it from the perspective of what is does to the person.
Keep his decrees and commands, which I am giving you today, so that it may go well with you and your children after you and that you may live long in the land the LORD your God gives you for all time. Deut. 4:40
We should consistently ask ourselves two questions:
1. What is there in my life that I keep hanging onto that will literally shorten my life or greatly damage the quality of life that God has for me? (e.g., gossip, drugs, alcohol, smoking, anger, pessimistic spirit, etc.”
2. What is there in life that has a negative influence on my ability to make a positive impact upon my children and those I work with and serve daily? In other words, is there something that is keeping me from being a great witness for my faith?
Paul says it this way.
25 What this adds up to, then, is this: no more lies, no more pretense. Tell your neighbor the truth. In Christ’s body we’re all connected to each other, after all. When you lie to others, you end up lying to yourself.
26-27 Go ahead and be angry. You do well to be angry—but don’t use your anger as fuel for revenge. And don’t stay angry. Don’t go to bed angry. Don’t give the Devil that kind of foothold in your life.
28 Did you use to make ends meet by stealing? Well, no more! Get an honest job so that you can help others who can’t work.
29 Watch the way you talk. Let nothing foul or dirty come out of your mouth. Say only what helps, each word a gift.
30 Don’t grieve God. Don’t break his heart. His Holy Spirit, moving and breathing in you, is the most intimate part of your life, making you fit for himself. Don’t take such a gift for granted.
31-32 Make a clean break with all cutting, backbiting, profane talk. Be gentle with one another, sensitive. Forgive one another as quickly and thoroughly as God in Christ forgave you. Ephesians 4:25-32 (MSG)
Confession is our realization that we have particular sins that we desire for Jesus to take away. John is not writing to a group of theologues; he is writing to the church about the very things that hinder the purity and power of Jesus from having full impact upon our lives.
III. CHILDREN OF GOD ARE FULLY AWARE OF THE STOCK FROM WHICH THEY ARE BORN–THEY LIVE ACCORDING TO THE WILL OF THEIR HEAVENLY FATHER
A healthy doctrine of sin is the very thing that sets us apart from the world. Our relationship with Jesus allows us to discern falsehood and to show why they are wrong. Too often, and too late, we find ourselves asking, “What went wrong?”
Perhaps the greatest challenge Christians face is the acceptance of their sin. As with the Jewish leaders who despised Jesus, many Christians have justified everything they say and do to the point they cannot see the plank in their own eyes. Yet, they feel comfortable trying to fix those with a speck in their eyes. The reference to Jesus’ words in Matthew 7:5 is interesting. The Jewish leaders failed to name their sins; sins that led to choices that closed their mind to truth. Some of the most close-minded people I have met are Christians who cannot recognize their sin and fail to see the need for forgiveness. They rob themselves of pure hearts. They, in turn, become disgruntled and toxic because they live with sub-conscious guilt and shame.
Here is a thought to process. What has happened when the magnitude of sin is viewed as mere specks? Jesus is suggesting that those who say they love God and focus on sawdust will live with little appreciation for the mercy and grace of God. When Christians do a reset and see the huge plank from which the sawdust comes, protruding from their eye, they will see how superficial they have become. I have often said that people outside of the church better understand morality applicable to Christians than those in the church. It is like them saying, you go around with a log protruding from your eyes and you want me to believe you have it all together. They will turn away. Yet, if they witness us confessing the little things, like specs of sawdust, with the same intensity as the logs, they will see the realness of our lives. John does not parse sin into planks and sawdust, commission or omission, or other expressions that suggest one is worse than another. God wants us to understand if we do not accept—own it—the sin in our lives, confess it, and let God forgive and heal the wounds it has left, we will lack the joy God has intended for us.
If we claim that we’re free of sin, we’re only fooling ourselves. A claim like that is errant nonsense. On the other hand, if we admit our sins—simply come clean about them—he won’t let us down; he’ll be true to himself. He’ll forgive our sins and purge us of all wrongdoing. If we claim that we’ve never sinned, we out-and-out contradict God—make a liar out of him. A claim like that only shows off our ignorance of God. I John 1:8-10 (MSG)
But in our time something new has been added. What Moses and the prophets witnessed to all those years has happened. The God-setting-things-right that we read about has become Jesus-setting-things-right for us. And not only for us, but for everyone who believes in him. For there is no difference between us and them in this. Since we’ve compiled this long and sorry record as sinners (both us and them) and proved that we are utterly incapable of living the glorious lives God wills for us, God did it for us. Out of sheer generosity he put us in right standing with himself. A pure gift. He got us out of the mess we’re in and restored us to where he always wanted us to be. And he did it by means of Jesus Christ. Romans 3:21-24 (MSG)
When I see the damaging effects of the sins that germinate from the seeds of Satan, I appreciate and better understand why John wrote as he did, “Do not love the world or anything in the world.” (2:15) Chuck Colson, in a Breakpoint Commentary wrote, “Nowhere does the clash of worldviews have greater social impact than in the denial of sin and the consequential loss of moral responsibility.”
John draws a particularly important contrast in this text. To understand it, let us use the idea of planting seeds. The gardener has one that is black, representative of the nature of Satan, and a white seed, representing Jesus. What will he see in the process of planting these?
Characteristics of Children of Satan:
• Sin is present.
• It is acted upon habitually.
• There is a lifestyle of lawlessness.
• His children do not know God and have no intimate relationship with Him.
• His children are characterized by hedonism, a love for self.
Characteristic of Children of God:
• As believers they allow God to take away their sins
• The habit of holiness is faithfully pursued.
• They celebrate their intimate relationship with God.
• They abide in Him, seeking to walk in harmony with Jesus.
• They have a deep love for others that supersedes their love for self.
John is clear, the philosophical systems that have been propagated by the Gnostics have failed. Our condition is not much different. For years we have attempted to fix the ills of our lives by treating surface, symptomatic matters. Ray Steadman reminds us that we have tried a variety of things, to no avail:
• Education...look at our problems...education is only a veneer.
• Psychological treatment...flood of lawlessness continues to mount.
• Legislation and police enforcement...they too have failed.
• “Bo Peepism” Leave them alone and they will come home, wagging their tails behind them.
General Carlos Romulo: “We have harnessed the atom, but we will never make war obsolete until we find a force to bridle the passions of men.
Wherein lies the answer to our human dilemma?
"Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it.
But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. Matthew 7:13, 14
It is not a matter of what is the answer. It is a question of who is the answer. Jesus Christ is the answer, He and he alone is “the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”
Jesus has the unique ability to take our sins from us and He places a seed, His seed, in us that begins to flourish and grow, producing the fruits of the Spirit in our lives.
Our question is this, Are we ready? Are we tired of despair, woundedness in the spirit, the hopeless, the pathetic, the pitiful, the lost, the broken people who float through life with no real purpose?
While working as the Quality Edge Capital Campaign Director at Louisiana College (1994-1998) I had interviewed several people to work as my assistant, after my first one was arrested for a DUI. Some had more skills that others. I elected to hire Jan Miller. I had gone to college with her brother who is a wonderful pastor, their dad who also is a good friend has pastored for many years. Her grandmother was a member of Ebenezer Baptist Church—I was her pastor. I knew this family very well. I recall telling her, “You don’t have some of the skills I would like to see; however, you can acquire those. I am offering you the job because I know the stock from which you come—you come from good stock.”
This is what Paul remembered as he spoke of his friend, Timothy:
I am reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also. 2 Timothy 1:5
Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God--children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. John 1:12, 13
It is Jesus’ desire for us to repent of our sin and begin to live purposeful lives. To walk and live and work through the abiding presence of Jesus is to know the peace, the joy, the ordered and restful activity that was in him–for we are his children.
The world may fall apart but we do not need to fall apart. God, our heavenly Father, enhances our lives by making us more and more like him. What I find interesting is that as we become more and more like Jesus, the more opposition we will encounter. At that point, how are we to respond? Keep becoming more and more like Jesus. This means our ability to respond to the challenges we face is linked to remaining faithful to Christ.
