1 John 1:9 - Forever Forgiven

1 John 1:5-10

5 This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.

6 If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do
not practice the truth.

7 But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one
another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin.

8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in
us.

9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.

NKJV

I listen to Hank Henegraaff almost every day. There are some callers I wish I could
intervene and show them the truth. This is one of those passages of Scripture where I
believe is the most miss-understood by most Christians. I want to give my thoughts.

This is written to Christians. They were Jewish Christians who are very much part of the Body of Christ and who have the same gospel as do we. John is giving us a bit of doctrine here. He is explaining that the Christian does not walk in darkness, and that his/her sins have been forgiven. It is often taught by many, especially Hank Henegraaff that we are to continually ask God for forgiveness of our sins. Without doing so we are not forgiven and our communion with God has and will continue to be broken with unconfessed sin. This is wrong. Lets look at some other Scripture:

Eph 4:32
And be ye kind one to another,tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for
Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
KJV

Col 2:13-14
When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God
made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written
code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it
away, nailing it to the cross.
NIV

Cor 5:19-20
that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting men's sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation.
NIV

Heb 1:3
Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high;
KJV

Heb 10:12
But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God;
NIV

John 19:30
When he had received the drink, Jesus said, "It is finished." With that, he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
NIV

So it is very evident that from the above verses that Christ has forgiven us all of our sins Past - Present - Future. Its finished, and He has sat down. No more forgiving to do.

Back to 1 John. There are five IF’s in this chapter. John is contrasting between lost and saved. If you are lost your walking in darkness. If you are saved your walking in light. If your lost you say you have no sin. If you are saved then you admit you do have sin. If you are lost His word in not in you, and if you are saved His word is in you. Now, He also states this fact. In Christ there is no darkness at all. He also records this in the Gospel of John

John 8:12
When Jesus spoke again to the people, he said, "I am the light of the world. Whoever
follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life."
NIV

I believe it is impossible to walk in darkness. I think we can sin, and do the same sin over and over, but not walk in darkness. He is the light, and we walk in that light. Notice what Jesus says:

John 14:20
On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in
you.
NIV

This is a profound truth. We are IN Christ, He is IN us. We can’t walk in darkness as He
is the light. Its impossible.

John goes on to tell us that if we can’t admit we sin, then we don’t have salvation. In fact this is the first step to Salvation, realize that we are rotten sinners. IF we confess our Sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. All our sins past-present-future. This is a one time event. Not an on going everyday event. In fact to even ask for forgiveness now is an oxymoron. Jesus has already once and for all forgiven us of all our sins. We can apologize for our sin, or ask help to overcome it, but they are all under the blood of Christ. I don't believe its possible that even our fellowship can be broken! We may feel that it is, but according to God, we always have full access to the Throne, even in a time of need. Our communion with God can’t be broken because of the wonderful power of Jesus. We are conditional people, but God is not. He accepts us unconditionally, and knows what He is getting.

If this verse meant it an ongoing event, then we would constantly be in danger of having some sin in our life unforgiven, and thus would have to pay for that sin by Spiritual death. The wages of sin is death, and if I sin and do not ask for forgiveness then I am dead until I ask. This has thus become a work. The word confess here does not always have to mean a verbal confession, but an acknowledgment:
<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>NT:3670
homologeoo, homologoo;
1. properly, to say the same thing as another, i. e. to agree with, assent,
2. universally, to concede
a. not to refuse, i. e. to promise:
b. not to deny, i. e. to confess; declare: John 1:20
3. to profess Titus 1:16
4. to praise, celebrate Heb 13:15
(from Thayer's Greek Lexicon<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

So once we admit we sin - forgiveness has been granted.

Rom 10:9-10
that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.
For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
(NKJ)

With love,

Chet

[ August 21, 2001: Message edited by: Chet ]

 

1 John is not about sanctification. Its about a person who has either been saved, or is a person who is lost. John is contrasting between the two. I do not believe that our
fellowship with God can ever be tarnished. We will always have a relationship. If you do not have fellowship, then your not saved.
This is the point of 1 John. Verse nine is a one time event, we do it at the time we are
saved. We do not need to continually dealing with the sin issue, its been taken care of. And it plainly says, IF we confess THEN we are forgiven, which implies clearly that if we don't confess then we are not forgiven. John is talking about salvation.

Wellsjs, you bought out Jesus example prayer from the sermon on the mount.
<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>FORGIVE US OUR SINS, for we also forgive everyone who sins against us. And
lead us not into temptation.'" (Luke 11:1-4 NIV)<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Welljs, this will open up a new can of worms but this is dealing with the Kingdom rule of
Christ, not the spiritual forgiveness of our sins.

If we took this passage to mean as you implied then we would also have to assume that if we do not ask for forgiveness then it too would not be granted to us.

We are IN Christ, IN Him is no darkness.

Hank is excellent on the basic issues. He is extremely good on the trinity, salvation,
predestination (he's real good), ect... He does fail on some issues, as I am sure we all do. I would never detour someone from listening to him. In fact I always encourage new converts to do so. But he has problems. In fact, he is very supportive of Hugh Ross. That is bad!

With love,

Chet

 

Rom 6:1-3
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly
not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?
NKJV

Wellsjs my dear brother, sin is no longer an issue for us ever again. Jesus took it away.

When I was first saved I studied the Bible greatly. I remember hearing a message on
forgiveness of sins. In it the pastor taught (like most do) that our sins have been paid for past, present and future but for the believer we need to continue to ask for forgiveness. I was confused. When confronting the issue, 1 John was always pointed out as being a letter to the Christians. In order for me to be forgiven I need to ask God over and over and over. I also remember hearing a message on prayer that literally made me never want to pray again! If you did not pray just right, then God could ZZZAP Ya! In it I was taught that if we did not first ask for forgiveness then our prayers would go
unanswered. Again 1John was the proof text. My Sunday school teacher would teach
that if you saw a man falling off a building and you prayed for him with unconfessed sin,
then God would not listen for your fellowship had been broken. I also remember a sermon by Jack Hyles teaching that we need to even write down our sins on paper and flush them down a toilet for our sins to be forgiven. I remember asking about sins we struggle with i.e. smoking. Do we need to ask forgiveness each time we light up?

These are all questions that certainly did not make sense to a new Christian, but God has given me the answers through the years of time and study in His word. And of course the above are extreme examples, just to illustrate a point. Our position IN Him is incredible. Hebrews teaches that we are perfect, and made holy! Sin is not something we dwell upon. The above examples stem from a legalistic way of thinking. The New Testament teaches that as a new creature old things have passed and we are made new. With our great salvation comes freedom from sin, it can no longer affect our relationship to Christ, because He took care of it once for all. So when we attempt to ask Him for forgiveness He can only say, "I did that 2000 years ago"

The verse in Romans has a sometimes overlooked truth. When we sin something happens, grace abounds. Like in geometry - its a given. We should not sin just to have grace abound, but it is inevitable - grace will abound. Every time we sin Gods grace will always abound more. And to even fathom asking for forgiveness is again an oxymoron as he already has:

Col 2:13-14
When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God
made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written
code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross.
NIV

Furthermore, there are no steps to the Christian life. We are to relax (Heb 4). He only wants a relationship with us that is not hindered by sin, its been forgiven and we are made perfectly righteous just so that we can enter a sweet fellowship with Him.

Often this relationship is compared to a father son relationship. This relationship can hardly be compared to that of a father and Son relationship because that relationship is strictly human and not divine. It only feels or seems like we lose touch with God because of sin, because we are conditional beings. And we equate our relationship with God to that of an earthly fatherhood relationship. If I wronged my earthly dad then I must ask for forgiveness. But this is not so with my heavenly Father, its always there... just so my fellowship will remain. This can be seen in the following scripture:

Heb 4:15-16
For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.
KJV

With love,

Chet

{e-mail me about Hank Henegraaff)

[ August 22, 2001: Message edited by: Chet ]

 

Chris,

Hello Brother. I read your post and thought ...almost. You quote Romans 8:1 which is powerful, there is no condemnation, whatsoever. This shows we can’t be affected. 1 John 2:1 is also a great passage, but we have an advocate in Jesus not in our verbal confession. The Godhead will always see Jesus righteousness before he can see our sin.

2 Cor 5:21-6:1
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become
the righteousness of God in Him.
NASU

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>NT:2842 koinonia (koy-nohn-ee'-ah); from NT:2844; partnership, i.e. (literally) participation, or (social) intercourse, or (pecuniary) benefaction: KJV - (to) communicate (-ation), communion, (contri-) distribution, fellowship.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Phil 3:9-10
and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death,
NKJV

1 Cor 1:8-9
God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
NKJV

I am thankful to God that if I had to rely on my constant reminder of sin in order to have sweet fellowship with Him, I wouldn’t. Its always there.

With love,

Chet

[ August 22, 2001: Message edited by: Chet ]

 

Brother Chris,

I thank you for responding, this is a healthy discussion. You ask a very difficult question. Can a person who commits adultery, murder or steals have a fellowship with Christ? This is difficult because you asked a human who can’t comprehend an unconditional
relationship. We all look for that, some in marriage, but the only relationship that is
completely unconditional is the one who is in Christ. Don’t misunderstand me, I
strongly believe that there are degrees to sin as the bible says. But all sins have the same result, death. So I ask, can a person have a better relationship to Christ who just tells a few white lies once in a while, but is pretty good other than that? It comes down to the fact that we can’t merit favor with God. Even in the confession of sins. I agree with you so much, we are asked or beseeched by God not to sin. But we have forgiveness
and grace to cover those sins already in advance. Confession does nothing. I am not
saying that a person can’t discuss their sins with God (I do that and it is really embarrassing ) but He has forgiven.

There are consequences to sin. If I drink a beer then I will not be sober, which could
result in me doing things I shouldn’t do. If jump off a building, I am going to get hurt. We reap what we sow. And even better God is our Father who is correcting us, even as you pointed out “For those whom the Lord loves He disciplines, And He scourges
every son whom He receives. He does not want us to sin! And He hates it. He will
correct us, and I think most of that is done through the Word of God:

2 Tim 3:16-17
All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.
NKJV

But its not true that God will turn from us, in fact the above scripture testify to that fact. He works with us. You brought up Eph 4:30. Again this is not about asking for forgiveness but simply stating that we can grieve the Spirit. I am sure we do this by sinning.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>NT:3076
lupeo (loo-peh'-o); from NT:3077; to distress; reflexively or passively, to be sad: KJV - cause grief, grieve, be in heaviness, (be) sorrow (-ful), be (make) sorry.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I think we should start a whole new thread on 1 John 5:16, because first of all I have some questions about that scripture and second I don’t believe God is in the business of rewarding us with death if we sin.

wells I thank you as well brother for the discussion.

You certainly brought out a great passage of Jesus washing the feet of Peter. We do get
our feet dirty, we do sin. God said we would sin. But Jesus is the one who washes our feet. He is our advocate, regardless of our verbal confessions. You are using David as an example, and that’s fine, but let me ask -Did David have the indwelling permanent Holy Spirit? Was he under a system that permanently took away sins forever? (Hebrews 9)

I think there is a major difference in the way we see 1 John chapter one. This is the crux of our disagreement. You are saying this refers to the formula for a person who is in Christ who must continually acknowledge our sins before God in order to really receive forgiveness of God. This is the popular teaching, as even my heroes of the faith attest, Charles Ryrie, Scoiefield, Lewis Sperry Chafer, Walvoord ect... But because its popular does not mean it right. John is contrasting between lost and saved. He makes it clear that we are IN Christ and we can’t walk in darkness. He makes it clear that all of our sins are forgiven, and if a person can’t admit their sin nature then the word is made out to be a liar and it is not inside of us. I feel that a whole complete doctrine has been made based on
one single verse. A verse that clearly indicates a one time event.

Are we forgiven or do we need to keep on asking? Only one of the two can be right. If you accept the later based on 1 John then it we must also be saying that there are unforgiven sins.

I will discuss the Lord’s prayer but its apples and oranges.

Gods wonderful blessings upon you brother!

With love,

Chet

 

Dajuid, Thanks for the comments. I have in a short time come to love you, wells, Dr.
Bob, Chris, and others. I highly respect their understanding of the Scriptures that they clearly do study.

Chris Temple I understand about the time thing

Wellsjs, all disagreement can be solved with an agreement that the Word of God is the truth Amen brother! Perhaps it is wise to start a thread focusing just on Psalms and Proverbs including all other poetic Scriptures in the light of dispensatinal study. In brief here is my thoughts. All scripture is profitable for 1. doctrine 2. instruction 3. correction 4. reproof. We can learn all these things from all scripture. But not all scripture is directed toward all people. For one of the best examples of this read 1 Timothy:5-11. With that said, David wrote the majority of the Psalms. He did so during the times recorded in the books of Samuel. And that was a time written during the Mosaic Law. A lot of what He wrote was under that assumption. I agree that Psalms and Proverbs are extremely unique and there are a tremendous amount of Christian conducts that can be gleaned from the study and the
application of its principles. Lets look at one of the most familiar chapters, 51
<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Ps 51:1-2 Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love; according
to your great compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash away all my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin.
NIV

Ps 51:7-9 Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than
snow. Let me hear joy and gladness; let the bones you have crushed rejoice. Hide your
face from my sins and blot out all my iniquity. NIV<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Now this is purely a different type of a prayer for than us today! While I can learn from it, it does not teach this in the New Covenant. God says to us:

Col 2:13 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he
quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;
KJV

Col 2:10
and you are complete in Him, who is the head of all principality and power.
NKJV

1 Cor 1:30
It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from
God-that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption.
NIV

Its almost insane to try to understand this believe me I know. But we are perfect and
righteous in His sight. He does not see Chet as a sinner, but a saint. He does not see my sin, but my Jesus righteousness.

1 John 4:17
Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment:
because as he is, so are we in this world.
KJV

Wow. My eyes just fill with tears as I think of my sins, then this passage. God gave us Jesus perfect righteousness. We not only IN Him but we are like Him. As He is
so are we. Did Jesus need to ask for forgiveness? No, He did not sin. And we have been given that righteousness.

Again Wells, Jesus said our sins are gone. In the Old Testament it is said they are thrown from the east to the west. Well that’s infinity. But John the Baptist declared that they are taken away by Jesus, taken away. We are told clearly that our sins, all of them, are forgiven. Lets use two illustrations, the first is mine, the second is one from Jesus. If my wife did something to hurt my feelings, then later asked,“will you forgive me?”I would probably pout a while, gain some sympathy, and use the opportunity to my advantage in some way hehehe, but then I would forgive. What if every day she would come to me and keep asking for the same forgiveness? I would say. “I did it already! Stop asking!” God forgave us in advance.

Lets look at the parable of the lost son found in Luke 15. This son left his Father, spent his money on parties ect.. lived with a Gentile, ate with pigs. But notice what happened when he returned home. In verse 18 he says, “ I will arise and go to my father and say I have sinned against heaven and before thee”. He also thought he would ask him to at least be a servant. But did he get the chance? Before he could say it His father had already forgiven him. He ran to him and kissed him and hugged him. The son could hardly speak before his father could order the servants to bring for the best robe and put a ring on his hand and have a feast. Perhaps all these things were just waiting for the return of his son.

Using an earthly father son relationship has merit, but it leaves out the greatness of God’s unconditional love for us. God forgives us even before we ask.

Lets go back again to 1 John look at these passages:

If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in
us.
If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in
us.
These are not saying its as if but saying they are not. If I have a sin that God declares a sin, but I thought it was not then does that mean His word is not even in me? These are stronger passages of Scripture than that. He is contrasting lost - saved. If we are saved we are complete, forgiven, perfected, reconciled justified, accepted, have been made near to God. No longer strangers but now friends. And that friendship is declared by God to be perfect.

And oh yes, there is still the Lords prayer hehehehe....

With love,

Chet

[ August 23, 2001: Message edited by: Chet ]

 

Hello brother wells, I am so glad you responded.

You are right, my wife analogy could only work for the same sin. Meaning if she sinned
against me again, then I would have to consider the forgiveness again. But we are
conditional God is unconditional. There are “lines we can't cross” for us. If she did something horrific or I to her, then as humans we are not so willing to forgive.
Much like if I called you a no good for nothing loser who was really an evolutionist, then I might be crossing the line. You may not forgive me. Even though we should it would not be easy.

Luke 17:3
So watch yourselves. "If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive
him.
NIV

But with God every sin has already been forgiven ahead of time. All of the sins that we will ever commit has been already forgiven. Regardless of how many times we do them.

Another illustration may be in order to clear up any misunderstandings that I may think it O.K. then to sin because of this forgiveness. Let us say there are two dogs. One dog a city dog who is always in the house or in a pen. As soon as you let him out, he just runs all over the neighborhood into other peoples yard. No matter how much you yell at your dog, he seems to have gone deaf. I know this from experience and ts over - the
embarrassment has come. But the second dog is a country dog who has 500 acres to
roam! He is free to do whatever his heart desires. But where is that dog when you open
your front door? Right there on the porch. The same is true with God, this can be used
to show that legalism don’t work. It can also show that He has forgiven us, set us free and we can now just do whatever we want. But this is the God we love, and with this God we are found right there on His porch, of course our feet a bit dirty. He will wash them.

Wells your said “Chet, dear brother, you keep saying its all about sin, and I'm
saying it's all about telling God (or your wife telling you) we're sorry. I agree with you completely about "forgiveness unto salvation." But when we damage our
fellowship with God (just as your wife damaged her fellowship with you), we should say we're sorry, i.e. ask for forgiveness.”
I agree, we should be sorry and tell Him we are sorry. There is nothing wrong with saying “I am sorry”. There is nothing wrong with saying “Please help”. But its wrong to keep asking for “forgiveness”. We can’t really compare horizontal fellowship with
humans with the vertical fellowship with God. Because we are forgiven I believe it is impossible to lose fellowshi. Again this will go back to 1 John in our
understanding of the passage. I believe in this passage clear factual statements attest that we are in Him and in the light. The Christian life is not a rollercoster ride, yet we make it out to be. We preach forgiveness from the pulpit, then we make all the saints come forward and kneel at an alter to keep asking for it over and over again so that we will feel right again. When He has made us right so we can enjoy our relationship without continually dwelling on that sin. People feel right with God today, but tomorrow may messed up causing Him to be displeased having us not feel right. Until we first John 1:9 ourselves and get my back again. Its an endless cycle.

Acts 8:22-24 is a reference to a lost man who thought he could purchase salvation. Peter tells him to repent.

In the parable of the lost son, to be technical, the son really did not ask for forgiveness. He did confess that he had sinned. He also thought he was not worthy to be a son anymore. Much like we feel when we sin, Satan is there to make us think we are no longer worthy. My point is worthiness does not come from us doing anything. Even
admitting to the sin. Which is really natural for a born-again Christian. God is like the Father in the parable, he had already hugged and kissed the son and welcomed him regardless of anything that came from his mouth.

Our relationship to Christ is so unbelievable we can’t even come close to even fathoming it. I sometimes sit on my swing in my yard as I meditate on Him and just can’t believe I know the creator of the universe. I am forgiven by this creator. Its so amazing.

With love,
Chet