I Am Blessed 16:
Following your "logic", then this verse must be for 'lost' people only???
"If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."
I John 1:9
What about these verses?
"If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us."
I John 1:8
"If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us."
I John 1:10
Thank you for posting these verses. We should add to that list 1 John 2:2, that Jesus is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but for the sins of the whole world.
Now, avoiding the contentions about limited atonement in scope or unlimited atonement in scope, either way you go the idea of 2:2 is that the wrath of God is settled, the atonement is paid for and done with for Christians by Jesus ALONE, not by Jesus plus faith or works, (for even if faith is from us on our own it is a Work...cf. Ephesians 2:8,9...Salvation, even the faith to believe is itself a gift from God, we have NOTHING about which to boast). In other words, there is no forgiveness without an anchor, a sureity, and that sureity is Jesus.
1 John is where we get the idea that one can not "practice sin" and be a true Christian. It is important we do something called proper exegesis. What does John mean by this? Some people talk about "lifestyles of sin." (Well, if we apply this to the homosexual who is single but not at this moment having sex, then that would say that person isn't at this moment practicing sin. In short, if that is what this is talking about, then one would have to practice sin all the time and habitually). The point, though, that freeatlast and others miss is that the sin John is talking about is the sin of apostacy, the falling away from the faith. He is saying that if a person continues to repudiate the gospel and deny Jesus, then one is not a Christian.
The entire letter turns on the repudiation of the Gnostic heresy. This heresy was a rejection of the entire gospel message, specifically that Jesus is God the Son and hat He made a real atonement for our sins and that He bodily rose from the dead. These Gnostics had left the congregation and were claiming in fact that they had no sin.
John says that if they contintue to repudiate Christ, there is no propitiation for them. Why? Because in continuing in their sin of apostacy, they prove they did not know Jesus to start with. Their sins are not covered, they are not paid for by Jesus (no matter which way you go with limited or unlimited atonement, we all agree, their sins aren't ultimately paid for here, because they are going to hell). In other words, these people that say they have no sin, are, in fact, the greatest of sinners, they make God out to be a liar (for Jesus did come, He really did die, and He really did rise bodily from the grave and not spiritually), and they further make God out to be a liar because they make a claim that they don't have any sin in them anyway (one of Gnosticism's key teachings). In doing this, they prove they do not have the truth in them and they are making God out to be liar.
Basically, folks, if you sit there and say to us and, thus to God that you don't practice sin of some sort, you are, in fact, the biggest sinner among us, because you deny the truth. The practice of sin that was going on in the Ephesian church was an outright apotasy, but it's ethical effect was an asceticim, an austere type of separation from the world. It effectively set the Gnostics off and they said, because of their practices, that "they had no sin in them," and so they proved the truth not to be in them and God to be liar. How ironic, then this truth becomes for us today. If you say that you have no sin, that you do not practice sin, you are in fact practicing sin! Your anthropology is way to high and you have likely forgotten that, while some sins, like homosexuality, do have greater consequences than others, you have forgotten the standard for sin and the practice of it is the holiness of God, not the relative comparison between individuals. Anybody that sins "just a little" or "every so often, but not that much" is, in fact practicing sin. It may not be the same sin all time, but the bottom line is that the Bible doesn't say "if you keep on in the same sin, you're not really a Christian," it simply says that if you practice sin you aren't a Christian," and, when we look at what it really means, the sin that is being practiced is apostacy and the effect of the apostacy is the claim that you don't have any sin in you to start with!
What did Billy Mac and I both say? We both were Christians, we knew we were Christians, and the entire time we were in sin, we knew we had sin in us and never denied it. Our hearts were under conviction the whole time. I came to Christ when I was 19, and my life was totally changed. I didnt commit a homosexual act until I was in my 20's. To say I wasn't saved is just, frankly, wrong. I did know the gospel, I had invited Jesus into my heart and life, and He had set about changing my heart, but, I also had serious childhood trauma to deal with, and that worked it's way out eventually, into homosexuality. It took indulging in those sins for me to "bottom out" as with an addiction for me to come to a point where Jesus could teach me humility and to get me to a point where I was ready to let him heal the traumas that formed the homosexual desires that I acted out upon in sexual sin and in drug addiction. It didn't mean I wasn't saved. It meant I had serious issues and I had to acknowledge I had those issues (which meant coming out) and it eventually meant letting go of those issues (which I finally did in a similar way to Billy Mac).
If you sit here and make blanket states that the person that is a homosexual can't really be saved if they continue in sin, you've missed the entire point of the letter of 1 John. If they do, and they really do, in their heart of hearts believe that they are not sinning and that they are not, in fact, sinners of any kind AND they also repudiate the gospel itself (for it takes both to practice the sin of apostacy), then you are correct and they are not Christians at all and they never were. They are not struggling with their sin, for that matter they aren't struggling with any sin at all. To recap: The person must not be struggling with sin at all, have no conviction in their hearts regarding sin (for the Holy Spirit convicts us of sin, righteousness, and Jesus Christ), and they must repudiate the truth of the gospel as well. This is the pattern of 1 John with regard to the nature of the apostacy of the men about whom John wrote.
However,
YOU AREN'T GOD, and YOU'RE NOT THAT PERSON, so you don't have ANY right to sit in judgment on them. John wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit about these folks, you're not being inspired from the Holy Spirit about the hearts and minds of every individual homosexual. If you think you are, then I'd like to introduce you to liberal Christianity and neo-orthodoxy, because that is a doctrine straight from there.
Here is a short sample of the doctrines of apostacy and backsliding from R.B.C. Howell, a Baptist:
" It is, secondly, necessary that you discriminate carefully, between backsliding, and apostasy. The former is the act of turning back from God; the latter is the forsaking, or the renouncing of the religion of Christ. Backsliding consists either in the relinquishment of evangelical doctrine; or in the loss of spirituality of mind; or in the gradual departure from correct morals.
All these evils are embraced in apostasy. The backslider commits transgressions, but returns to his allegiance, and obtains forgiveness, and acceptance. The apostate continues; dies in his sins; and "so eternally perishes." We teach that none of the true children of God--he believing, the pardoned, the regenerated, the sanctified--become apostate, but to backsliding, of every character and degree, all, it is but too evident, even the best, and most devoted, are constantly, and painfully liable. "
Here is an article by an acquaintance of mine, Matt Slick regarding this very subject with regard to homosexuals:
http://www.carm.org/questions/sex_homo.htm
It all boils down to this: If that person that is homosexual is not experiencing any conviction of any sort and they also express a complete lack of desire for the things of God (which are internal and only God and that person can truly know) and this shows in their life (which you can see) and that person in both heart and with voice can repudiate the gospel, the match the pattern given for apostacy as set forth in Scripture with regard to the Gnostics and some of the Judaizers as set forth in the Johnanine epistles and Hebrews. If however, they do not fit this pattern, and they have made a profession of faith, unless you can see their hearts, you should treat them as a backsliders. If they are not saved, God will deal with them in the end. You are not God; you can't see the heart, and you have no right to tell somebody they are not a Christian, unless you can know the things that person knows and God knows. Likewise, you have no right to tell somebody that returns to the Lord that it is sure that they weren't saved until a later point, again, because only God and that person know that. Likewise, if you sit and say, "I do not practice sin," you do in fact practice sin, for that is the very sin you practice, and so you say God is a liar, and you are one of the greatest sinners among us.
[ October 19, 2004, 12:18 PM: Message edited by: GeneMBridges ]
