Making a Practice of Sinning

Introduction

Read 1 John 3:4-10

1 John 3:4–10 ESV

4 Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. 5 You know that he appeared in order to take away sins, and in him there is no sin. 6 No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him. 7 Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. 8 Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. 9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God. 10 By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.

Question for Thought:

Explanation

Heart Check: How do we treat people who are walking in sin? We need to deal with this before we get into the text.

John Downame - We must avoid two extremes. One is to hate the person for the sin’s sake. The other is to love the sin for the person’s sake.

He gives this illustration. Imagine you are in a museum and you go up to a world renown piece of artwork. On the artwork, you see a smudge. Someone, in attempting to preserve the artwork, smudged it.

You can do one of three things: (1) You can hate the artwork because it is smudged. (2) You can love the smudge, because it is on the artwork. (3) You can love the artwork and hate that it is smudged. And that is the only option.

Does this make sense?

1 John 3:4–5 “4 Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness. 5 You know that he appeared in order to take away sins, and in him there is no sin.”

The Greek word for lawlessness here is “anomia” There is a doctrinal heresy known as “antinomianism.” Antinomianism the belief that because God’s grace is sufficient for us, we are released from the obligation of observing the moral law of God.

Do you think that is right belief? Are we released from the observance of God’s moral law because His grace has now come?

John answers the question: You know that he appeared in order to take away sins.

If you make a practice of sin, you make a practice of violating God’s law.

Violation of God’s law is what separates us from Him.

When I do pre-baptism counseling, I ask kids to confess their sins.

And I ask them who’s sin separated them from God. Is it mom’s? Dad’s? Brother and sisters? Even if they annoy them?

Yes, their sin separates them from God. The violation of God’s law separates them from Him.

Sin is a large affront to God. There are no small sins, because there is only a big God. And we sin against Him.

Jesus dealt with our sin and shame. He broke our bondage. I never understood the Israelites desire to go back to Egypt. God broke their bondage, and He brought them out to the wilderness. But they longed for Egypt over such trivial things.

1 John 3:6 “6 No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.”

The only answer is abiding in Christ. Sanctification, our growth in Christ, comes from Christ and Christ alone.

Abiding is the only way to keep from sinning. If you do not abide, you won’t have victory over sin. If you do abide in Christ, you WILL have victory over sin.

We talked much about this last week, but abiding is literally a work of life or death.

1 John 3:7 “7 Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous.”

Thabiti Anyabwile - John is addressing four types of Christians in 1 John

Fully- Assured nChristians

Christians struggling with assurance

Falsely assured non-Christians

Known non-Christians

Who do you think, of these four groups, that Paul is addressing?

In this passage, John is talking about falsely-assured non-Christians. He is attempting to shock them so and wake them up to their spiritual status.

Side-Note: Don’t do the shock therapy unless you have to do so. David Platt used Jim Shaddix’s sermon, and it didn’t turn out well for him.

1 John 3:8–10 “8 Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. 9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him; and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God. 10 By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.”

There is a dividing line. You will either be on one side of that line or the other.

You will either be on the side of the devil’s or on the side of Christ.

Invitation