Prentis
New Member
It's true Prentise that "God is merciful, but that is to the person, not to the sin." Sin is always in judgement and therefore God does not forgive sin but forgives the Christian just as you've stated. Rom 6:6 writes that "our old man is crucified with Him". The idea of crucifixion is not to immediately kill the subject, but only render him to a detained position until he is dead. This is the model of the ongoing ("is crucified"; not has been crucified, but remains on the cross, and that "daily"--Luke 9:23) crucifixion of our sinful nature, it is still alive enough to affect us but too weak to rule us and it will eventually be eradicated.
Christ is the "only begotten of the Father", but we are not. Christ is sovereign, but we are not. He is Deity, but we are not and He is sinless, but we are not.
Whether we are or not is not the issue here. The issue is whether the power is available to become the sons of God. People deny a standard of holiness they believe impossible because they have never experienced... But the Bible testifies to a power by which we become just like Christ. If we would die, Christ will live fully through us.
Do you believe this, that if we die, he will live through us? Then how can Christ sin? If he lives, and we don't, then there is no place for sin, because he is without sin. This is the truth men go through greath theological lengths to deny.
The issue is, regardless of our understanding concerning the continued possession of a sinful nature or the absence of it, the believer is free from the guilt of it. To be inaccurate in our understanding of this issue will not affect the possession of our salvation, but will affect the growth of it.
To claim we are without sin may intend a good motive but is a denial of self deception (1 John 1:8). The only way to be sinless, at anytime, is to never have sinned, because after the first sin, one is guilty of all sin (James 2:10) and only One can claim He has never sinned (1 John 1:10). This is also why "as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse" (Gal 3:10), because man wasn't intended to be able to kept the Law perfectly, to show it required Another that could. The Law was not intended to make one right because only Christ could make this possible. The Law was to reveal man is guilty of sin, because "the strength of sin is the Law" (1 Cor 15:56).
Free from the guilt? That is the basis of a powerless gospel. It takes out transformation, new life, and replaces it with immunity.
The issue is not to have never sinned.
Rom_3:25 Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;
2Pe 1:9 But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins.
If we truly have come to the cross, and been crucified with Christ, we are a new creation, and the things past are gone. The sin, the old life, is no more. But now we must abide in him and walk as he walked. This is the calling.
The unbelief preached in today's modern gospel is well masked... It becomes obvious with one question; can we truly be in Christ in whom there is no sin, and thus live as he lived? Is the gospel speaking of power, or words?
Paul himself claimed to have 'not yet attained'... The modern gospel of unbelief begs the question, attained what?