day 4

1 John 1:8-10

I know that in my own life I could have avoided a lot of pain by simply living by the Word of God that I knew and understood. It was never a matter of knowing the entire Bible, but only applying what I already knew. In John’s day the common Greek inspired philosophies were all convinced that reason and knowledge were the means to salvation. This is of course a falsehood. Intelligence and reason are tools that can help us understand and apply the word of God to our daily living.

The people that John was writing to were used to a polytheistic system that lacked a divine standard of morality. If you remember your Greek/Roman mythology then we know that the gods were among other moral failings jealous, adulterers, murderers, incestuous, petty, thieves and mutually deceptive. For many people the basis of right and wrong was a matter of public opinion. Does this sound familiar?

I believe that this is also true for many people today. They often reason that they are good people or at least better than those people, whom the want to compare themselves with, over there. They become so convinced of their own goodness and righteousness that they believe that they are sin free. It is always so sad to see people so falsely lead astray. If a person thinks that they are sin free then they will have no need to confess their sins and therefore they live outside of God’s grace and mercy. Such a person then would never seek God to ask him for forgiveness. Such a person does experience neither God’s grace nor his power to transform lives. Moreover by believing in this lie, they deceive themselves.

This is a struggle between two world views. On one hand there is this Christian world view which says that God is the ultimate basis for determining the difference between right and wrong. On the other hand there is the thought right and wrong are determined by the individual or a majority of a particular group. The Bible says that God’s way is correct and any other opposing way is then wrong. This is based upon an understanding of God as holy and righteous. He is the very definition of truth. This is something that Jesus, God, claims about himself, John 14:6. He is the way, the truth and the life.

This suggests something that is far more intimate than just my 1½ hour Sunday worship service. We need to invite Jesus into our daily living. It is Jesus in my home and my job and my school that brings the truth of his claims into tangible reality. Just think about it for a minute. He is the path that I follow. This is the basic pattern of my life, from the time I wake up until I go to sleep at night.

Every person’s life is on a path. There is no person who is pathless. Each path has a destination. Now as a Christian my life is on the Christ path where every believer starts off. After some time has passed then there are opportunities to follow smaller parts of the path. This is what I would call the path of being a dedicated follower or Jesus-in-the-middle-of-my-life path. This smaller path has nothing to do with salvation because it is part of the Christ path. It does however have a lot to do with in what way I follow Christ.

This path requires a type of nakedness before God. The doors of my life are opened to Jesus. This is scary because this means that certain behaviours and thought patterns must be corrected. In this nearness I cannot ever portray myself as sinless, perfect or better than others. In it I am resigned to accepting some things about myself, without making the very common mistake of then stating that I am now this thing.

I sin. I sin more than I ever wish to. I want to do the right thing but many times my motives are wrong or I just keep choosing the wrong thing. But I’ve decided to live intimately with God. He has unbridled access to my life. So through his Word and the Holy Spirit I am alerted to the presence sin manifested in my life. If I claim something other than what God has informed me, then what I am saying that God is a liar. It is only when I come into agreement with what God is saying that I can then be cleansed of my sin. I have to admit that it is sin. Sin is always wrong. Sin always incurs debt and harms fellowship. Since sin in all these things is in opposition to God, and I follow the Christ path, which is life in harmony with God, I turn away from the sin and turn to God. By his the guarantee of the Spirit and his power I can do all these things. This is part of the consequential gifts of salvation, which is much stronger than my own will power.

The only way that I can do this is because I am convinced of God’s faithfulness, justice and power.

He is faithful, so that each and every time I confess my sin to him he turns his face towards me and hears my. It is like the prodigal son each and every time, the loving father who receives the wayward child. God receives me. In this verse is an underlying promise that when we come to God in this way we will meet his mercy and not his wrath. I know what I deserve but that should not become an obstacle to what I need.

He is just. God tells it like it is. He is truth and as many have experienced the truth sometimes (I think often) hurts. In this confession there is a brutality to the honesty of the conversation. And yet this is one of the greatest acts of love. Adultery is not something that just happens or is the justified response to marital problems. It is sin. It is wrong. It hurts. It is allowing the lust in my heart a justified path of expression. It causes a breakdown in trust and fellowship, etc. In this honest light this is only a fraction of what one is confronted with. But then comes the good part.

We receive forgiveness and cleansing. This is because of his power. Jesus is the only one who can cleanse us of all unrighteousness. It does not matter how bad or how long you’ve been at it. This is such an act of trust. If I were to have a bowel movement in my pants, I would feel too ashamed and afraid to come to one of you and ask for help. But when it comes to God I know that it doesn’t matter. I don’t need to be cleaned first.

This message must have rocked St. John’s first century readers. They could have never expected this from the pagan gods. I know how it has sounded to me. I will never fully understand the depth of God’s love, but I am so glad that it exists.