02 What It Really Means to ‘Walk in the Light’ (1 John 1:5-10)

Krisan Marotta: Good morning. This is Krisan Marotta. Thank you for downloading the Wednesday in the Word podcast. This is the podcast where we explain not only what scripture means, but how we figure it out. Today we're gonna be covering First John chapter 1 verses 5 through 10. This is the second talk in our series on 1 John. The lecture notes for today's talk are on the link below this podcast, or you can find them on the website. Just go to wednesdayintheword.com slash one John Two. So glad you joined us today. Every self-help book I've ever read needs one more chapter. And that chapter is how do I do that? Most of the time when we're faced with an ethical or moral decision, we already know the right thing to do. The problem is we don't want to do it. Whatever the question is, if it's how to deal with desires, how to deal with difficult people, how to deal with anger, lack of patience. Whatever the problem is, we usually have a pretty good guess about the right thing to do. Often, at some level, we really know what the right thing to do is, but we don't like it. And you've seen this. Some great article gives you five steps to control your anger, and step one is remain calm. Well, yes, that's the problem. If I could remain calm, that would keep me from getting angry, but how do I become the kind of person who can remain calm? How do I change me? Not just control a momentary outburst, but how do I change so that I become the kind of person who doesn't get angry so easily? Because my real problem is how do I get that inner strength or resolve to do whatever the steps are they're saying to take? How do I be the kind of person that even wants to take whatever steps they're recommending? That's my problem. And no self-help book I've ever seen addresses that. The bottom line is what we all really want are a few simple doable steps. We want to know those few easy steps that will transform us and make us different than we are. We can come up with five steps, but in the end I would contend they won't work. And they won't work because we aren't the right kind of people. There are no such techniques and devices that will change me at that deep level. The only thing that will transform us is God at work inside us through His Holy Spirit. God through his spirit can change us so that we now look at life from a gospel centered worldview. We now catch that vision of what holiness is and how wonderful godliness is, and we have become committed to that deep in our souls. So I would contend what transforms us is understanding reality differently than we used to understand it. We need to become the kind of people who see the world the way God sees it and not the way our selfish, sinful selves saw it. And that doesn't come from practicing five steps. It comes from seeking the things of God and believing them and having Him work inside us. We get there by becoming fortified in the truth of the gospel, not by reading self-help books. That's precisely the problem that John addresses in our passage today, the problem of sin. So let's just review a little where we are in the letter. When John writes this letter, he is an old man, most likely the last surviving apostle. He probably wrote this letter from Ephesus and it was near the end of his life. The generation that lived it during Jesus' earthly ministry is passing away. There are very few of them left, and of course John is the last apostle. As they pass away, a dispute arose in the church over the gospel. Because now instead of the churches learning the gospel directly from an apostle or from someone sent directly by an apostle, now they're learning the gospel one more step removed, and the gospel's getting distorted. And false teachers are arising who claim, no, no, the apostles got all that teaching of Jesus wrong, but not to worry, we teachers have the real gospel, and oh by the way, Jesus never claimed to be the Messiah. Well, John as the last surviving apostle steps into that debate to set the record straight. And we looked at his opening in the last podcast where he appeals to the fact that he was an eyewitness to the life of Jesus. John says he not only heard Jesus preach and teach, he saw, heard, and touched him. It's always been interesting to me that John adds touched in that list. Seeing and hearing would be enough to qualify him as an eyewitness, but John notes that he had the extra experience of touching, of physically touching Jesus and touching those people that Jesus healed. And just imagine Jesus heals the man with the withered hand, and then you walk over and you can feel the now strong muscles in his arm. Or imagine embracing Lazarus after he walks out of the tomb and helping him remove the grave clothes. John not only saw and heard everything Jesus said and did, John also had that kind of sensory firsthand experience with it as well. So John tells us that the gospel is about how to find life in the kingdom of God and that he, as an apostle, is in a unique position to teach that message because he was there, he saw, he heard, he touched, and he was commissioned by Jesus and given the authority to speak for Jesus. So if you want to know which voice to listen to amidst the cacophony of voices, you listen to Jesus and the apostles Jesus sent. Jesus has the words of life, the message, and the truth about how to find life in the kingdom of God, and Jesus uniquely gave his apostles the authority to speak for and about him. So John is saying, This is objective truth about reality. It comes from God to Jesus, to us, and we apostles are telling you so that you might know and understand how to find eternal life. That was verses one through four of chapter one. Now in verse five, he begins to explain what that message is and how to recognize it. I'm going to read first John chapter one verses five through ten. This is the message we have heard from him and announced to you that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. Let's start with verse five. This is the message we have heard from him and announced to you that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. When he starts, this is the message we heard from him. I think the hymn is Jesus, and John does not intend to give us a summary of the entire gospel, but rather to explain the part of Jesus' teaching that is relevant to the issue at hand. Essentially the context we have is John is writing to churches who are trying to sort out what's the real gospel and what's the false gospel. He's established his authority to be able to say this one is right and this one is wrong, and now he's saying, here's the first thing you need to know. You need to know that God is light and in him there is no darkness at all. And I would paraphrase that. What Jesus said in his teaching that is relevant to the point at hand is that God is completely, totally, and utterly good. There's no aspect of his being that is the least bit compromised by evil. So what's the first thing you need to know when you're trying to recognize a real gospel versus a false gospel that God is light and in him there is no darkness. Essentially what he's going to go on to say is God is the source of all holiness, righteousness, goodness, and truth. And he's going to say, Therefore, those who are in fellowship with God, those who believe what God has taught through Jesus, will have a certain understanding of sin. Those who are in fellowship with him will have lives marked by a concern for goodness and a pursuit of righteousness. Let's talk about what he means by God is light. It's interesting that Jesus is not recorded in any of the Gospels as saying God is light. He does refer to himself as the light, and in that context I think he's making a very similar point to John here. In the Gospel of John chapter eight, verse twelve it says, Then Jesus again spoke to them saying, I am the light of the world, and he who follows me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the light of life. Notice the light of light. Light is often a metaphor for life, truth, and goodness. And by life I mean eternal life or salvation. And we see this usage of life or salvation in several places. For example, Psalm 27 1, the Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? Notice light and salvation are parallel terms there. Psalm thirty six nine, for with you is the fountain of life, in your light we see light. Again, the context is this finding the fountain of life, and he says, Your light, it is in your light that we see light. How do we find the fountain of life? We find it in God's life. Again we see this metaphor of light equaling salvation, equaling life. Then in Isaiah forty nine we find Isaiah quoting God who is speaking about his servant, and God says in forty nine, six, I will also make you a light of the nations, so that my salvation may reach the end of the earth. So God says he will make his servant, who I think is the Messiah, who is Jesus Christ, a light to the nations, so that salvation will reach the end to the ends of the earth. God sends his servant to proclaim the truth so that everyone to the farthest corners of the earth would know how to find salvation, and he calls that being a light to the nations. Closely related to light as eternal life or salvation, we also see light as a metaphor for truth in contrast to darkness, which is often error. Now, you can see the connection there. We need to know the truth to find eternal life. But here's an example, Psalm 119, verses 104 and 105. From your precepts I get understanding, therefore I hate every false way. Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. So where do we get understanding? From God's word, and how is that visualized as a light or a lamp that lights our way? We learn truth from falsehood, and your word is the lamp to light that truth. Proverbs six twenty-three for the commandment is a lamp and the teaching is light, and reproofs for discipline are the way of life. Again, notice light and life are parallel here, and they talk about the way to find life. Light sheds light on the truth so that we might know how to find life. How do you find truth? You find it through God's commandments, God's teaching, and God's discipline, and that is a lamp or a light to the way of life. So we see light as a metaphor for salvation or life. We see it as a metaphor for truth, and finally we see it as a metaphor for goodness or holiness, which is of course another idea closely associated with finding eternal life. Most of you are probably familiar with John three sixteen, but let's read the verses that follow it. This is Jesus speaking. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through him. He who believes in him is not judged. He who does not believe has been judged already because he is not believed in the name of the only begotten Son. And now notice the use of light here. This is John three hundred nineteen. This is the judgment that the light has come into the world, and men love the darkness rather than the light, for their deeds were evil. For everyone who does evil hates the light and does not come to the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the light so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God. Notice how he talks about how men love the darkness rather than the light because their deeds are evil. Light is that place where we find goodness, holiness, and righteousness, in contrast to the dark where we find evil, selfishness, and sin. Light is the place where we know the truth about what is right and wrong, and therefore we understand holiness and godliness and we live accordingly. In contrast, darkness is the place out of the light where we ignore the truth and practice evil and sin and selfishness. Finally, I want to look at how Paul uses light as a metaphor in Ephesians. This is Ephesians five verses seven through eleven. Therefore do not be partakers with them, for you were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. For the fruit of light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth, trying to learn what is pleasing to the Lord. Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them. Paul is talking about walking in the light and being children of the light, and his emphasis is on being people whose life is characterized by goodness, holiness, and a concern for righteousness. Children of the light, that is children who understand the truth that God has revealed, believe his gospel, and are on the path to finding eternal life. They now have God working to change them so that they experience goodness and righteousness, and that's what I think he means by the fruit of the light. No longer do they live their lives in the darkness that is characterized by sin and selfishness and evil, but rather their lives are characterized by striving for holiness. So let's take all that back to 1 John. He's writing to people who are confused about how we recognize the true gospel, and he says, What's the first thing you need to know? Here it is. God is light and in him there is no darkness. When you're trying to recognize the true gospel, the first question you should ask is, What is this gospel teaching me about sin and holiness? If this gospel has a low or a minimalist view of sin and a disregard for holiness, it is most likely not the real deal. But if this gospel takes sin seriously and has a high view of the standard of holiness, then it's most likely on the right track because God is the source of salvation, truth, and holiness, and those who follow Him are seeking those things. So John is saying, if you want to know what's true, if you want to know the foundational truth that will show you how to find life, I can tell you I'm an eyewitness to the life and ministry of Jesus. Jesus is the visible representation of the invisible God, and God is light. God is the source of all holiness, righteousness, goodness, and truth, and those who are in fellowship with him will have lives marked by a concern for goodness and a pursuit of righteousness. Now he is not saying that those who follow Jesus will now be perfectly obedient. John is not saying that true believers will no longer struggle with sin, far from it. In fact, he's gonna go on to say in the very next verses, he's going to explain how we should view our sin. He's gonna talk about how we are forgiven when we sin, but he expects we're gonna continue this struggle with sin. But there's a fundamental difference between believers and non-believers when it comes to our attitudes towards sin and holiness. Believers take sin very seriously. We understand that sin is more than a misstep here and there or a couple of slips where we break the law or speak a little white lie. We understand that God is holy and we are not, and that judgment day is coming, and on that day those who rebel against God and pursue a life of sin and evil are going to be destroyed along with this creation. But those who trust in the blood of Jesus to cover the the guilt of their sins and pay their debt to justice, they will find eternal life and a place in the new heavens and earth that God creates. So I think John's point here is God is the source of salvation, truth, and goodness. God is completely and utterly good. If you claim that you're following Jesus and thus God, you will necessarily want to be forgiven and freed from your sin and will strive to be holy. Because that's the point he's going to go on to make in the next verses. Let's go on to verse six. If we say that we have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. Fellowship, this Greek word simply means having a share in something with someone. So fellowship is or koinania is having something in common with somebody else. The hymn here I think is God. And in this context, he's talking about being believers. If we claim to share the same understanding that God has, in other words, if we claim to share the same gospel that God revealed through Jesus about the way to find life, and we pursue sin, that is, we walk in darkness, we pursue sin, we're lying. If we claim to understand and believe what God has said to be true, and yet we walk in the darkness, we pursue sin as a lifestyle, we are lying to ourselves. Walking is a metaphor for how you live your life. Your choices reveal what you really believe. So I can tell you what I believe with words, but you judge how honest I'm being by how I act. For instance, if I claim to hate ice cream and then I eat a bowl of it, my actions reveal what I really believe to be true. It calls into question what I just said. As an example, Netflix dropped their original rating system because watching activity didn't match ratings. Everyone, for example, would rate Schindler's list very high, but few people actually watched it. Their culture said this is a great film and you should value it, so they gave it five stars, but it went when it came time to sit down and turn something on to watch, they would watch something dumb and dumber. That's a case where, as we say, actions speak louder than words. And we have other cliches that capture that idea. We say things like, you can talk the talk, but can you walk the walk? Or do as I say, not as I do. All of those cliches capture this idea that when it matters, when you have to make a choice about what to watch, what to value, what to pursue, where to set your goals and your hope, that's your walk. And that walk reveals what you really believe. Your walk is the way you live your life that makes it clear what is governing you, who you're following, what you believe in, what you're counting on. And you'll see this metaphor used in the scriptures frequently. Paul talks about walking in the spirit versus walking in the flesh. Here we see John talking about walking in the light, in contrast to walking in darkness. The idea is if we claim to follow Jesus and then we pursue evil sin and selfishness, we're lying and we're not living according to the truth that Jesus revealed. So I would paraphrase verse six something like if we claim to believe God. God's message as revealed by Jesus' teaching, and yet live our life in such a way that it's characterized by evil. We are lying about believing God and do not live in accordance with what is true. Now scholars debate whether John has Gnostic teaching in mind here or not. Some say that Gnosticism had already begun at the time John wrote this letter. Others say Gnostic teaching came much later in the second century, and I suspect there's some truth in both of that. From my study, I do think that full blown, widespread cultural Gnosticism came a long time after this letter, but I suspect the ideas were already beginning to circulate and catch hold when John was writing. Among other things, the Gnostics taught that it doesn't matter what you do with your body as long as your spirit is enlightened. So as long as you had their secret knowledge and your spirit was enlightened, you could do whatever you want. Promiscuity, drunkenness, hedonism, whatever is alright as long as your spirit is saved because you've been enlightened. So they had this disconnect between what you believe and what you do. And that's the idea John is writing against, even if Gnosticism itself wasn't widespread yet. And we see Paul dealing with the same basic idea in Romans. He had to argue against those who took his teaching and said, Hey, Paul says we're saved by grace. That means we're forgiven. We don't have to keep the law. We're forgiven now by the blood of Jesus. And since we don't have to keep the law to be saved, we can do whatever we want, eat, drink, and be merry. And Paul writes against that in Romans 7. He says, You don't no, no, that is not an implication of my gospel. Part of the gift of saving faith is that we no longer want to sin. Part of faith is coming to realize that sin is my most serious and deepest problem, and I need to be saved from it. Why would we continue to pursue the very thing we want to be rescued from? If we don't care about holiness and righteousness, then we don't care about the gospel because the gospel is all about salvation from sin. So we know that idea was around at the time of John, whether it was full-blown Gnosticism or just an idea that was catching hold. I think that's the idea John's writing against. He says then in verse 6, if we claim to share Jesus' teaching and view of the world and yet live our lives in such a way that it's characterized by evil, we're lying about believing Jesus' teaching and do not live in accordance with the truth. And then he goes on in verse seven. But if we walk in the light, as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his son cleanses us from all sin. Okay, walk in the light. Walking has that same idea here. He's not saying we now live perfect lives, but rather our lives reveal what we believe to be true. Walking in the light is to strive to pursue love and holiness and truth and godliness. And I think this is the exact idea Jesus meant when he talked about hungering and thirsting after righteousness. If I claim to follow God, if I claim to believe in Jesus, then my life will no longer be characterized by a thirst for sin, it will be characterized by a thirst for holiness. If my life is characterized by this thirst for holiness, then I am a believer and I'm forgiven, and that's the connection that John's making. Peter makes that same connection, James does too. To paraphrase, if we live our lives in such a way that it's characterized by striving after goodness, then we do in fact share the same understanding of the gospel as God and Jesus, and Jesus' death on the cross pays the debt for our sins. Let me give you an analogy to explain what I think is going on here. Suppose you're lost in the jungle and a local comes along and says, I am the best tour guide in the jungle. I can get you out of here. Do you believe me? And you say, Oh yes, I believe you. You are the best tour guide in the jungle. And then he says, Great, follow me, we're going north. But you then say, Oh, you know that northern path is kind of steep and it looks really difficult and rocky. I think we should go south. That way looks very smooth and downhill. And the guide says, But south is gonna lead you over a cliff. I am the best tour guide in the jungle. I grew up here, I know every square inch of this place, trust me, north is the way to go. And you say, Well, I believe you're the best tour guide in the jungle, but I really want to go south. That's the way I'm going. In that situation, your actions have revealed what you really believe to be true. You say one thing, you say you believe he's the best tour guide in the jungle, but your actions tell a different story. If you truly believed he was the best tour guide in the jungle, then you would follow him. So you said you believed one thing, but when it came right down to it and it came time to make a choice and act on your beliefs, you didn't really believe that to be true because it didn't change your decisions or your choices. So we would say your walk did not match your talk. And that's the kind of thing John's getting at here. If we claim to follow Jesus and we pursue sin and glory in it and revel in it and love it, then we're lying. But if we claim to follow Jesus and we regret our sin and repent and grieve over it and we pursue holiness, that shows our faith to be genuine, and if our faith is genuine, we will be forgiven. I would argue that John is not talking about a moment by moment experience here, but rather he's talking about the overall tone and characteristic of our lives. In other words, John is not saying, Well, you sinned yesterday, so now you're disqualified, or I caught you in a lie today, so your claims to faith are false. I don't think John's that kind of perfectionist. He doesn't expect 24-7 perfect obedience. Neither do I think he's describing a now you're cleansed, now you're not kind of experience. I don't think this verse or the rest of scripture teaches that you can be good. Oh wait, no, you're not. Oh wait, now you're good, nope, now you're not, kind of in and out of God's favor. Rather, I think he's talking about the overall characteristic of your life. When people look at you, what do they see? Do they see someone who sins and grieves over it, or do they see someone who sins and glories in it? And walking is the metaphor for that overall characteristic of your life. What is it that defines the character and quality of your lifestyle? Is the controlling force in your life a desire for sin or a desire for holiness? Where have you set your hope? Who and what are you counting on? Where do you think you're going to find life and fulfillment and meaning? Genuine believers are characterized by a desire to be holy. And if you have that hunger for righteousness, that's a mark of saving faith and a sign that you are in fact forgiven and covered by the blood of Jesus. Verse 8, if we say that we have no sin, we're deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. Okay, he adds the idea of how we understand our sinfulness. I'd paraphrase verse 8 something like, if we deny that we are inherently sinful, we do not understand reality and do not know the truth. To deny our sinfulness is to be missing an element of faith, the recognition of our own moral bankruptcy before God. So I think in six and seven he dealt with the issue of do we want to be holy? In eight and nine, he's dealing with the question, do we understand the depth of our problem with sin? Because it's possible to want to be good and think, you know, I'm almost there. I'm I'm really pretty good. And many people believe that being totally good is within our power. Now the Gnostics claimed that they had gotten beyond all this good and evil stuff. They claimed they had reached a stage of spiritual development where moral principles just weren't relevant anymore because they were enlightened so they could do whatever they wanted with their bodies. And John would say that's self-deceived. We also see a similar attitude in the Pharisees of Jesus' day. They thought that they were good because they kept the law. They would have said, Well, I'm not really sinful. Yes, I'm looking for God to save me, but I'm I'm not really sinful, I'm just human. Those those little missteps and white lies, that's just being human, but I'm not really sinful because look, I eat kosher, I keep the law, I'm going to all the festivals, and I'm following all the rules. Those minor white lies and mistakes done, then that's just normal human stuff. That doesn't matter. But the gospel is all about this problem of sin. And if I don't recognize that I have a problem with sin, it calls into question whether I really care about the gospel. We need to be forgiven for our sins so that we can find life, and we need to be rescued from our sinfulness so that we can find godliness. That's what God has promised to do through us through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The Christian hope is primarily a hope for moral restoration or a hope of the glory of God, as Paul says in Romans 5. Sin has nothing to offer us in the long run, even if it seems attractive now in the short run. I don't think John is contrasting perfect people with people who are messing up now and then. He's contrasting those who walk in the light with those who walk in darkness. He's contrasting repentant sinners with people who claim to follow Jesus, but are unwilling to admit that they need to change anything about their lifestyle or that sin is a problem. They are unwilling to admit that sin is a problem that needs to be solved. They want to indulge themselves, so they put together a religious system that gives them permission to indulge. Yet I think Scripture teaches that faith includes this vision of being free from sin and sharing in God's holy moral character. It includes what Jesus talked about as hungering and thirsting after righteousness, and that hunger and thirst shapes my life now. Yes, I still sin, but I have this vision that there is something better and a life of faith follows that vision. So it's not only do I want to live in the kingdom of God, I want to be holy and good like Jesus when I'm there. So if I say that I have no need for that kind of forgiveness and rescue, because you know I'm not really that sinful, then I'm deceiving myself and I have not understood the truth or the message that Jesus taught. Verse 9, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. So when he says here in verse 9, confess our sins, I would argue that the context suggests that he is not talking about acknowledging each and every individual sin, but to agree that we are intrinsically sinful. All the other verses in this section are talking about the overall characteristic of their lives. How do we walk? Walking is not taking one step in one moment, at least I don't think that's what the metaphor means. I think it is the overall goal and direction of our lives. Is our life, our outlook, do our actions and attitudes and beliefs are they marked by a longing for holiness and a recognition of our sinfulness, or are they all marked by a pursuit of sin? When he says he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, I think he means he is just and trustworthy. He is a just, trustworthy advocate who can forgive our sins because of his sacrifice. So faithful here, I would I think has the emphasis of trustworthy, you can count on it, his promise is sure. Righteousness has the idea of just as injustice, he is fair and just and can justly forgive our sins because of his sacrifice, and then cleansing has the sense of removing our guilt for the sin. So we are reconciled to God, we are no longer rebel outcasts, no longer his enemies, because our guilt has been forgiven. Now I would argue that John is not advocating that we adopt some kind of spiritual practice or discipline to ensure that we confess each and every sin. And I would argue that this verse does not teach no confession, no forgiveness, because that's salvation by a really good memory and being organized. Well, you might say, well, why is this verse conditional? He says, if we confess our sins, why does he say if? Well, forgiveness is conditional, but the condition is not did I remember to confess to each and every sin? The condition is do I have saving faith? And the first part of saving faith is realizing that I am sinful and left to myself, I can do nothing about it. The condition is bowing your knee to the truth, not whether you perform some kind of ritual or discipline. Now, some people would respond to me, well, yes, but John is not talking about ultimate salvation in this verse. John is talking about being in God's good graces or being in fellowship with Him. I can't lose my ultimate salvation, but I can fall in and out of God's favor in this life. So they would say, Yes, I will be saved, but God is not pleased with me right at this moment. And so John is giving me away a ritual to get back into God's good graces, and that ritual is confession. Well, I would argue that we cannot fall out of God's favor like that. We are either forgiven or we're not. We are saved and chosen and elect and part of God's children, or we're not. There is no well you're saved, but reluctantly. Now we may not feel like we're in God's favor in the same way every child thinks her parent hates her when her parents discipline her. But our feelings lie to us. Forgiveness is not dependent on how we feel at any given moment, whether we feel emotionally close to God or not. It's a reality based on the blood of Christ, and we are either forgiven or we're not, we're saved or we're not, we're his child or we're not. Now he may be disciplining us, but we have not lost his favor. So John is saying in this verse, if we acknowledge our inherent sinfulness as sin, then Jesus is a just and trustworthy advocate on our behalf, such that as a result, God forgives the debt incurred by our sins and removes our guilt. The if then is whether or not we fundamentally understand the problem of sin and our need for our Savior in Jesus Christ. And in the context and the flow here, I think that John includes this to emphasize the idea that we need have no fear of confronting our sin. We need have no reservations about facing into our sin fully and admitting our the depth of our problem because God is faithful to forgive us. We have nothing to lose and everything to gain by owning up to our sinfulness. We will receive forgiveness and cleansing, not wrath and punishment. So I think that's why he's saying, Don't be afraid to face into your sin, because if you do, God will forgive you. The gospel is about how to find his forgiveness and salvation. He is not a God who requires you to get your act together before you can approach him. Quite the opposite. All it takes is the humble admission of Father, I am not worthy, I have sinned, I am a sinner, and the only way I will be forgiven and redeemed is by trusting in the blood of Jesus Christ. Then verse 10. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us. I would paraphrase that. If we deny that our actions are evil, we contradict the teaching of God as revealed through Jesus and show that we do not understand his message. I think what this verse adds to the argument is can we tell right from wrong? Are we making excuses for our sins and saying, well, that's not really sin, that's you know, that's just normal stuff. You know, I want to be good and I might not be good, but you know, I'm pretty close. Those actions are really sinful. Now, we all do that to some extent, but the question is, is this the overall quality of your life or not? Is this a type of behavior that defines you? Some of the heretics would acknowledge that sin was a problem in theory, but they claimed that because they were enlightened, they didn't sin anymore. They were no longer sinful people, and it didn't matter what they did with their bodies, they just weren't sinful anymore. I think John is saying this is self-deception. This accuses God of lying because the scripture says we are all sinful, and that's a denial of the truth. Essentially, John is describing the kind of understanding that genuine believers share, and I want to suggest to you that this is what saving faith is all about. I have this definition of saving faith that I teach over and over because it just comes up in so many passages, and I think we see it again here. That saving faith involves four things. The first is knowing that I am sinful and I want to be righteous. So I know that deep down I am marked by sin through and through, and I want to be freed from it. The second is a genuine understanding that left to myself, I cannot make myself righteous. I cannot solve the problem of sin on my own. I can't try harder. There's no divine spark I can ignite to recover it. I can't get my act together and keep the law perfectly. Left to myself, I cannot change my sin. The third aspect then is I know that God is not required to save me. In other words, he owes me nothing. I have done nothing that deserves righteousness or requires him to bless me. If he's gonna bless me, it's because he wants to out of his grace, but he does not owe me anything. So I know I'm sinful and want to be righteous. I know I can't make myself righteous. I know that God is not obligated to make me righteous, and then the fourth aspect of saving faith is I trust that God will in fact save me, forgive my sins, and make me righteous or holy because of the blood of Jesus Christ. So genuine believers recognize that they're sinful and long to be good. That's what he says in verses six and seven. That's the first part of saving faith. They know that they are not good and they can't make themselves good. That's in verses eight through ten, and also they know that sin is sin. They recognize that they have done nothing to deserve righteousness, and that is a gift of God's grace. And then finally, they trust that God will forgive them because of his grace, and I think that's part of what he means by verse nine. That's saving faith in a nutshell. I want to be good, I know I'm not good, I know I can't make myself good, and I trust that God will forgive me and make me good only because of the blood of Jesus Christ and not because of anything I've done. To close, I'd like to consider an example from the life of the Apostle Peter. I find this story very helpful in sorting out this idea of walking in the light versus walking in the darkness and in understanding what John is saying here about our view of sin. Jesus said in Matthew ten verses thirty two and thirty three, everyone therefore who shall confess me before men, I will also confess him before my Father who is in heaven, but whoever shall deny me before men, I will also deny him before my Father who is in heaven. Now Peter, at a very key and crucial moment in the life of Jesus, denied that he knew Christ. Jesus had been betrayed by Judas, he'd been arrested, he was hauled before a Jewish court, and the events that would lead to his crucifixion were set in motion. If there was any time to stand up and be counted, this was it. If there was any time for the followers of Jesus to take a stand and support him, now as he's facing trial and staring down the cross, that's the time. And what does Peter do? He denies that he even knows Jesus three times. Now I would argue that what Peter has done in principle is exactly what Jesus says in Matthew 10, 32 and 33, if you do that, I will deny you before the Father. Peter sinned and he sinned in such a way that Jesus says, You do that, I'll deny you before the Father. And yet we know that Jesus does not deny Peter before the Father. After the resurrection, Jesus meets Peter face to face and forgives him and commissions him to carry the gospel into the world. The fact that Peter actually failed to confess Jesus before men and denied Jesus before men was evidence that Peter was fearful, weak, and sinful, but it was only a step on the road. Ultimately, we know that Peter did confess Jesus before men. Ultimately, he was willing to be jailed and beaten and eventually martyred himself rather than deny Jesus. So that's a case where he wasn't perfectly obedient in every moment of his life, but overall the direction and the character and the course of his life was clear in the end he chose to follow Jesus. So it's not the case that believers will be perfectly, courageously always obedient and always keep Jesus' commandments, but if we love him, we will ultimately choose to follow him and our lives will show it, and when we fail to follow him, we will grieve over it. We will, as Paul says in Philippians, hold fast to the word of life. You've been listening to the Wednesday and the Word podcast. I'm Krisan Marotta, and my goal is to explain not only what a passage means, but how I reach those conclusions. If this podcast has been helpful to you or you enjoyed listening, please leave a comment on your favorite podcast platform because it really does help others find the podcast. I also encourage you to tell a friend what you've learned, and if you can only do one, telling a friend is best. If you've only been listening to my podcast, let me take a moment to invite you to visit my website, WednesdayandTheWord.com, where you will find a wealth of Bible study resources and materials. It's all free. I have no advertising on my site. I don't track you, and I don't ask for any financial support. Our theme music is graciously provided by my friend Reggie Coates. You can find more of his music on heartfeltmusic.org. He has some wonderful CDs available. Thank you for listening, and I hope you'll join me next week for Wednesday in the Word.