Whoever…

Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness. And you know that He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him there is no sin. Whoever abides in Him does not sin. Whoever sins has neither seen Him nor known Him. Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous. He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil. Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God. In this the children of God and the children of the devil are manifest: Whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is he who does not love his brother. (1 John 3:4-10)

There are only two kinds of people in this world—and Scripture says they can be told apart.

Coming Back to What Is Eternal

We live in a distracting time. Our culture is geared to constantly spin us up into a distracted frenzy—political theater, endless notifications, even the latest season of Stranger Things dropping this week. I get emails from supposed Spanish lawyers promising me half of a ten-and-a-half-million-dollar transaction. There is always something vying for our attention, and most of it is not as important as we think.

You can test the value of a thing by asking what it will mean in five years. Most of what stirs us up will mean very little then, and nothing when we have been with the Lord for ten thousand years, bright shining as the sun. So I encourage you as your pastor: set aside time daily, preferably in the morning before the chaos begins, to look at what God says in his eternal Word. The passage before us is challenging, but exceedingly important, because it reveals what sin is, what our condition is, and why Jesus came and what he accomplished.

The Word "Whoever"

As you read this section, you may notice a word John repeats. It is translated "whoever" five times here, but it is the same small Greek word, pas, which means "all." He used it twice in the previous section as well.

Look back at 1 John 2:29—"everyone who practices righteousness is born of Him." Then 3:3—"everyone who has this hope purifies himself." Then 3:4—"whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness." Verse 6—"whoever abides in Him does not sin," and "whoever sins has neither seen Him nor known Him." Verse 9—"whoever has been born of God does not sin." And verse 10—"whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God." In roughly five verses John uses this word about seven times, identifying two groups into which all people fit.

Children of God and Children of the Devil

Why does John keep returning to this word? He is making an important distinction between true followers of God and those who are not, who were following the false teachers of his day. Point one: in the world there are children of God and children of the devil. All people fit into one of these two groups, and John says it is easy to identify them.

That classification makes people uncomfortable. Our culture insists on many "in-between" areas. But not according to John, one of the first followers of Jesus. There are those born of God who practice righteousness and pursue purity, and there are those who commit lawlessness and practice sin. There are those who abide in God and do not remain in sin, and those who abide in sin and do not abide in God. First John 3:1—"that we should be called the children of God." Verse 8—"he who sins is of the devil." Verse 10—the two groups are made manifest.

This mattered because people had entered the church identifying themselves by their words as being in fellowship with God, while their practice betrayed them. Back in 1 John 1:6—"If we say we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth." We understand this; we call such people hypocrites. Their lives lie about their profession.

Sin Is Lawlessness

So John gives us clarifying words in 3:4—"whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness." Here is the clearest definition of sin in the Bible. We would not know sin apart from the revelation of Scripture. Paul said, "I would not have known sin unless the law said, 'You shall not covet.'" By nature every one of us covets—from the youngest age—but we would never have thought it wrong had the law not named it. That is the tenth commandment.

This definition matters because of what John warned earlier. First John 1:8—"If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves." Verse 10—"If we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar." Both in John's day and ours, many do not recognize their sinfulness. We misdiagnose ourselves as sinless because we misunderstand what sin actually is.

Point two: I am a sinner if I break God's law. What law? First, the law of conscience. Evolutionary biology has no good answer for conscience; most in that field won't even touch it. C.S. Lewis, the great author of the twentieth century, called this the basis for Mere Christianity—every culture has a basic understanding of morality because there is a moral Lawgiver who gave you a conscience that either accuses or excuses you. We also have the revealed law of God. When we go against either, we are lawless, and we are sinners.

People don't like to think they are sinners, but that only reveals they don't know what sin is or how vast God's law is. Ask ten people if they'd go to heaven and most say yes, "I'm a pretty good person," because they don't grasp the law's extent. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus shows that the law deals not only with actions but with the heart. "You have heard it said, 'You shall not murder'—but whoever is angry with his brother is guilty." "You shall not commit adultery—but whoever looks to lust has committed adultery in his heart." And then: unless your righteousness exceeds that of the most religious, you will by no means enter heaven. That is a problem. But the bad news prepares us for the good news.

The Sinless Sacrifice

First John 3:5—"You know that He was manifested to take away our sins, and in Him there is no sin." Point three: Jesus is the sinless sacrifice who came to take away my sin. This is exactly how John the Baptist announced him. John 1:29—"Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world."

The title "Lamb of God" meant something to a Jewish audience. For fourteen hundred years, since Moses, the way to approach a holy God was through animal sacrifice. But as Hebrews says, those sacrifices could only cover sin temporarily—which is why they had to be offered again and again, day after day, year after year, until the perfect, spotless, sinless Lamb of God came to take sin away. Only Jesus can do this, because in Him there is no sin. He alone is sinless, so He alone can deal with my sin and yours.

Notice it is my sin. We are good at identifying everyone else's sins—the things other people do that make us angry. Generally you are only seeing in them what you know is in yourself. He was manifested to take away my sin.

Abiding and Not Sinning

Verse 6—"Whoever abides in Him does not sin. Whoever sins has neither seen Him nor known Him." To abide means to remain in, to stay connected to Jesus, the vine, as in John 15: "I am the vine, you are the branches." The branch bears fruit because the life of the vine flows through it.

Some in the charismatic stream read this verse and say Christians never sin. But this was written in Greek, a technical, inflected language. The phrase "does not sin" is in a present, ongoing tense. John is saying the person who abides in Jesus will not go on sinning perpetually, will not practice sin. Likewise, "whoever sins" at the end of verse 6 is a present active participle—those who go on sinning prove by their actions that they do not know God. The one who is in Christ does not remain in sin. If you abide in Christ, you will not abide in sin.

A Child of God Will Not Remain in Sin

Point four: a child of God will not remain in unrepentant sin. Does that mean a child of God will never sin? No. John cannot contradict himself. First John 2:1—"My little children, these things I write to you, so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And He Himself is the propitiation for our sins." So we will fall short, but we will not perpetually walk in ongoing sin if we are abiding in the vine.

What do we do when we sin? You very likely sinned this morning—and probably will again before you leave this building when someone steals your jelly-filled donut. Memorize 1 John 1:9—"If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." This is what God wants to do: cleanse us completely. He was manifested to take away our sin.

A New Nature, a New Identity

Verse 7—"Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous." There is much deception about sin, then and now. God in his very nature is holy and perfectly righteous. If you have trusted in Jesus, He has remade you and given you a new, righteous nature. Second Corinthians 5:17—"If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new." Ephesians 4:24—this new self is "created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness."

Grasp the weight of this: God has remade you to be righteous before Him. Two thousand years ago, and today, some taught that it was fine to continue in unrepentant sin after conversion, or that you remain a slave to your old nature and cannot walk in righteousness. John believed neither. The children of God are remade by grace and given the power to walk in righteousness. The children of the devil may say with their lips that they are God's, but their lives betray them.

Justification, Sanctification, Glorification

We have been saved, past tense—justification. On the cross Jesus cried, "It is finished," paying our debt and bearing our punishment, so that we are declared righteous. Scripture also speaks of a future work—glorification. "In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye," this corruption will put on incorruption, and we will be with God, no longer in the presence of sin. First John 3:2—"It does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him."

Between those two ends, God is doing a present work—sanctification. We are being saved as the righteousness of God becomes our practice, by the Spirit, by grace, as we take responsibility to walk in the Spirit and not in the flesh. You no longer have to be a slave to the old nature.

Freed from Sin's Power

Verse 8—"He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil." The works of the devil are lawlessness and sin, and God wants to destroy them in my life. Verse 9—"Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God."

Point five: Jesus came to free me from sin's power in and over my life. I keep driving this home. At a pastors' conference this week I heard a man preach that being gospel-centered means we will never be able to walk in righteousness and always need grace and forgiveness. I understand the theology, but it doesn't go far enough. Jesus died not only to forgive sin but to give me power in Christ to walk in righteousness—and we can, because we are the children of God. Will we never sin? No. But when we do, "if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us." His aim is that my life would increasingly be walked in righteousness. Philippians 2:12—"Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling." God works salvation into you; now work it out. He created you with muscles, but they're invisible until you do the work—and that takes discipline we'd rather replace with a pill.

Putting Off and Putting On

Because you have a new nature in Christ, you must live out this new righteousness practically. Ephesians 4 makes it concrete. Verse 22—"Put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man... and put on the new man." What does that look like?

Verse 25—"Put away lying, and let each one speak truth." If you're a liar, stop it; instead speak truth. Verse 26—"Be angry, and do not sin"—be angry for the right reason and respond rightly, and "do not let the sun go down on your wrath." Verse 28—"Let him who stole steal no longer, but rather let him labor, working with his hands"—if you're a thief, get a job, so you have something to give. Verse 29—"Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth." When a follower of God speaks crass, foul language, it grieves the Holy Spirit who dwells in you. Speak instead what edifies and imparts grace.

Verse 31—"Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you." You may say you do none of those things—yet someone wronged you last week, last month, ten years ago, and you're still bitter. Malice is wishing harm on someone: when you hear most people got cancer it breaks your heart, but there's that one person you'd almost be glad to hear it about. Put that away, and instead be kind and forgiving.

Jesus came to free me from sin's power that I could walk in righteousness before God. The result is true fellowship with God and one another, and a light to the world. "You are the light of the world... Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven." May God work these things into our lives as we work out our salvation with fear and trembling, while He works in us to will and to do His good pleasure.

Closing Prayer

Father God, I thank you for your Word. It is quick and powerful and convicting; it reveals where we really are at this very moment. Lord, my desire is to walk in righteousness before you, and I believe that is the desire of my brothers and sisters here today—why else would we gather? So God, we recognize areas in our lives that are not in line with your nature or your Word, and we confess those to you now. We are thankful that you are faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness. We pray that cleansing work would continue as we go from this place, and that you would shine your light through us—because only you, the perfect, sinless sacrifice, can take away our sin. We cannot do it by our own strength or religious efforts. O God, cleanse and purify us, that we would shine brightly in this world. We ask this in Jesus' name, and all those who agreed said, Amen.