“My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” – 1 John 2:1
This verse perfectly encapsulates the lifelong challenge and abundant grace of the Christian life. All those who have been saved as a gift of God’s grace through faith in Jesus Christ are called to live holy lives of genuine, heartfelt obedience to the commands of Jesus. As a new creation in Christ, you have the power to not sin. The power to choose joyful obedience over sinful disobedience. The Holy Spirit lives in you and you have the power to crucify your flesh’s sinful desires. It is expected of Christ-followers that we exert serious effort to living a life that pleases God. And so, John wrote this letter to encourage exactly that, challenging every believer to pursue holiness and resist sinful temptation.
And yet… we all stumble and fall into sin from time to time. None of us will be completely perfect on earth until Jesus returns. So, John makes clear that there is always abundant grace available when we do stumble back into sin. When we sin, we aren’t rejected by God. We aren’t renounced by Jesus. We aren’t abandoned by the Holy Spirit. No! To the contrary, the Holy Spirit convicts us of our sin, the Father invites us to confess our sins and turn away from them, and Jesus intercedes on our behalf when we do. Because Jesus already paid the penalty for our sins on the cross, when He speaks up as our Advocate, we KNOW our latest sins are just as fully forgiven as our previous ones.
This isn’t God’s permission to live a sinful life, continuously presuming upon His grace. Far from it. John makes clear in other verses that if that’s our mindset, we most likely aren’t actually saved and forgiven in the first place. This is the tension of life in a fallen world after we becoming new creation in Christ. We are holy in God’s eyes and empowered and commanded to live holy lives. However, when we fail, we must not believe the devil’s lies and live defeated, guilt-ridden lives. Instead, we simply need to turn back to our Advocate, our Lord, our Savior and #FollowJesus