Kill Your Sin or It Will Be Killing You[1]
Truth Taught- We must be putting to death what is earthly within us
Pastoral Prayer
-Grant us understanding into this text
-Holy Spirit come and apply this passage to our hearts
-Grant us to grasp the gravity of these next few minutes together around Your Word
-Put sin to death
-See the seriousness of sin
People have many goals in life. Some goals are honorable while others are worldly goals. Some seek after fortune and fame or setting profession on a pedestal seek promotion or some worldly success as their end. What are your goals in this life?
The Apostle John is teaching us as his little children that our goal as we follow Christ is sinless perfection. He is waking us up from our slumber to look at our sin in a new way. Have you been tolerating sin? Have you been sleeping when it comes to putting earthly things to death?
My aim today is to exposit what this massively important verse teaches us. To learn what it means and then pray that our understanding will be fueled by the Holy Spirit to instill or renew our focus on the biblical command of putting sin to death.
Romans 8:12–13 (ESV)
12 So then, brothers, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
Colossians 3:5–10 (ESV)
5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. 6 On account of these the wrath of God is coming. 7 In these you too once walked, when you were living in them. 8 But now you must put them all away: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and obscene talk from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, seeing that you have put off the old self with its practices 10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.
Here in both passages, we read put to death what is earthly which is referring to our sin that is in contrast to God and His Word. This is what the Puritans called mortification. We must be killing sin or it will be killing us.
Colossians 3:7…tells us that these earthly things or sins are how we once walked. In other words, before we trusted in Christ for salvation and before we had the Holy Spirit living within us, we used to live or walk in these sins. Now, we must stop. We must put them all away. Then the passage gives us a list of sins. Notice what the key to killing sin is…
10 and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.
There has been a change…our new self is being renewed and made more and more into the image of Christ. This has lasting effects…we love Christ more than we love our sin. Our affections turn to Him and away from the sin that held us captive. We exercise self-discipline and say no to sin and yes to Christ.
By the Holy Spirit we are a new creation we are a new self. The key to putting sin to death is you must be a Christian with the Holy Spirit working in you. If you’re not putting sin to death then you may not actually even be a Christian or if you are then there is something very wrong.
Please Stand…
1 John 2:1 (ESV)
2 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’s Purpose: To Prevent Sin (2:1a)
2 My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.
We have already seen how John brings sin and the blood of Christ together. When sin meets its enemy, it will be defeated.
1 John 1:9 (ESV)
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Oh precious is the flow that makes us white as snow, no other fount I know nothing but the blood of Jesus
When our sin meets the blood of Christ it is eternally removed from us.
So, we have John’s letter before us today and see his purpose for writing. He wants us to be free from sin in every realm. He wants us to see our sins forgiven in Christ, cleansed washed away and then he also wants to see us utilize God’s resources to stop additional sins from needing to be cleansed.
My little flock John begins. Those whom God has entrusted me with and to. Those to whom God has washed with His blood…remember not to sin. Do not sin. Set it as your goal do not sin. Think about it all the time. Seek this in all your thoughts and actions do not sin.
We see that John has a particular interest in this small group of people. The aged Apostle is sharing his heart with his Church…2 My little children.
His appeal is made to the Church, the flock of God. The original plea goes like this…These things I write unto you, that you sin not. Far from tolerating sin, I would have you to aim at being sinless.
Our sinful nature immediately raises up and declares we can’t be sinless. We cannot stop!! We cannot stop entirely!!
We must realize the danger of giving in too easily. Just because we cannot hit the bullseye every time does not mean we don’t take careful aim for it at every shot. We don’t say I can’t hit the bullseye so Ill aim in another direction.
God’s design for us in writing the book through John is that we would kill sin. We would fix our minds on a set purpose to not sin. Notice, he doesn’t say our goal should be to sin less or as little as you can but that we are not to sin at all.
Do not enter into the battle against sin by saying that you’re going to let some of the enemy live. This sin or that sin is not a big deal but rather put to death all things earthly within you. What God desires is a radical life of fighting against sin.
So, the intended meaning that John conveys to us the Church is that we must fight to be sinless… so that you may not sin.
Do you have a set determination to not sin? Have you been fighting to not tolerate any sin?
As John writes to us we see that he is after exactly what God is after…conformity to Christ in our lives.
Romans 8:28–29 (ESV)
28 And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. 29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.
I want to turn now to a great asset God has raised up for this purpose…John Owen in his work The Mortification of Sin gives us nine ways to think about sin and to fight against it so that we can put it to death.
13 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live.
How to think correctly about sin. What strategies to take in killing it. Remember our victory over sin will only come as we understand that even the very desire to not sin comes as a grace gift from God as He is working within us to produce Christ likeness.
2 My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin.
1. Diagnose sin’s severity.
When a person has struggled with a sin for a long time, it’ll be more difficult to kill. This is especially the case if there have been long seasons when that person has indulged the sin rather than actively trying to kill it. Making excuses, justifying sinful behavior, or too quickly applying grace and mercy to a sin also contribute to the sin’s severity and lead to a hardened heart and conscience. Consider such factors when diagnosing a sin’s severity, because a more severe struggle calls for more focused effort in mortification.
2. Grasp sin’s serious consequences.
Even for the Christian, who has been declared righteous positionally, sin remains dangerous. Owen outlines four dangers sin poses for the believer: 1)being hardened by sin’s deceitfulness, 2) God’s temporal discipline, 3) losing peace and strength, and, 4) finally, the danger of eternal destruction—that by continuing in sin, one may prove he was never truly converted. A Christian’s sin grieves the Holy Spirit (Eph. 4:25–30), wounds the Lord Jesus (Heb. 6:6), and can cause a Christian to lose his or her usefulness for ministry.
3. Be convinced of your guilt.
We understand guilt through the law and the gospel. “Bring the holy law of God into thy conscience,” Owen writes, “lay thy corruption to it, pray that thou mayst be affected with it.” Meditate on biblical commands that speak to sin’s sinfulness then also consider your sin in light of the cross. Ask yourself, “Why have I gone on sinning when I’ve been shown such grace and mercy? How can I show such contempt?”
4. Earnestly desire deliverance.
Knowing your great guilt, you can long for deliverance from sin. Why is this important? Because “longing, breathing, and panting after deliverance is a grace in itself, that hath a mighty power to conform the soul into the likeness of the thing longed after.” Indeed, according to Owen, “unless thou longest for deliverance thou shalt not have it.”
5. Consider the relationship between your sins and your natural temperament.
Each person has a unique temperament and nature that makes certain sins harder to kill. Owen reminds us, “A proneness to some sins may doubtless lie in the natural temper and disposition of men.” We are not less guilty for committing the sins to which we’re prone, but when we know ourselves, we know the areas of our lives where greater self-discipline is necessary.
1 Corinthians 9:27 (ESV)
27 But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.
6. Avoid occasions that incite sin.
Consider the circumstances that attend your falling into sin, and guard yourself from them. “Know that he that dares to dally with occasions of sin will dare to sin,” says Owen. If we want to stop sinning, we must avoid the slippery places that occasion our falls.
Romans 6:13–14 (ESV)
13 Do not present your members to sin as instruments for unrighteousness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments for righteousness. 14 For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.
7. Address sin’s first signs.
We’ll be most effective in putting sin to death when we “rise mightily against the first actings” of our sinful desires. It’s hard to stop water once it bursts into a flood. So too it’s hard to stop sin if we allow our desire for it to grow.
8. Meditate on God’s glory.
We must not let it gain ground. Instead, we must turn from our sin to “the excellency of the majesty of God.” When we see God’s glory, we’ll see our sin’s ugliness in contrast. Owen says it’s especially helpful to consider how much of God’s greatness we don’t know: “It is but a little portion we know of him.” It’s hard for sin to flourish in a heart filled with a sense of God’s majesty.
9. Don’t rush to comfort yourself.
Owen’s final instruction comes in the form of a caution. Though we may experience guilt and conviction over sin, we shouldn’t assume the sin is defeated. Sin is deceitful, and it can trick us into thinking we’ve dealt with it decisively when we have not. Owen warns us not to speak peace to ourselves before God speaks it (Jer. 6:14), but rather to “examine [ourselves], to see whether [we] are in the faith” (2 Cor. 13:5). He warns we may console ourselves falsely if we treat the process of repentance lightly, don’t show concern for other sins, or if our consolation “is not attended with the greatest detestation imaginable of that sin in reference.”
Sin is like an aggressive snake. If we don’t proactively attack sin, it will prove deadly. Thankfully, we aren’t alone in the fight. The power to kill sin comes from Christ through the Holy Spirit. As we focus on snuffing out sin, we must also draw near to the throne of grace. It’s there we’ll find grace to help in our time of need (Heb. 4:16). Effort is necessary, but as Owen says, “Mortification of any sin must be by a supply of grace. Of our selves we cannot do it.”
2. Our Savior at Work for Us (2:1b)
But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.
Here, John wants us to know that the reality is that in our fight against sin we need more than our efforts, even efforts empowered by the Holy Spirit. There will at times still be sin. So, he gives us words of comfort.
John is out to promote true fellowship between us and the Father. As we walk in the light, he said we have true fellowship.
1 John 1:7 (ESV)
7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.
When we sin, the fellowship is greatly hindered. Our daily walk with God suffers and our relationship with other believers also suffers. Our sin does violence to others.
So how does God go about restoring our fellowship with Him and with others?
The answer…Jesus, our Savior is working on our behalf.
John explains how our ongoing forgiveness happens…We have One who speaks to the Father on our behalf.
Our Lord has impeccable qualifications, He is the Righteous One. We have the best possible Advocate. He is the best possible Savior who makes intersession for us.
Jesus is our Advocate…
Jesus is acquainted with our weaknesses…
Hebrews 4:15 (ESV)
15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.
Jesus saves us to the uttermost and is our great Intercessor…
Hebrews 7:25 (ESV)
25 Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them.
Jesus is God’s Messiah…
Jesus has fulfilled all the demands of the Law for us.
Think of it…God has sent Jesus who is for us who also is for God. He has fulfilled all God commanded and He is our advocate. He brings God and us together into fellowship.
Jesus the Righteous One…
Words of Blessing
2 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.
And may the God of peace
Himself make you holy through and through
May He grant you grace for the fight against sin
My He keep you blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The One who called you is faithful…He will accomplish it.
AMEN!
Resources Used:
https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/john-owen-killing-sin/ Article by Grant Gaines
1 John by Kistemaker
1 John by Candish
1 John by Pierce
[1] A famous quote from John Owen in his book, The Mortification of Sin
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