John is writing that this church might know the joyful fellowship of the Triune God. This fellowship will only happen through conformity to the apostolic Gospel – the Gospel entrusted to the apostles (the NT writers) by Jesus himself. The problem is that many false teachers have arisen and are leading the church away from true Gospel, so that John has to correct what they are saying with the truth of God.
The first issue that he attacks head-on is the issue of sin in the life of a believer. It is this root issue of Christianity that is being perverted and twisted, and so he writes to make clear how Christians are to think of sin. He does this in verses 1:5-2:2 by announcing that the God with whom we have to do is utterly holy: He is “light and in him is no darkness at all.” And then he corrects three false statements about sin that were commonly being made in the church, in verses 6, 8, and now 10.
This morning, I would like us to see from this text three truths John would have every Christian to believe about sin, beginning with his correction of the false statement in verse 10, followed by two more truths in 2:1-2.
We Must Agree with God’s Word that we are Sinful The final false understanding of sin John addresses is found in verse 10: “If we say we have not sinned.” What appears to be behind this statement is a group of people in the church claiming that they have reached such an incredible state of sanctification that they have achieved sinless perfection. For them, it has literally been years since they have sinned. This is a position that has been taken at various times throughout church history, that it is possible to undergo such a powerful work of the Spirit, that you no longer sin
But John says that this position cannot stand. He says, “If we say we have not sinned, we make God a liar, and his word is not in us.” The serious consequence of claiming to be sinless is to reject everything that God himself has declared about us: it is he whose eyes test the children of man to see if any does what is good, and he has declared that there is none who is without sin. If you say you have not sinned, you find yourself in the uncomfortable position of disagreeing, not just with a preacher or an apostle, but with God himself.
Few of us would make the confession that we do not sin at all; this is not a very popular position to take. And yet, so many times we deny that we sin by calling sin other things: I made a mistake. I made a bad decision. I handled that poorly. Or we make excuses for our sin – Well, I’ve really been struggling with these things . . . I’ve really had a hard way to go . . . I was just following my heart. Instead of calling it what it is: sin. When was the last time you owned up to something you did and called it what it was: straight-up sin. I have sinned. I sinned when I did this. I sinned against God and against you. Where among us are those who are broken like David in our confession? Where among us are those who will be broken over our own sin? David says in Psalm 32:5, “I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity.” Psalm 51:3, “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against you, and you only have I sinned and done what is evil in your sight.”
And so John tells us that we must agree with God’s Word that we are sinful.
In correcting these false teachers, John has left no room for doubt in these opening verses: we are sinful. But the danger that can come, even when rightly underscoring the our depravity and hopelessness in ourselves, is to unwittingly produce in people a defeatist, Romans 6:1 attitude, “He’s right – I’m a sinner, you’re a sinner – let sin abound so that grace can abound all the more!” But this aged pastor, who after decades of Gospel ministry is so well-versed in the deceptions of the human heart, wastes no time in correcting this notion. He addresses them in 2:1 with the tenderness and affection of a father and says, My little children, I write these things to you so that you may not sin. And I think it is helpful for us to see the model that John is giving us here – in our hyper-sensitive, don’t-judge-me age, it seems totally incompatible to be loving and affectionate and still speak plainly and powerfully to the issue of sin. But John reminds us here that when he forces us to examine our sinful hearts, he is for us. He is fighting for our joy and our fellowship with God. Let’s remember that.
He says the reason that I write these things to you is not so that you will wave the white flag of surrender at sin, but so that you may not sin. How can this be? He has just finished telling us how sinful we really are, how we make God a liar if we deny our sin. And yet he tells us here he writes this so that we may not sin. The message of the Gospel not only frees us form the legal condemnation of sin, but it changes our desires at our very core so that we have a completely different attitude toward sin. In this letter, John wants to so display the glory and the holiness of God, the beauty and mercy of Christ, and the ugliness and the darkness of sin, so that carelessly embracing sin becomes unthinkable to us. He wants us to hate sin, to be horrified by sin, to be disgusted by sin, so that we can truly desire each day, “Lord, keep me from evil! Keep me from sin! Keep me in your fellowship.”
This is a burden for all of the NT writers as they instruct the early churches. The writer of Hebrews tells us in Hebrews 12:4 that we are to Strive for or Pursue holiness, without which no one shall see the Lord. That is not a statement to be taken lightly. In other words, if there is no pursuit of holiness taking place, no fighting against sin, no driving desire for holiness, no desire to be nearer to Christ and further away from yourself, you will not be see the Lord. J.C. Ryle speaks powerfully to the Christian’s call to war in a chapter entitled “The Fight:”
“Let us take care that our own personal religion, is real, genuine, and true. The saddest symptom about many so-called Christians is the utter absence of anything like conflict and fight in their Christianity. They eat, they drink, they dress, they work, they amuse themselves, they get money, they spend money, they go through a scanty round of formal religious services once or twice a week. But the great spiritual warfare – its watchings and struggling, its agonies and anxieties, its battles and contests – of all this they appear to know nothing at all. Let us take care that this case is not our own.”
Oh, but far too many of us have simply made peace with sin. John wants us instead to fight to the death. Is this your attitude toward sin? Do you know yourself, and know your weaknesses, and know those situation in which you can find yourself that lead you to sin – and avoid them? Or are you able to wake up each morning, coast through the day, without the thought of pursuing holiness ever crossing your mind? Do you set your mind against sin each day? My prayer for my own people on so many days is simply Matthew 26:41, Lord, may they watch and pray that they do not enter into temptation.
John tells us that we are to fight sin to our last breath.
[Transition]
So we are called to be holy. We are commanded to be holy. If we do not pursue holiness, we will not see the Lord. And yet, if at the end of the day our salvation and our security depended on our fighting and the cleanness of our own hands, we are undone. Even on our very best day, even when we are at the peak of our sanctification in this life, we will not be pure enough and holy enough to stand before God. Even our holiest prayers are tainted with sin. Behind our holiest acts of service lurks pride and the desire to be praised. As John himself has just said, ”If anyone says he does not sin, he makes God a liar and his Word is not in us.” So what do we do? John points us finally, beautifully, to Christ. To the Gospel.
Lloyd-Jones said of this passage that John has given us a challenge, and now moves to gives us comfort. He has given us an exhortation, and now extends to us an encouragement. John does not have us take such a long look at sin that we would despair. He does not force us to gaze at our own depravity so that we would be made hopeless. He does it in order to exalt Christ, which is how he closes this section. He tells us three aspects of the work and ongoing ministry of Jesus Christ in this final verse and a half.
In the Fight Against Sin, We Must Look to Christ and Rest in Him
But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate before the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.
In the rest of our time, let us see three aspects of Christ’s ministry to us in the fight against sin.
Christ Our Advocate
The word “advocate” is a legal term that means “one who is called alongside to defend.” The image here is of a heavenly courtroom, a perfectly holy place where a perfectly holy God sits on a perfectly holy throne to deliver perfectly holy justice. Only that which is pure and glorifying to God is valued here, and all that falls short is disdained. And John calls us to see ourselves, Christians, standing here before the judge to receive our decision. And though you may have fought your sin and pursued holiness with dogged determination, you have sinned. And in though your sinned may have seemed slight on the earth, in the blinding presence of God you see it for what it is: rebellion, high treason against the Holy One. There is nothing to plead. No objection to be made. It would seem that you have no hope, for this God cannot acquit those who are unrighteous. Justice must and will be served in this courtroom.
And yet John tells us that for every believer standing before the Father, there is an Advocate by your side. There is one pleading on your behalf, and this One is Jesus Christ, the righteous. The crucified and risen Son of God stands before the Father and fights for you in the court of Heaven.
But what is this Advocate saying? Is he simply trying to convince the Father to forget about your sins, to go easy on you? To do away with justice? No! He is pleading for justice to be done! Christ does not hide our sinfulness, but he pleads in its place his own righteousness. When he stands before the Father he cries out, “This one has sinned, but I have already received his punishment. He has been given my righteousness. And on the basis of my own righteous life which has been credited to him, I plead and demand justice for this sinner!”
And what is the Father’s response? He does not angrily and grudgingly say, “Oh, how I wanted to cast this rebel into hell, but you have stopped me!” No! With joy he declares the believer to be innocent on the basis of the work of his Son. Because let us never forget, it is the Father who has provided us with this Advocate. It is the Father who desired to see us made righteous, and so he delivered up his Son to death and raised him up to stand for us in Heaven. The Father and the Son are working beautifully, powerfully, for our salvation together, and they shall not fail. Our salvation is the glorious, harmonious work of our Triune God.
John Bunyan was so taken by the power of Christ’s work as advocate that he advised his listeners, “Let us often then, by faith, go to the bar of God, there to hear our Advocate plead our cause.” Christian, do you recognize this office of Advocate that Lord Jesus fills for you? Do you know that the eternal Son of God has taken it upon himself to personally plea for your life before the throne of God, in the audience of angels? When you sin, are you grieved by it, but then ultimately look Heavenward with faith to where Christ stands for you, earnestly going about this work? What a comfort!
John Bunyan was so taken by the power of Christ’s work as advocate that he advised his listeners, “Let us often then, by faith, go to the bar of God, there to hear our Advocate plead our cause.” Christian, do you recognize this office of Advocate that Lord Jesus fills for you? Do you know that the eternal Son of God has taken it upon himself to personally plea for your life before the throne of God, in the audience of angels? When you sin, are you grieved by it, but then ultimately look Heavenward with faith to where Christ stands for you, earnestly going about this work? What a comfort!
Christ our Righteous One
But John also specifies that the advocate who pleads for us is Jesus Christ the righteous. Why is it such a burden for the NT writers to underscore the sinless obedience of Jesus? Consider some of the statements and examples we hear in the Gospel accounts of the righteousness of the man Christ Jesus. (Matt 4:1-11, Mark 1:35, John 4:34, 5:19, 8:28, etc.) The righteousness of Christ doesn’t simply mean that Jesus “avoided” sinful things like refusing to smoke cigarettes, but that at every moment of every day he was actively pursuing the glory of his Father.
Why is this so important to us? When I ask people about the purpose of Christ coming, many respond by saying, “Jesus came to show us how to live, to give us an example.” While Christ is our ultimate example and there are passages which speak to this, if Christ’s righteousness was only an example, it would be a cause for mourning, not for rejoicing, because none of us can follow that example! His perfect obedience would be damning to us rather than saving. But the reason that Christ’s righteousness is a source of joy for us is because he is righteous for us. He lived a perfect life of righteousness for 33 years in order that all those who are joined to him by faith could be credited that righteous life. This is what is done for us at the cross: we aren’t just agreeing we are going to “start living right” and “get our act together.” We are crying out that we have no righteousness in ourselves, and we need for God to exchange our sin for his righteousness.
So we should dwell at length on the perfect righteousness of Jesus Christ. One of my favorite devotional exercises in the mornings now is to read through the Psalms and to hear Christ himself praying the prayers of Psalm 24, Psalm 17, etc. This should thrill and delight our souls that Christ will always be able to pray these prayers.
Just a few days before his death, it is said that J. Gresham Machen wrote to John Murray and said, “I am so thankful for the active obedience of Christ.” Oh, my beloved, think often on this. When the fight against sin becomes so heavy, when you feel at the point of despair over your continued sin, remember that you have been given a righteousness in Heaven that shall never be moved. Jesus Christ stands before God for you.
The word propitiation is not one we use often, but there could be no more important term for a Christian to familiarize himself with or hold onto dearly. It has been called, “the heart of the Gospel,” and “the most important word in the universe.” What does it mean? The word propitiation means a sacrifice that removes or sets aside anger and wrath. John has already told us that God, the Creator of the universe, is perfectly holy. And again and again throughout Scripture, we find that this holy God is angry with sinners. His wrath burns against those that who use the very breath that he put in their lungs to turn and wage war on him. And it is so important that we understand the Biblical teaching that God is angry with the sinner, not simply the sin. Do you read those Psalms and put yourself there? Put your own sin there?
But the good news of the Gospel is that God is so full of love and mercy that he acted to do something about his own anger. He acted to deal with sin, and to do it in a just and righteous way. God the Father sent his own Son as a propitiation by his own blood, a perfect sacrifice hanging on a cross, upon whom he poured out his fury, so that all who fled to Christ would be rescued from his wrath. Later in this letter John says this is how we understand the depths of what love is. John 14:10, “In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.”
And John tells that Christ is the propitiation for our sins, writing to this church, and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world. What does he mean here? This can be a bit confusing. But John is not saying that Jesus has removed the sins of every person in the world so that all people are now automatically forgiven. He is saying that Christ is the propitiation for sins, and there is no other. There is one propitiation that has been appointed and accepted by the Father. For all those in the world who would be saved from the wrath to come, they must come through Christ.
Of all people, we should be aware of our sin. But we should be even more filled with joy that we have a Christ who has delivered us from this sin. Lean upon him. Look to him. Love him.