Do You Have Eternal Life?

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This morning, in preparation for our taking the Lord's Table together, I invite you to turn with me to 1 John.

When health care professionals want to get a snapshot of your physical health, they begin with a series of tests of what are called the "vital signs." They measure those vital signs to the most basic body functions. Usually, it includes your temperature, your heart rate, your blood pressure and your respiratory rate. When one or more of those vital signs is weak, it's a sign that you are in, at that moment, a weakened physical condition. There is something wrong. And obviously, if there are no vital signs, something's desperately wrong—there's no physical life at all.

Well, there are also vital signs that measure our spiritual life. In the Apostle John's first letter, we really have here a series of spiritual vital-sign checks. How is our spiritual life? In fact, he concludes his letter—look at 1 John 5:13. He explains why he's written this letter, probably to the churches around Ephesus where, before he was exiled to Patmos, he lived out his remaining years. Verse 13, "These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God [you have professed faith in Christ, I've written to you], so that you may know that you have eternal life." Here is a checkup of your spiritual vital signs.

Now, it's really hard to sort of outline 1 John, because he sort of looks again and again in sort of a cyclical, spiral sort of way at a variety of those tests. But basically, there are three categories of tests or checkups on your spiritual vital signs. The first we could say is a doctrinal checkup. Do you believe the right things about God, about Jesus Christ and who He is, about His life? Do you believe the right things about yourself and your sin? Do you believe the right things about

salvation? The second category of tests that he cycles through in his letter is, not only the doctrinal tests, but moral tests. Do you demonstrate the reality of a changed life? Does your life manifest eternal life in how you live day in and day out? The third category of tests are the relational tests. The relational tests ask, do you really love God, and do you manifest that love of God by loving your fellow brothers and sisters in Christ? So, doctrinal, moral, relational.

But the first test that comes in this letter, the first checkup of our spiritual vital signs has to do with how we respond to sin. It falls really into the second category, the moral category. Does our life manifest what a life should manifest when there is true spiritual life in it? Look at 1 John 1, and let me begin reading in verse 5. Here's the first test. How do you respond to sin?

This is the message we have heard from Him [that is, from Jesus Christ] and announce to you, that God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all. If we say that 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.

Here at the outset of John's letter, he explains that how we deal with sin is a test of whether or not we have eternal life. We can test the reality of our faith by how we respond to sin in our personal lives.

Now notice, John begins by proclaiming to us what he and the other Apostles had heard from Jesus. Verse 5, "This is the message we have heard from Him and [we're now proclaiming it] to you." And here's its heart: "God is Light, and in Him there is no darkness at all." Now John, both in his gospel and in his first letter, uses this image of light in two ways. He uses it of truth versus error, the light that truth brings versus the darkness of error. The other way he uses it is of the light of moral purity versus the darkness of sin. And in context it's that second that's emphasized here. He's emphasizing God's moral purity. God is light. God's moral purity is like blazing white light without even the slightest tint, the slightest shadow, the slightest downgrading of light. It is blazing, brilliant light. In other words, we could put it like this. Think about this for a moment. God has never thought a single thought, He has never spoken a single word, He has never carried out a single action that fails to perfectly correspond to His own holy character. There hasn't even been a hint of it, a shadow of it. There is no darkness in Him, no, none at all. And John's point is, you can't come to truly know the God whose character is pure, blazing light, in whom there's no darkness at all, and remain personally unchanged. So how we respond to sin in our lives tells us whether or not we have come to know Him.

Now as this passage unfolds, he begins by showing us how false Christians respond to sin. There are people who profess Jesus Christ who in fact are not really Christians, and he wants us to know how they respond to sin. So let's look at it. John here identifies three wrong responses to sin manifested by false Christians. Each of them is marked by the expression "if we say." You see that beginning verse 6, beginning verse 8 and beginning verse 10. By using the plural pronoun "we," John isn't saying that he's been guilty of this. He is instead implying, he's talking about claims that are sometimes made by people connected to the Christian community, people who profess faith in Christ. And if a professing Christian responds to the sin in his life in these three ways, then he's not in fact a Christian at all. That's his point. So let's look at the wrong responses, the way false Christians respond to sin.

First of all, we could put the first one like this. I know God, but it doesn't matter how I live. I really do know God, but how I live out my life doesn't really matter to Him. Look at verse 6. "If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth." Now notice in verse 6, these people claim to have fellowship with God. The Greek word is koinonia. It's a word which means "a close relationship." It's often used of marriage. It involves a partnership, two lives coming together in a close relationship. These people are constantly saying that they have a close relationship to God. They're claiming to be Christians, in the context of 1 John. They have made a profession of faith. If you ask them, are you a Christian? They would say yes, I'm a Christian.

Verse 6 goes on to say, yet they are walking "in the darkness." Walking is a biblical image of how we live out our lives on a daily basis, how we live in our predictable patterns of behavior. They are walking in darkness. Their daily lives are characterized not by light, by holiness, but by darkness, by sin. Now, this false claim here in 1 John may have been one attached to a sort of a form of early Gnosticism, kind of a pre-Gnosticism that was beginning to show itself at the end of the first century when John wrote this letter. But you don't have to be Gnostic to hold this view. American churches are filled with people who make this claim. "I really do know God. I'm a Christian." And then, "You know, it doesn't really matter how I live." My great fear as a pastor—can I tell you this? This has been my prayer this week. My great fear as a pastor is that there would be people who regularly are a part of our church, who prayed some prayer years ago, who walked some aisle, who signed some card, who are clinging to some decision they made, and yet day in and day out they are walking in the darkness. Their lives are characterized by a lifestyle of sin.

John says, if we claim to have a close relationship with God but walk in darkness (notice the end of verse 6), "we lie." Our claim of fellowship with God is a lie. It's not reality. You may think it's reality. It's not reality. It's a lie. And we are not practicing the truth; that is, we are not practicing and living out the truth of who God really is. He's light, and light and darkness are mutually exclusive. It is impossible to have fellowship with God and a life characterized by darkness. In other words, it's impossible to be a Christian and to have a life that is characterized, ongoing, day in and day out, by a pattern of sin.

Look at chapter 2, verse 3: "By this we know that we have come to know Him." Here's how we know if we've really come to know God through Jesus Christ. "If we keep His commandments." You want to know if you're a Christian? There it is. Do you keep His commandments? Are you in a pattern and habit of life of keeping His commandments? "The one who says, 'I have come to know Him," and does not keep His commandments, is a"—what? Is a what? "Liar." That's not me, that's the Apostle John speaking for Jesus Christ. "I know Him!" You don't keep His commandments, you're a liar.

And the truth is not in him, but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has been truly perfected. By this we know that we are in Him [here's how we know]: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as [Jesus] walked.

You want to know whether or not you're a Christian? Are you progressively, however slowly it might be, becoming like Jesus Christ? And is that your desire?

Let me ask you, is there more sin in your life than there is holiness? Is there more disobedience in your life than there is obedience to Jesus Christ? Do you respond to the sin that's in your life by thinking, "You know, I'm saved, I'm a Christian, I prayed a prayer, I walked an aisle. It doesn't really matter how I live. I am eternally secure. So I can sin, and you know, God won't like it, but He'll be OK with it. It'll all work out"? Listen, if that's is how you think about your sin, your response shows that you are not a Christian at all.

There's a second response those who profess to be Christians but aren't can have to sin. Here's a second response. Let's put it like this: I am a good person who sometimes does bad things. Look at verse 8: "If we say [if we are saying] that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us." Now notice the wording of that sentence carefully. Sin is singular. It's a claim not to be in a state or condition of sinfulness. It's not a denial of acts of sin, but rather, it's a denial of an inborn disposition to sin. It's a denial that we are depraved. You know, if you ask most people if they have sinned, if they've committed acts of sin, what will most people—There there are a few exceptions, and we'll deal with them in just a moment. But what will most people say? "Well yeah, sure, of course I've sinned." Almost everyone will agree to that. But what they will not admit to is being totally depraved in all parts of their being. They will not admit that their minds, their wills, their emotions and their bodies are all terminally infected by sin, and that there is absolutely nothing spiritually good in them at all. Instead, they say something like this: "You know, it's true that I do sometimes do bad things, but I'm not a bad person. I'm essentially a good person." You hear it like this in our society today. Someone will say, "You know, yeah, I've been arrested. I'm going to prison. But I've just made [what?] some bad decisions, some bad choices. It's not really me. And in fact, even those bad choices aren't really my fault. It's my environment. It's the culture. They did this to me. It's my dysfunctional home. It's my parent's fault. They made me the way I am. It's my psychological problems I take medication for. That's the real issue." Listen, blame shifting started right after sin entered the Garden of Eden, and it has continued ever since. An unbeliever—listen carefully to this. An unbeliever will never accept full and complete responsibility for his sin and who he is at the heart level. Instead, they convince themselves that when they sin it's not really who they are. It's an anomaly. It's an aberration. Compare that with what the Bible says.

You remember David's prayer in Psalm 51, that great prayer of confession? In verse 5 he says this: "Behold, I was brought forth [I was born] in iniquity, and in sin my mother conceived me." Now, there are a couple of misunderstandings of that text. Some people think David's admitting maybe that he was illegitimate. That's not what he's talking about. Other people think that maybe it's kind of an excuse. Not at all. It's exactly the opposite. You know what David is saying? He's looking at his sin with Bathsheba, his adultery, his sexual sin; he's looking at his sin in finding a way to get Uriah her husband killed. And as he looks at that, he's saying God, that was not an aberration, that was not an anomaly. It's not that I'm basically a good person who did a couple of bad things; instead, God, this is who I am, and it's who I've always been. It's a reflection of my heart.

In Jeremiah 13:23, the prophet Jeremiah writes, "Can the Ethiopian change [the color of his] skin or the leopard his spots?" You say no, that's how God made those men, that's how God made those animals, it's part of their nature. He says if that can happen, if a person can change his skin color (be it black, white or yellow), or if the leopard can change his spots, then "you also can do good who are accustomed to doing evil." In other words, you know what he's saying? Our real problem isn't our actions. Our real problem is our nature. We cannot make moral choices that conflict with what we are by nature. That's our problem.

Let me ask you, do you think about your sin like the people John's describing? "I'm essentially a good person, but I made some bad decisions, I've made some bad choices in my life. I'm not totally morally bankrupt. I'm not depraved." If that's how you respond to your sin, then you are not a Christian. Notice verse 8, "If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves." Those who deny that they have a sinful disposition that lies behind all of their sinful actions are deceiving themselves. You keep telling yourself a lie often enough and you'll believe it. And they've convinced themselves, they've deceived themselves with the idea that they're a good person.

And it goes on to say, verse 8, the truth of God is not in them. The truth of the gospel is not in them. Why is that? Because you cannot be spiritually rescued, you cannot be saved until you come to realize you need to be, until you come to realize your utter moral and spiritual bankruptcy before God. You don't become a beggar until you know you have nothing else. And a true believer understands this about himself or herself. I am utterly depraved, and without God's common grace restraining me, I would manifest the sin that's in my heart in its extremity. I need rescuing.

There's a third way that professing Christians who are really unbelievers respond to sin. We can put it like this: I'm a moral person, and I don't need forgiveness. Look at verse 10. This is slightly different than verse 8. Verse 10 says, "If we say that we have not sinned." In other words, if we claim that we've never committed acts of sin. That's what this person's claiming. Now this doesn't mean that these people deny that they ever do anything wrong. They simply downplay what they do that's wrong. They redefine sin as maybe weaknesses or struggles or issues, but not as acts of rebellion against their rightful King, acts that deserve His eternal wrath. They deny that. Usually, the people who make this third claim live exemplary lives, humanly speaking. They're often religious. They're generous. They're outwardly moral. They are happy to attach themselves to Jesus and to Christianity and to some church somewhere, because Jesus is a kind of hero. After all, He's the perfect moralist. They tend to think of Jesus, not as their Savior, but as their example, as a pattern to follow.

Mainline denominational churches in America are filled with people like this. They're like the religious people of Jesus' time. You remember the Pharisees? They looked great on the outside, but Jesus said inside they're like a tomb filled with death. They're the ones who saw Jesus eating with, you know, the lowlifes in the society, and they said what is Jesus doing? Doesn't He know any better? I mean, why would someone who's really righteous attach themselves at all to that group? You remember Jesus' response? He said I didn't come to help those who are well but—what?—those who need a physician. He said I did not come to call those who think they're righteous, but those who know they're sinners.

If you think you're a moral person who doesn't need God's forgiveness, you don't need to be saved, then listen to the clear testimony of Scripture. Ecclesiastes 9:3, "The hearts of the sons of men are full of evil and insanity is in their hearts throughout their lives." They look sane, but when it comes to really dealing with God on the spiritual level, they're insane. Isaiah 64:6, "For all of us have become like one who is unclean [before God], and all our righteous deeds [our best deeds] are like a filthy garment." Jeremiah 17:9, "The heart is more deceitful than all else and [it is terminally ill]." That's God's diagnosis of my heart and your heart apart from grace.

Now what if we deny the truth that those verses teach? Well, look at verse 10: "If we say that we have not [committed acts of sin], we make Him a liar." If we respond to sin by claiming that we're not sinners, we don't need a Savior, we make God a liar. Those verses I just read, listen, there are hundreds of others in the Bible that make exactly the same point. To deny them is to say to God—this is what Jesus taught us through the Apostle John. If you deny the fact that you are a sinner in need of a Savior, you are saying to God, you might as well stand to His face and say, "God, You are a liar." That's what he's saying, because over and over again the Bible says we are sinners in desperate need of spiritual rescue. He adds at the end of verse 10, "And His word is not in us." When we take this approach to sin, we make it patently clear that His Word, the Truth, the truth of the gospel is not in us. In other words, John says, you're not a Christian.

So that's how false Christians, those who profess to know Christ but who aren't truly Christians, respond to sin. But John also tells us in this passage how true believers respond to sin. If you're really in Christ, how do you respond to sin? True believers respond to the sin in their lives in two ways. First of all, even though they still sin, their lives are marked by obedience and holiness. Look at verse 7. Here's the other side. In verse 6 there are those who claim fellowship but walked in darkness; verse 7, "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."

Now notice, if you look at verses 6-7, there are only two alternatives. Everybody here is on one side or the other of this. You are either walking in the light or you are walking in the darkness. Now we already saw in verse 6 that the one claiming to have fellowship with God and yet walking in darkness is not a Christian. So listen carefully. All unbelievers walk in darkness. You understand that? That's what he's saying here. All unbelievers walk in darkness, and all believers walk in the light. A true Christian isn't known by what he claims, but by how he walks or how he lives.

Notice, in verse 7 John is saying this: if as a pattern of life we are walking in the light (that is, if we are consistently living in the light of God's personal holiness), we're true Christians. And when we live in holiness and obedience, notice he says, "We [are having] fellowship with one another." That is, with others who are in that same situation. And you go back to verse 3, and we're all having "fellowship... with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ." You are enjoying a personal, close relationship with God if you're walking in the light.

Now, by walking in the light or living in obedience and holiness, he does not mean—This is so important.—he does not mean that we never sin. We're not talking about perfection here. We're talking about a life that's marked by obedience and holiness, not in perfection but in direction. Because look at what people who are walking in the light still need. Look at verse 7: "And the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us [literally, keeps on cleansing us] from all sin." In other words, even those who are walking in light, even true Christians who are living lives marked by holiness and obedience still sin and still need cleansing. And He's more than able to provide that.

I love that expression "the blood of Jesus His Son." Not the literal blood that flowed through Jesus' veins, he's talking about the blood as a symbol of His violent death as a sacrifice. His violent death on the cross as our substitute keeps on cleansing us from all sin. This is wonderful news, because even though we are living in and pursuing holiness, we still sin. If you're a Christian, you are all too aware of your sin. But the good news is, that sin doesn't remove you from a close relationship to God. Even though He is blazing, perfect light, the fellowship with God continues even when we sin. Why? Because the blood of Jesus keeps on cleansing us from every sin. Every sin. There is no sin too great in kind or degree for the cleansing power of the blood of God's Son.

John's point in verse 7 is this. True believers live in a pattern of holiness and obedience. There has been a fundamental change in their relationship with sin. They still sin, but sin does not have the dominating power in their lives that it did before. They've been transferred, Colossians 1 says, out of the kingdom of darkness into "the kingdom of His beloved Son," into the kingdom of light. We live in a different realm. We now walk in the light. That's who we are as Christians. We still sin, but that doesn't change our fellowship with God, that doesn't change the reality. We still have a close relationship with Him, because the blood of Jesus His Son keeps on cleansing us.

There's a second response to sin in the lives of true believers. It's this: their lives are marked by continual confession of sin. Here's how that continual cleansing of verse 7 actually happens. Here's how it takes place. Verse 9, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." It's a very familiar verse. If you've been a Christian any time at all, you've memorized that verse. But maybe you've never thought about this. That verse raises some very important and even difficult questions.

The main question it raises is why is confession even necessary for a Christian? We are confessing our sins here in order to receive forgiveness. You say, wait a minute. I thought that's what happened at the moment of salvation, that all my sins (past, present and future) were pardoned. And that's true. So why then do I still need to ask God for forgiveness? I mean, isn't Colossians 2:13 right that when He made us alive He forgave all of our transgressions as an act in the past? So why does a sinner who's been totally forgiven, who's been declared forever righteous before God, still need to seek daily forgiveness?

Have you ever asked yourself that question? Well, Jesus answered that question in John 13. Turn there with me. He does so in a powerful image. This is the evening of the Last Supper. Our Lord's death will come in about 12 hours. And in John 13:5, in the play out of that evening, He gets up at one point, He takes a towel,

He poured water [verse 5] into the basin, and [then He] began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded. So He came to Simon Peter. He said to him, "Lord, [You are going to] wash my feet?" Jesus answered and said to him, "What I do you do not realize now, but you will understand [it] hereafter." [You're going to get it, so let Me do this.] Peter said to Him, "[No!] Never shall you wash my feet!"

What's he saying? He's saying Lord, You're my Lord, my Teacher. That's too lowly a position for you to occupy. I'm not going to let You do that. That's demeaning to You. I ought to be washing Your feet. And Jesus answers in verse 8, "If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me." Well, Simon flip-flops here, and now he goes the other way. "Lord, then wash not only my feet, but also my hands and my head." Give me a bath. You got to love Peter. Jesus said, verse 10,

"He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but not all of you," For He knew the one who was betraying Him; for this reason He said, "Not all of you are clean."

Now what's going on here? Well, in this foot washing there are three separate lessons, and each of them really deserves a message in and of itself. Let me just point them out to you. The first lesson is a lesson as an example of humbly serving one another. Look down in verses 14-15. After Jesus finishes, He teaches them this. He says, listen, I've washed your feet, and I'm your Lord, I'm your Teacher; this is an example; you should humbly serve one another. It doesn't mean we ought to wash each other's feet, literally. It meant we ought to be willing to take up the role of a humble servant of fellow Christians even in menial ways. Maybe a modern example would be shining their shoes.

The second lesson is, an exposure of one of the disciples that he has in fact not been saved. Do you see that at the end of verse 10 and verse 11? Jesus uses this to make a point that one of the disciples, Judas, has not even been saved, he's not been washed.

But the third lesson is a lesson in two kinds of cleansing. And this really goes to where we're studying in 1 John. Look at verse 10: "Jesus said to him, 'He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet.'"

Now put yourself back in that first-century world. When you were at home, in your own home you would have taken a bath. Then you would have put on your robe and your sandals (if you were a man), and you would have walked across town to be the guest of someone else. And as you walked through the roads, most of which were made of that real fine dust—if you've ever traveled to Israel, it gets on everything, all over your shoes. It would have gotten all over your feet if you were barefoot. When you get to that house where you're going to be a guest, they would have washed your feet. You took a bath before you left. When you get there, you don't need another bath, you just need your feet washed.

Jesus uses that analogy to make a spiritual point. If you are a Christian, at the moment of salvation you were bathed, you were washed, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 6:11. That's our justification. And once you've been bathed, once you've been washed as a Christian you don't need another bath. A lot of kids will be happy to hear that. But we still need our feet to be clean, because as we walk through this world we sin. That's the daily confession of sin. That's the daily seeking of God's forgiveness.

Let me describe it in another metaphor that maybe will let you see it in a little different way. Think of it like this. Before salvation God was our judge. In salvation we came to His courtroom. We approached His bench as the judge, and we seek His forgiveness as our judge, as our magistrate, forgiveness before the law. He forgives us as judge, and then an amazing thing happens. The judge walks down from behind the bench and around to where we're standing, puts his arm around us, and adopts us as his own child. We leave the courtroom never to go back in the courtroom again. We've been declared righteous. But then we go home to live with the judge as our father. And as we live in his home, we still sin against him. We don't need to go back to the courtroom and be justified again, we just need to go to our father and confess what we've done is wrong and seek reconciliation with Him. Before, we were seeking justification with our judge; now we're seeking reconciliation from our father. Forgiveness in both cases but different. So that's why we need to.

But what is this confession? Well, notice verse 9. It's got to be the unbroken pattern of our lives. "If we are confessing." Jesus even taught us to include confession as a regular part of our prayer life. Remember? The fifth petition in the Lord's Prayer—your kids were learning it today. "Forgive us our debts." That's to be a regular part of our prayers. The Greek word for confess here is homologeo. It means "to say the same thing." It means that we say the same thing about our sin before God that He would say about our sin if He were talking about it. In other words, we pass judgment on ourselves and our sin the way God would pass judgment on us and our sin if He were doing it. We confess our sins.

By the way, we confess our sins to God. Obviously, there are times when we confess them to people if we have sinned against them. Matthew 5 makes that clear: if your brother has something against you, you've sinned against him, you go to him and make it right. But ordinarily, we confess all of our sins to God. And that was true, by the way, even in the Roman Catholic Church, which some of you have been saved out of. That was true until until 1215 AD. In 1215 AD, at the Fourth Lateran Council, Pope Innocent III made auricular confession (or, confession to a priest) the dogma of the Roman Catholic Church. Prior to that it wasn't true. Biblically, we confess our sins to God.

What should we confess? Notice, verse 9 says, "our sins." Plural. Our particular and individual acts of sin. That doesn't mean you have to confess every sin you commit specifically and in detail. In fact, I know that's true, because you don't even know all the sins you commit. You don't even know the ways you violate the perfect, holy character of God, and nor do I. What it does mean is that we regularly, faithfully, as part of our normal prayer lives (according to Jesus in Matthew 6), confess our sins, in categories and in specific. You want some great examples of confession? Make a note and go back and read the classic Old Testament examples: Nehemiah 9, Psalm 32, Psalm 51 and Daniel 9. All great examples of what confession of sin looks like.

Now, on what basis does God forgive our sins? Notice, there are 2 bases. He says in verse 9, "If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous." That's the basis on which God forgives. First of all, He's faithful. That is, He's faithful to His promises, He keeps His promises. Do you understand, if you're a Christian, God has made a legally binding promise to you called the New Covenant? Read it in Hebrews 8. And part of the New Covenant promise God has made to you is, I will remember their sins no more forever. That's a legally binding promise God made to you. And guess what? Thank God He is faithful to His contracts, He's faithful to His promises, so when He forgives, it's an expression of His character. He promised. He'll do it.

But there's another reason given here: He is righteous or just. Now, God Himself says it is unjust for a judge to let the guilty go unpunished. Right? Over and over again He talks about that in the Old Testament. So how can God be just and yet forgive guilty sinners? It's because His perfect justice has already been satisfied. Look up at verse 7: through His blood, His death for us. Look down in 2:2: Jesus "Himself is the propitiation." That is, the satisfaction of God's just wrath against our sin. Jesus satisfied the justice of God, and so we can be forgiven. When you and I pray for forgiveness, we ought to plead the character of God. We ought to say something like this: "Father, I don't deserve Your forgiveness. You didn't have to make me a promise, but by Your grace You have made a promise. And You are always faithful to Your promises. Forgive me." Or we pray something like this: "Father, Your justice demands that my sin not be unpunished, and yet You satisfied that justice in Jesus Christ. He paid for the sin that I am asking You to forgive me for, so that You can be just and yet forgive." Always remember that back of Your forgiveness, always, always, always lies the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.

What does God promise to do in response to our confession? Notice, God promises to respond in two ways in verse 9. To "forgive us our sins." The Greek word for "forgive" here is a word which means "to send away (Sometimes it's even translated "divorce."), to let go, to give up a debt, to cancel a debt." So God is promising that in response to our confession, He's not going to hold onto our sins. Instead, He's going to let them go, He's going to send them away, He's going to cancel them entirely.

And then there's a second way He responds. Verse 9 says, "And to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." This is probably synonymous with forgiveness. But forgiveness sees sin as a debt that needs to be forgiven; cleansing sees sin as a stain on the soul that needs to be washed. You remember David, in Psalm 51? "Wash me." Clean me. I've stained my soul with sin. I need Your forgiveness. I need Your cleansing. And God promises to do exactly that in response to the confession of our sin. When we judge our sin before Him as He would judge it, He responds in this way. It's His promise. It's His promise to a true believer who, as a pattern of life, is confessing his sins to God.

Now don't miss the huge theological lesson that is the foundation for this passage. Don't miss this. There is only one reason that we who still sin on a daily basis, on an hourly basis, can have fellowship with a holy God who is like pure white, blazing, blinding light. It's in verse 7. It's because of "the blood of Jesus His Son." The only reason God can extend forgiveness to you and to me, the only reason we who still sin can walk in fellowship, can have a relationship with such a holy God, is because of "the blood of Jesus His Son." That's what we remember and celebrate in the Lord's Table. Let's bow together.

Our Father, we thank You so much for this powerful reminder of what our Lord accomplished on our behalf. Lord, thank You that He shared His perfect life with us, that He lived among us, that He lived as we should live. But O God, we thank You most of all that He willingly, voluntarily was crucified and died in our place; He endured Your sentence of judgment against us, so that we could go free. Thank You, O God, that You raised Him from the dead, and even now He is at Your right hand interceding for us, making our worship, making our celebration of the Lord's Table acceptable to You, because He is the only righteous One. Thank You that You have clothed us in His righteousness. Help us to live in keeping with our position, to walk in the light as He Himself is in the light. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.