December 2024 – Snapshots

If We Confess

Being forgiven by God is part and parcel of what it means to be justified (Ac 13:38-39) or saved (Ro 5:9), to be His child. If we die with any sin which isn’t forgiven by God, which is not washed away by the blood of Christ (Re 1:5), the consequence is spiritual death (Ez 18:4), separation from God forever in Hell. (Ro 6:23) So, it’s vital to ensure that all our sins are forgiven, every last one of them. (Co 2:13)

If we make forgiveness of our sin conditional upon our confession, then by definition this behavior becomes a means of earning or maintaining salvation, since it implies we’re lost forever if we don’t faithfully confess all our sins.

This is effectively salvation by works, or legalism, which the Scripture rejects as inconsistent with the Gospel: we’re justified by faith (Ro 3:28), not by works. (Ga 5:4)

God’s salvation doesn’t require that we act a certain way to keep it; rather, it produces behavior within us reflecting the divine nature; we become new creatures (2Co 5:17), moving away from sin to walk with God.

Striving against sin is an ongoing process where we’re growing over time; no believer is perfectly sinless this side of Heaven (Ro 7:21); we continue to sin in ways we hardly even comprehend (1Jn 1:8), but we don’t commit ourselves to a life of willful, presumptuous sin. (1Jn 3:8-10)

As believers, once we realize we’ve sinned we acknowledge this before God; we confess our sin, agreeing with God about it, and look to Him to help us overcome sin, knowing He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (1Jn 1:9)

He doesn’t forgive us because we confess our sin, Father God forgives us because Jesus died for us and paid our sin debt once for all. (He 10:14) Confession is how we restore our fellowship with God, how we walk in the light (1Jn 1:7), not how we get Him to forgive us.

Confession does not cause forgiveness; we believers are forgiven of all our sins — past, present and future sins. Confession of sin is simply the natural response for us as we become aware of our sins, and when we do confess we can rest assured we’re forgiven: He never even charges us with sin. (Ro 4:7-8) This is the only way we can be sure of our salvation: God has already accomplished it for us. (Ro 7:16)

We may confirm 1^st John 1:9 does not teach this cause-and-effect relationship between confession of sin and forgiveness by carefully noting what it says, and what the text doesn’t say. It says: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” The text does not say, “If we don’t confess our sins, God will not forgive us.”

This latter statement, which many infer from this verse, is called the Inverse and it’s not logically equivalent to the original (it means something different). To illustrate, I might say, “If it rains I will go to the store.” If it doesn’t rain and I do go to the store, I’m not being inconsistent; I didn’t say what I would do if it didn’t rain, only what I would do if it did rain. So, 1^st John 1:9 says nothing about what God will do if we don’t confess a particular sin; it simply affirms that as we confess our sins we may be confident we’re forgiven.

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Striving Against Sin

Overcoming sin in our lives is a really big deal; Scripture presumes we’re earnestly striving against sin (He 12:2) and that we aren’t done yet. (Ro 7:21-23) What does this struggle look like and how do we engage in this fight?

Firstly, we must become aware of the specific sins we’re committing, either doing what we shouldn’t (1Jn 3:1a) or not doing what we should. (Ja 4:17) To do so we must start paying attention to what we’re thinking and doing and how we’re feeling. We must take heed and observe how we’re living (Ps 119:9), focusing in on what’s motivating and driving us. We can’t intentionally correct our sinful behavior unless we’re aware of it.

Secondly, we must correctly classify each behavior as holy or sinful, which requires properly understanding the divine moral standard and accepting God’s definition of sin: sin is breaking Torah. (1Jn 3:4) Whenever we’re sinning, we’re violating God’s Law, and whenever we’re violating God’s Law, we’re sinning. This is how God defines and identifies sin. To even begin to fight against sin, we must first get this straight.

Then we must put these first two steps together: start paying attention to our behavior with a proper understanding of sin. Whenever our behavior is violating God’s Law, especially in a repeating pattern, we have a stronghold of sin to contend with, to strive against and overcome. (2Co 10:5)

Identifying sin is easier when we’re suffering from it, but we’re often blind to our worst sins, the ones we should really be focusing on. We can be asking God to search our hearts (He 4:12), exposing our sin and helping us identify it (Ps 139:23-24a), and guide us on what to work on next. (24b) This is when we can begin to fight, when the struggle begins in earnest.

Then we must do a bit of earnest root-cause analysis: why are we sinning? (Lk 6:46) There’s a reason we’re committing any particular sin; to stop we must find the underlying problem and correct it: we’re believing a lie related to this particular behavior. Sin is grounded in deceit (Ro 7:11); believing the truth sets us free from the dominion of sin. (Jn 8:32) We must pinpoint the lies we’re holding on to, which are deceiving us into desiring sin (Ja 2:13-15), and start believing the truth. (2Th 2:13)

There might be a whole web of lies keeping us in bondage to a particular lifestyle (Ro 7:23), but the Son can set us free by helping us believe the truth. (Jn 8:36)

As we prayerfully and regularly expose our minds and hearts to His Word (Ps 119:11), which is the Truth (Jn 17:17), pressing in on those particular verses which relate specifically to our struggle (Mt 4:3-4), He can help us believe His words and deliver us from sin. (Ja 1:21) He gave Himself for our sins that He might deliver us from this present evil world according to the will of God. (Ga 1:4)

If we aren’t making good progress, try as we might, we should engage spiritual community, confessing where we’re struggling so others can pray for us to be healed (Ja 5:16) and point us to the truth. (Ja 5:19-20) At times we need help from our brothers and sisters, and this is God’s wonderful design.

And we shouldn’t be surprised if it takes time to correct deeply held beliefs. If we’ve been training ourselves to think a certain way most of our lives, it might take some prolonged effort to renew our minds in the truth. (Ro 12:2) Just as it takes time to heal and retrain our bodies when we’re in poor physical health (1Ti 4:7-8), we should be consistent and disciplined in our pursuit of godliness (2Pe 1:4-8), patient with ourselves and thankful for any progress we see.

This is striving to believe (Mk 9:24), a faith-struggle to rid ourselves of all the lies holding us captive and keeping us in bondage. This is war, a fight to the death; we should engage like soldiers in combat (2Ti 2:3-4), not expect to overcome as we watch passively from the sidelines.

Wherever the enemy has taken us prisoner, Jesus Christ is offering us the key to freedom and fullness; we shouldn’t be content to remain in our chains. Yeshua has fully committed Himself to this fight (Ti 2:14); He’s all in and will set us free as we cleanse ourselves through Him. (2Co 7:1)

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Unskillful in the Word

It is often claimed the Bible does not teach Sola Scriptura, that Scripture itself does not teach that Scripture is our only authority in faith and morality and that we’re each responsible to interpret Scripture for ourselves.

If something as important as Sola Scriptura is true, one would expect it to be evident in Scripture. Perhaps it is, and just we can’t see it; maybe we’re expecting it to be stated in a certain way, unable to perceive it as He’s actually stated it.

Or it may be that we don’t want to see it because we’re unwilling to obey it. (Jn 1:17)

One way to tackle this is to observe that if any scripture is inconsistent with rejecting Sola Scriptura, Scripture is effectively stating Sola Scriptura via Proof by Contradiction. To recognize the truth in such a context we must carefully think through the implications of the passage, or we’ll likely miss it.

Consider the last part of Hebrews 5, where God accuses believers who’ve been in the Faith a while with neglect for being unskilled in interpreting Scripture. (He 5:12-14) They are expected to have a reasonably good handle on Scripture by this time, able to use it to parse out difficult moral dilemmas and articulate their faith. If we’re not expected to interpret Scripture for ourselves, and to interpret it properly, this passage makes no sense. This proves Sola Scriptura by contradiction.

And when Paul exhorts Timothy to be diligent to demonstrate he’s approved by God, a laborer in the Word who doesn’t need to be ashamed, correctly interpreting Scripture (2Ti 2:15), he’s telling Timothy to immerse himself in the Word, pondering it day after day, comparing Scripture with Scripture, until he can demonstrate how all of his personal beliefs are consistent with all of Scripture. Again, if we aren’t expected to interpret Scripture for ourselves, and accountable to God for how we interpret it, this passage makes no sense, proving Sola Scriptura by contradiction.

And when Paul exhorts Titus to ordain to the office of bishop older men who have a firm grasp of Scripture, who are able to challenge and expose false teachers (2Ti 2:15), he’s telling us all by example to immerse ourselves in the Word, pondering it day after day, comparing Scripture with Scripture, until we can reason properly from Scripture to expose those who are trying to exalt themselves through false teaching. Again, if we aren’t expected to interpret Scripture for ourselves, and accountable to God for how we do so, this passage makes no sense, proving Sola Scriptura by contradiction.

And when God commends the Ephesian church for exposing false apostles (Re 2:2), He presumes we have an infallible authority by which to evaluate and expose deceptive authority figures who would lead us astray, which by definition cannot merely be other men claiming the apostolic role. Disqualifying one claiming to be an apostle of Christ requires showing their message to be inconsistent with the words of Christ. This requires having the written, infallible Word and the ability to interpret it correctly. Again, if we aren’t expected to interpret Scripture for ourselves, and accountable to God for how we do, this passage makes no sense, proving Sola Scriptura by contradiction.

If we’re unwilling to shoulder the responsibility of rightly dividing the Word, since that takes a lot of investment on our part, a lot of soul searching, much prayerful pondering and digging, if we don’t care much about finding the truth for ourselves and owning our personal beliefs before God, thinking we can delegate this to others and that God won’t mind too much if we’re wrong, we’ll be looking for ways to support that mindset, and be totally blind to what the Word is actually saying.

When God tells us to labor to enter into His rest (He 4:11), to strive to enter the heavenly kingdom (Lk 13:24), to give diligence to make our election sure (2Pe 1:10), to search the Scriptures to ensure we have eternal salvation (Jn 5:39), to obediently receive His Word into our inmost being since it’s able to save our souls (Ja 1:21), He’s warning us we have no excuse if we neglect His offer of salvation (He 2:3), if we don’t personally seek the Lord until we’re absolutely sure we belong to Him. (Mt 7:13-14)

“Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.” (Ga 6:7-8)

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What Saith the Scripture?

The Bible is an amazing, self-referencing work of art: interwoven within it are 63,779 cross-references which elaborate on and explain what it means, depicted in this beautiful diagram.

The base comprises a vertical line for each chapter in the Bible, with Genesis 1 on the left, where the length of each line reflects the number of verses in that chapter (the long line in the center is Psalm 119) and complete books alternate in shades of grey. Each cross-reference is depicted by an arc with a color corresponding to the distance between the two chapters, creating a rainbow-like effect.

And these are the explicit references, inviting us to explore the innumerable interconnections embedded within and among the various concepts and how they all interrelate with, build on and flesh one another out. (Ps 139:17-18) God has breathed out this entire text: He inspired it (2Ti 3:16), and surgically leverages these living interconnections as He pleases in the hearts of those who are seeking Him. (Ja 1:21)

Through His Word He comforts and guides us in our individual, particular circumstances (He 4:12), enabling us to engage with His Spirit and understand His Heart, to fully furnish, guide and equip us in living with and for Him. (2Ti 3:16-17)

God inspires His Word like this, with infinite depth, precision and scope, so we can meditate on it endlessly (Ps 1:2), comparing Scripture with Scripture (Mt 4:4), searching out all the treasures of His nature and Way. (Pr 2:4-5)

For example, through part of a verse hidden in an obscure, messianic prophecy written by Isaiah hundreds of years earlier (Is 49:8), the Apostle Paul discovers salvation is available now (2Co 6:2) to all who earnestly seek Him. (1)

Moments later, Paul weaves a thread from Leviticus (Le 26:12) into another from Ezekiel (Ez 3:27) to understand how God indwells and infuses the community of believers as a living temple. (2Co 6:16) In his very next breath (17-18) he blends several more distinct references together to call all believers to come out and separate ourselves from the world (Is 52:11) so God will receive us into His family as sons (2Sa 7:14) and daughters, just as He has promised. (Is 43:6)

Paul leverages these exceeding great and precious promises (2Pe 1:4) to exhort all believers to pursue perfect holiness in the fear of God. (2Co 7:1)

How does Paul do this? As he memorizes the Old Testament (Ps 119:9) and meditates on it continually (Ps 119:97), God shows up, teaching him and revealing precious truths to him (Ep 3:3-4), to equip him in his calling to preach the Gospel to the nations. (6-7) God is showing us His willingness to personally nourish and instruct each of us Himself through His written Word. (Ep 4:21)

The Scripture foresees and preaches (Ga 3:8), speaking as though it were alive (Ro 10:11); we’re to let His words dwell in us richly (Co 3:16), saturating our minds and hearts with them (Je 15:16), focusing and seeking infinite riches (Ps 19:10-11): His very words are Spirit, and they are Life. (Jn 6:63) They will never pass away. (Mt 24:35)

What treasure remains hidden in these vibrant, living texts, just waiting to be discovered? (Pr 2:3-6) They are vast, the unsearchable riches of Christ await us. (Ep 3:8) O God! Open our eyes, that we may behold wondrous things out of Your Law. (Ps 119:18)

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