Our friend's question was this—"Is sin still on the believer all his life, while he lives here?" What is the answer of scripture? If sin be still on him he is eternally lost, for there can be no more offering for sin; and without shedding of blood there can be no remission of sin. (Heb. 9:2222And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission. (Hebrews 9:22).)
Sin, or the flesh, the old nature, is still in him—he is deeply conscious of this. The scripture does not say, Blessed is the man in whom there is no sin; but, " Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin." (Rom. 4:88Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin. (Romans 4:8).) If sin, then, is still in the believer, how is it true that it is not on him? In other words, if sin, as a fact, is in the believer, how is God righteous in not reckoning it on him, or to him? This is not the question of God forgiving our sins for Christ's sake, but the deeper question, How has God dealt with what we call original sin, the root of all the sins? We do not read that He has, or does, forgive this, the flesh, or sin in the flesh. What then? Did not Jesus die to put away sin? Truly the word says that " he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." " Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." " For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil." Most surely that work is accomplished on the cross by which all this shall be effected. But to see the full effect in result, we must wait for the new creation—the new heavens and the new earth. Is sin put away from the world? Are the works of the devil yet destroyed?
Now as to the believer. First, it is all-important to know the ground of the righteousness of God in not reckoning the sin that is in us. It has been not forgiven, but judged; condemned, according to all the claims of infinite holiness, and righteous wrath against sin. " For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." (2 Cor. 5:2121For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. (2 Corinthians 5:21).) " God sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin [or by a sacrifice for sin] condemned sin in the flesh." What wondrous grace this is to us, and what righteousness! Since my sin has been condemned in the person of my Substitute, it cannot in righteousness be reckoned to me, or on me. Thus is that word fulfilled, " Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin."
Now, if we see that sin has thus been judged in the person of our Substitute, the Son of God in the likeness of sinful flesh, we see that God does not reckon it to exist before Him: then we can say, "I am crucified with Christ; nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.
Can you look back at the cross, and not only say, He was delivered for my offenses—sins which I have committed; but can you also say, "I am crucified with Christ"? Then will you also understand that word, " Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God in Christ Jesus our Lord." (Rom. 6:3-143Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death? 4Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. 5For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection: 6Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin. 7For he that is dead is freed from sin. 8Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him: 9Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. 10For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. 11Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. 12Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof. 13Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: but yield yourselves unto God, as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. 14For sin shall not have dominion over you: for ye are not under the law, but under grace. (Romans 6:3‑14).) This, then, is how scripture deals with sin, the root, or evil nature. It is there. It is not changed. The Lord says, " That which is born of the flesh, is flesh; that which is born of the Spirit, is spirit," That which is born of a sinful nature remains a sinful nature. Why is it not condemned in me? It has been, in my Substitute. " I am crucified with [him] Christ." It is not on me, though in me—cannot be imputed to me; because I am not reckoned alive in the flesh, or sin, but dead with Christ, and alive to God, If Christ, then, bare our sins, was delivered for our offenses, and raised again for our justification; and if sin, the root, has also been condemned, and we accept this judgment of death on the old man, as an accomplished fact; what is there left to judge or condemn in those who are dead with Christ, and in Him alive to God? Plainly " There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus." (Rom. 8:11There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. (Romans 8:1).)
Sins all forgiven, to be remembered no more. Sin not imputed. And all this eternal redemption, immutably the same. If this is not so, if either a single committed sin, or the sin still in us, be reckoned to us, how can we be saved? or, in that case, how could it be true that the worshippers once purged should have no more conscience of sins? (Heb. 10:22For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience of sins. (Hebrews 10:2).) Are we not quite conscious that we do sin, and that we still have sin in us, and that we need the mighty power of God to keep us every hour? How is it, then, that we have no more conscience of sins—that is, that sins are no more between us and God? Because we are justified from sins by the death and resurrection of Christ. We are dead with Christ. Thus sins, and sin, can never be imputed unto us. And in no other way could we understand those remarkable words: "But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, forever sat down on the right hand of God..... For by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified." This is the truth which has been lost for centuries. The two things are equally true. Whilst Jesus sits there, the believer sanctified through the offering of His body is thus perfected here. That is, as to sin being reckoned to him, or on him, or on his conscience, between God and his soul, the Holy Ghost bears witness that God will remember, his sins no more. Oh, blessed witness of the Holy Spirit! Why should we doubt Him?
It is in this sense we understand, if in the light "But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanseth us from all sin." That is, it is not that sin is eradicated, that we can say we have no sin as a fact: if we do, we deceive ourselves; but that sin is not imputed to us. The context proves this. (1 John 1:77But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin. (1 John 1:7).) Indeed we have distinct instruction, both if any man sin, and also on the confession of our sins, forgiveness and restoration. We will look, however, a little further into the question of sin, the fallen nature.
If, says the inquirer, grace has so abounded, both over our sins and over sin; if salvation is so entirely the work of Christ; would not this make us indifferent about sin? Is it so even amongst men? If a friend has shown you great kindness in deep distress, does the depth of your need, and the vastness of the unexpected kindness, make you the more indifferent about pleasing him? Nay, is it not the opposite? Does not the half-and-half gospel which men believe only produce halfhearted obedience and lukewarmness to Christ?
If a sinner is brought, through grace, to believe that God has loved him from eternity, given His Son to die for him whilst he was a sinner, that -there is now nothing between his soul and God, that God loves him with infinite and everlasting love—will not the effect be, that he loves God because God first loved him?
And more, the scripture says, "How shall we, that are dead to sin, live any longer therein?" It may be said that death alone is not power. Quite true; but we are dead to sin, and alive to God in Christ, that we should not serve sin; that it should no longer be our master. That we should yield our members unto another master, even unto God, as those that are alive from the dead. On this follows the great delivering truth, " For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death." As born of the Spirit, we learn, in one way or other, the terrible nature of " the law of sin which is in my members/é But now, having the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, we are free from the law of sin and death. Therefore, though the flesh is still in us, we are not debtors to it, to fulfill its lusts, or to live after it. The flesh is still there, for it lusteth against the Spirit; that is, against the Spirit of God dwelling in us. "I say then, walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh." (Gal. 5:16, 1716This I say then, Walk in the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. 17For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would. (Galatians 5:16‑17).) Thus, whilst we see distinctly that the power of deliverance is the law of the Spirit of life, yet these scriptures plainly imply that the flesh is there, and unchanged, though no longer master.
There is one point more. Many a reader will say, This is very different from what I have been taught. I thought our old sinful nature, or original sin in us, that in which we were born, had been done away somehow, either by baptism, regeneration, or sanctification—when shall we be pure and sinless, have no sin? Is our own death to do more for us than the death of Christ?—more than our redemption?
This shows most sadly the effect of the loss of the true knowledge of the coming of the Lord, without which we cannot hold the true, complete gospel of God. Death is made the great event, the climax of the Christiana hope, in modern teaching. Not so in scripture. To be absent from the body, and present with the Lord, is far better. But are all the effects of sin actually gone in death? Death is the effect of sin, by sin it came. Is the day of our death the day of our redemption, for which we hope? Is it in death that we shall be like the risen and glorified Christ? As to our bodies, we could not be more unlike His body; His body incorruptible in glory, ours a loathsome mass of corruption in the grave. No, it is not for death that we wait as the day of our redemption from original sin, and its effects. No, the very opposite, we are " waiting for the adoption, to wit the redemption of our body."
Let us, then, pass on to that glorious consummation, the resurrection of those that are Christ's at His coming. To faith redemption is sure. We are sealed by the Holy Spirit unto the day of redemption. (Eph. 4:3030And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. (Ephesians 4:30).) But it is not until that blessed day of redemption that the full results of redemption will be seen in us. Never till then shall we bear the image of the heavenly. When we see Him, we shall be like Him. Can anyone in this present state say that he is sinless as Christ is pure? He would only deceive himself, and the truth would not be in him. Then, oh, blessed fact! we shall be pure, as He is pure—we shall be like Him; and he that hath this hope in Him, purifieth himself, as He is pure. Away, then, with the mistaken thought that our death will do more for us than the death of Christ. We have no right to look for death at all. We may not have to die, but be alive when He comes. But shall we not, when we in His glory shine, ascribe it all to His death on the cross? Yes, and onward still; when the untold numbers are saved, and sealed during days of tribulation; yes, and the teeming multitudes of millennial days, when scattered Israel shall be born in a day; yea, when the new heavens and the new earth shall appear.
" Where God shall shine in light divine,
In glory never-fading."
Then, and now, would we ascribe
" Glory, glory everlasting,
Be to Him who bore the cross."
No pen can describe, no tongue can tell, the full results of the cross of Christ. God has surely proved His acceptance of that infinite atonement in raising Him from the dead. Now, there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ. Sins forgiven, sin judged, and we justified from all things. And soon, very soon, to see Him, and to be like Him, when He appears. " Behold the bridegroom." He says, " Surely I come quickly." Every desire of the heart will be far more than realized in that blissful moment. Then shall we be actually perfect in the fullest sense at the resurrection from among the dead. For this, may we, with the apostle, be able to say, " I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." He did not press on to attain to death; but, any way, by death asleep in Jesus, or alive when He comes; that in any way he might arrive at it, or, " If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection from among the dead." (Phil. 3:1111If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead. (Philippians 3:11).) Then shall sin and its effects with us be no more. For the present it is not imputed to us. We have also the delivering power of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, and we wait for the coming of the Lord. C. S.
Keeping the Spirit's unity is not confined to the truth of the " one body;" but when any of its members go on together with the "one Spirit," then its unity is being so far kept.