ANB 48, you conquer sin

“Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.”
(Hebrews 12:14)

“Nevertheless the foundation of God stands sure, having this seal, The Lord knows them
that are His, and let everyone that Names the Name of Christ depart from iniquity.” (2
Timothy 2:19-20)

“And the Lord said to Cain, ‘Why are you angry? And why do you look sad? If you do
well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin crouches at your door:
its desire is for you, but you must master it.’” (Genesis 4:7, Amplified)

We have to begin understand the importance of walking holy before the Lord. God tells us to be
holy as He is holy. If you name Jesus Christ, you are to strive to live like Him. Or do you claim
Him, and say you receive His salvation, but pay no attention to now avoid that which He saved
you from. Do you live in the mire that Jesus Christ saved you from, or do you do everything you
can to physically walk out that salvation with fear and trembling as we are instructed to do.

Tonight I want to discuss with you a new way of looking at how to keep from sin. I believe this
is true revelation knowledge that can help you in your war for the Lord.

First, before you even can begin, before any of this will matter to you, you must decide you hate
sin. “The fear of the Lord is to hate evil.” (Proverbs 8:13) As a true follower of Christ you
should be content with no sin in your life. You should strive to be perfect. If you do not, if you
allow sin to still rule in your life in any area, then sin still rules in your life in every area (James
2:10). Sin contaminates the entire body (see story of Achan with promised land). One little sin
will corrupt your entire life if you know about it and don’t deal with it. I am convinced that
Christians who go confessing the promises and goodness of God all day and night without
striving to master sin are wasting their time. There is no person walking in the promised land of
God who has not surrendered every area of his life to God’s commandments.

Yes, we will always sin, but I believe our ability to steer clear of sin is far greater than we might
think. I heard someone say he can go for long periods of time without sinning, I believe this.
Let me show you why.

As we have seen over and over the ten commandments can be broken into two groups.
Commandments 1-4 relate to man’s relationship with God. Commandments 5-10 relates to
man’s relationship to man. Feel free to review these in Deuteronomy 5 and see for yourself.
Now, Jesus, in Matthew 22 gave us two commandments that He said ‘fulfill all the law and the
prophets.’ These two commandments were 1) love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul,
mind and strength and 2) love thy neighbor as thyself.

These 2 commandments we are given by Jesus represent the two groups of the ten
commandments. These are his restatements of the law. So what Jesus tells us is that at our core
we don’t have a problem with lying, stealing or any of the rest of them, at our core the problem is
a love problem. You have a lack of love. Remember, we know that no man could fulfill the law
save Jesus Christ. No man had enough love, except for Jesus Christ to perfectly love God and
perfectly love all men. You, in and of yourself could never fulfill the law, you could never love
enough to keep all 10 commandments.

Let’s go just a bit deeper with this. We know that 1 John 4:8 says God is love. We know that
Adam was made in the image and likeness of God, and that Adam was made without sin. So as
we have said before, Adam was not born with a sin nature. He was born with a love nature.
Love is the opposite of sin. Adam, like God, had a love nature. When He fell He committed the
first sin. Before this happened God’s Spirit could dwell within Adam. God’s Spirit, which is
also love, dwelt in Adam, and Adam therefore had a spirit of love. When Adam ate that fruit He
was not loving God properly. When he sinned his love nature was immediately exchanged with
a sin nature, or a nature no longer perfect in love. Jesus Christ, Who we know is referred to as
the Last Adam in 1 Corinthians 15:45, was created in such a way as Adam, they were, in their
spiritual make up, the same. They were both born directly of God’s Spirit. Jesus was created
with the same love nature that Adam was. Only Jesus fulfilled the law.

So now what does that mean? Remember that when you accepted Jesus Christ His blood was
made the penalty for all your sins, and in that instant His blood purified your body so that the
Holy Spirit could come into you. Your body is now the temple of the Holy Spirit. (Read 1
Corinthians 6). Now the Holy Spirit is just as much God as God or Jesus, so therefore the Holy
Spirit is love. The Holy Spirit is not the imperfect human love, it is the perfect love only God
and Jesus have. This same love came and dwells in you today if you have accepted Jesus Christ.
Romans 5:5 says “The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost.” (Also see 1
John 3:17) The Holy Ghost has come and shed the perfect love of God in your hearts. He has
purified your spirit. When a person gets born again their spirit is recreated in an instant, and
their love nature is restored to them. Moreover, they now have the blood of Jesus covering all
their sins, so they won’t lose their love nature like Adam did with a subsequent sin.

So you say, I can think of many Christians who don’t have a love nature. Well they really do,
you just can’t see it and they don’t know it and they don’t understand their ability, or the
importance, to show it.

So let’s do a recap. You should strive to live holy and sin not. All sin is really a love issue. You
were made with imperfect love that could never fulfill the love law. But now you have been
given God’s perfect love with which you can love perfectly. So let’s talk practical application.

The first step in walking out this truth is you must believe it. You must believe the love of God
dwells within you to overcome all temptation. You must believe the Word of God which says
the love of God is within you.

Now, this may sound somewhat bold. I’d say 99.9% of the time when I sin I had a choice
whether or not I would do it. How can I say that? Because, with prayer and study, the Holy
Ghost now brings to my mind every time I have an occasion to step out of love. I don’t need to
think about the 10,000 different sins I could imagine if I tried. All I need to do is examine every
area of my life for love, love for God and love for my fellow man. Think of all that occurs
throughout your day. It may sound hard to remember everything the Bible says to say and do,
but it’s not to hard to determine to always walk in love. Moreover, you who are in Christ Jesus
have the Holy Ghost in you, who will bring to your notice any opportunity you have to step out
of love.

As I go through life there are many opportunities to sin. A long drive through line, a long hold
on the telephone, you know how it is out there. (If you never experience any persecution or
discomfort in life, you seriously need to check your relationship with God, see Psalms 34). So
you have lots of opportunities to step out of love. Now, before you would be fighting these
temptations on your own, but now God fights for you and with you. What you have to get in the
habit of doing is largely what James 4:7-8 says.

Submit to God. Remember you must remain in love at all costs. Make the decision right then
and there you won’t step out of love.

Resist the devil, begin resisting. Begin focusing on God’s love that empowers you to resist.

Draw near to God. Remember that God, with His perfect love, has recreated and in-filled your
very being. Draw near to this part of yourself. Say out loud over and over, ‘God’s love is here,
God’s love is here, I am empowered with the very love of God to walk in love.’ Give this time,
you will literally feel the power of God well up inside you and take you to love levels you never
thought possible.

I should warn you, as soon as you begin believing and working this Biblical truth, you will have
opportunities to fall out of love like never before. So you have a great chance to develop big
time right off the bat, Praise God.

To some of you, this may sound crazy. Spiritual things are foolishness to the natural mind, so I
don’t blame you. Your job is to renew your mind to spiritual truth and get it in line with your
now love natured spirit. Trust the love of God, activate it with your mouth. You will begin to
see yourself defeating the devil in ways you never thought possible.

God knows those that are His. God sees our efforts to live as Jesus Christ. “Fear God and keep
His commandments; for this is the whole duty of man.” (Ecclesiastes 12:12).