Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. I think all Christians are like six-year-old little boys.
You put a six-year-old little boy and you let him go outside. I don't care what he's dressed in, where he's at. He's like a magnet. He just, he can't help it.
You know, I can remember hearing things like, whatever you do, don't get grass stains on those pants. And inevitably, inevitably, that's the way we are as believers. You see, we have this tremendous propensity to sin. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church, located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's Word meets our world. So the question is then, how do I walk with the Lord? How do I have fellowship day in and day out? How do I abide in Christ?
How do I take full benefit of what it means to be a believer in Jesus Christ? And there you see this in verse 7 and verse 9. First, verse 7, the conditions of fellowship with God. He said, 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 live righteously, not perfectly, by the way, he's not talking about perfection here, otherwise there'd be no reason for the blood of Jesus, his Son, to cleanse us from all sin. He's not talking about that. He's talking about not abiding in the darkness, living righteously.
Every single epistle that Paul writes, that's what Paul writes about. Hey, you know the way you used to be? Don't be that way anymore.
That's what he says. And basically what Paul says, you know what you are in Christ? Act that way. You see, you're a child of God, then act like a child of God. You're declared righteous by God, then live righteously. Let me give you one example that Ephesians, we'll come back to 1 John, Ephesians chapter 5. Paul says it differently, but it's the same thing in these first eight verses. He says, therefore, be imitators of God. Obviously, he's not talking about perfection. As beloved children, the way children imitate their parents. And live or walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.
Now watch. But immorality, he says, or any impurity or greed must not even be named among you, as he says, is proper among saints. And there must be no filthiness and silly talk or coarse gestures which are not fitting. But rather, he says, the giving of thanks. Verse 7, he says, therefore, do not be partakers with them. You were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk or live as children of the light.
That's one of the ways we do it. You see, one of the great things that happened when you became a Christian is that the Spirit of God came to reside in you. So you know what that means? It means you now can live righteously. It's a battle.
We all know that. But I can actually live righteously. And so he says, well then live that way. Now back to the second condition, a very important one, because we'll never do it perfectly, is verse 9. He then says in verse 9, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Now, to some, this has become an extremely confusing verse.
And you can understand it on a certain level. Whenever we became a Christian and we put our trust in Jesus Christ and his finished work on the cross, we were told that our sins were forgiven, correct? All of our past sins, all of our present sins, and all of our future sins.
And that's true. So then why is he saying here that we need to confess our sins? Let me give you some examples of how others have responded. One radio personality said, if you practice this verse, you live in daily insecurity and always doubt whether your sins are ever going to be forgiven. Another author wrote this, to practice 1 John 1-9 reveals your unbelief. They're missing the point.
It's sincere but misguided. There is a context here. In fact, they try to interpret that and say this is for unbelievers.
Well, that wouldn't make much sense in the context. Look at the words that are used. First of all, John is writing. In verse 6, we. In verse 7, we. In verse 8, we. Verse 10, we. Verse 9, we.
Now, who are the we? Verse 1 of chapter 2, my little children, I am writing these things to you. These are believers. This is clearly not unbelievers that he's talking about at all. And he says, my little children, I am writing these things to you that you may not sin.
Well, we are the only ones that have that capacity. So John says, that's what I'm writing for. And John isn't confused by this because look at verse 12 of chapter 2. John understands the judicial forgiveness that we received. He said, I am writing to you, little children, because your sins have been forgiven you for his name's sake. Have been forgiven, past perfect tense, an action in the past that the results continue forever. John's not talking about judicial forgiveness here, which is from the penalty of sin, which is separation from God. John is talking about relational forgiveness here. Some have called it parental forgiveness in my day to day relationship with God. Now, what does this look like?
Are you sure this is the case? I want to look at another passage. I want to go to John, the Gospel of John, chapter 13, to show you the distinctions between the two. Night before Christ is crucified, you know the scene. Jesus is going to wash the disciples feet. Now, they did need washed.
I don't deny that there was no one there to wash them. But Jesus is trying to teach his disciples something much more important than just washing feet. And in verse five, it says, then he poured water into the basin and he began to wash the disciples feet and wipe them with a towel in which he was girded. And he came to Simon Peter and he said to him, Lord, do you wash my feet? And Jesus answered and said to him, he says, what I do, you do not realize now. He said, you understand hereafter.
That tells you there's something else going on. I don't think there was any doubt that he knew he was getting his feet washed, but he didn't know exactly what it meant. And so Peter said to him, never shall you wash my feet.
Clearly didn't understand it. You're the Lord. There is no way you're going to wash my feet. Jesus said, if I do not wash you, you'll have no part of me. If I don't wash your feet, you have no part of me. No relationship with me.
None at all. No fellowship, no koinonia, no abiding. Peter got it. Simon Peter said to him, Lord, then wash not only my feet, but how about my hands and my head? And Jesus said to him, he who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean.
What's he mean by that? Peter, you've been forgiven. You've been bathed.
That's once. You only get bathed once by God in God's forgiveness. You are declared righteous.
That's Romans. You are declared righteous by God. You've been bathed.
Your sins are forgiven. He said, but I need to wash your feet in order for you to have an abiding relationship with me. He said, you are clean, but not all of you. And of course, he was referring to Judas, who had never been bathed. Now, let's go back to First John. He says, if we confess our sins.
Now, that's a hard word. Some of you come from a religious background that really make this difficult because you've been to confession. Okay, well, first of all, this really probably had almost nothing to do with what you did. First thing, there's no middleman here.
All right, there's no middleman. You don't go to a middleman to confess. You just go to God. The second thing is, what does confession mean, depending on your background? For some of you, it means that I have to confess and then somebody will tell me what I need to do for penance.
What are the things I have to do to get this all right? Now, that's fundamentally flawed. That's no different than saying, how do I earn my salvation? You see, you don't do anything.
In fact, that's the problem. It's the word. If we confess, homo legao. Homo means the same.
Legao means to speak. Homo legao, to say the same thing, to speak the same thing, to agree with. In other words, when I confess my sins, I agree with God about my sins. I see my sins the way God sees my sins. It's not just admitting that I've done something wrong. One writer said this, I side with God as a witness against myself and I see my sin as he does. That's what it means to confess.
Homo legao, to acknowledge, to agree with. You see, you can't do this in a way of just, you know, on the one hand, I can't do it as a sacrament by which I am going to do penance to get it right. There's none of that in here. On the other hand, it's not a credit card. You see, there are a lot of evangelicals that use this as a credit card. They can do whatever they want and just pull the credit card machine and say it's all clear, all paid. I did it.
I just told them what it was and I'm okay now. In fact, that can go to such an extreme that several years ago I had a man in my office on a Monday or Tuesday tell me of a sin he was going to commit on Friday or Saturday. And he said, don't worry, I'm going to 1 John 1-9 it.
No, he's not. You see, that's not 1 John 1-9. You can't say, I'm planning the sin this weekend, but I'll just tell God I agree with him that was a sin and he'll go on my way.
That's not what it means at all. You see, think of an example. Think of the Apostle Paul in Romans 7. The Apostle Paul says, you know what my life's a lot like?
I find myself not doing the very things I should be doing. And he said, and yet I find myself doing the things I do not want to do. You see, that's agreeing with God. I do not want to do these things, Paul says, but I find myself doing them. I agree with God. That's sin. You see, the problem is if we stay in the darkness too long, we begin to want to do it.
Some have called that scar tissue of the soul or sin sick. And boy, we can slide in the darkness. We can abide in there. And you run into Christians all the time that do that. It's a long way home for them. They're a lot like the prodigal.
Once they go off, they stay in the darkness. Let me show you sort of the confession in action. Psalm 51. Psalm 51. This is David's confessional Psalm, along with 32. This is David confessing his sin of having adultery with Bathsheba.
Now, this confession took a while, a little bit like ours. It took about a year before David would confess. And he had to have a little help. So God sent a prophet named Nathan to David. And he told David a sheep story. And remember, he was an ex-shepherd, so he was a sucker for a sheep story. And the sheep story was, what do you think of a kind of guy who has a whole bunch of sheep, and there's another guy who only has one little lamb. And that guy with all the sheep goes and steals the little lamb. Well, that got David's hair up on his neck.
He's a shepherd. He said, that guy, that guy should die. And Nathan said, that guy is you. And David realized, uh oh, I've been found out. So David writes this tremendous confessional. He says, Be gracious to me, O God, according to your lovingkindness, your hesed, according to the greatness of your compassion, blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. And then this, for I know my transgressions. He said, my sin is ever before me. David will go on to tell you, he said, I was being eaten alive by this.
What do you think, by the way, is going to happen to you when you stay in darkness as a believer or child of God? Your conscience is going to get to you. He said, against you and you only I have sinned. He doesn't mean he didn't sin against Uriah, he didn't sin against families. He's saying, in the sense of my relationship with you, against you and you only I have sinned and done what is evil in your sight. So you are justified when you speak and blameless when you judge me. What did David see his action as?
Evil. It's confession. That's agreeing with God.
You see, that's exactly what happened. Now, let's go back to First John. The process here is if we confess our sins, we come into agreement with God about our sins.
He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins. And then he adds this and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. There is a cleansing going on. You see, there is a cleansing going on.
I am clean again. I have a tremendous capacity to get dirty. I think all Christians are like six year old little boys.
You put a six year old little boy and you let him go outside. I don't care what he's dressed in, where he's at. He's like a magnet. He just he can't help it.
You know, I can remember hearing things like, whatever you do, don't get grass stains on those pants. And inevitably, inevitably, that's the way we are as believers. You see, with this tremendous propensity to sin and this cleansing idea. Again, hold your place here and just go with me to Second Corinthians Chapter seven for a moment. Second Corinthians Chapter seven and verse one. Apostle Paul writing, he said, therefore, having all these promises that we have as a believer, beloved, that's us, let us cleanse ourselves from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness and the fear of God. He's not talking about judicial forgiveness.
We are clean. We're declared righteous. He's talking about parental or relational forgiveness that we need every day of our lives. In other words, this becomes an idea of keeping ourselves right before God and clean before God.
That's why back to First John now. He says, my little children, in verse one of Chapter two, I am writing these things to you that you may not sin. Hey, look, I hope you live righteously. He said, and if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. Christ will plead our case. Remember, God is light. He has nothing to do with sin. But our advocate will plead our case.
Well, how will he plead it? And he himself is the propitiation for our sins and not only ours only, but for those of the whole world. Christ said, I paid for those.
Those are all paid for. He intercedes on our behalf. You see, this idea of confessing our sins is is paramount to the Christian life. It's like spiritual breathing. It's just part of who we are. And by the way, it never changes.
Here's something you have to learn. The more spiritual you become, the more time you're likely to spend acknowledging your sins to God, because the more aware you are of the sins in your life. When you first become a Christian, you might have just stopped doing dope.
You might have just stopped swearing like a sailor. You see, and that's what you thought your big sin was. You walk with the Lord for a long time.
And you notice you have all kinds of sin issues in your life. Several years ago in this church, and I was sitting right over there, man up on the pulpit was named Alden Gannett. He was the president of Southeastern Bible College, and he was in his 70s at the time. And he was preaching this passage. And Alden said, if we confess our sins and how important it is, and he said, I want to let you all know that this morning I had to confess my sins before the Lord. Now everybody got interested. Wow.
Man like that. He said, while I was staying at this couple's home, members of our church, I got up in my early time to read the scriptures around five o'clock. And he said, and as I was reading the scriptures, my mind wondered. And immediately I acknowledged my sin before God. Now, I was sitting over there and our whole congregation went and looked at me like, that's sin? That's sin? Your mind wonders in your sinning?
It was for Alden. See, it might not be for you, but it is for him. You just become more and more sensitive to it. You see, I have noticed as I've walked with the Lord longer and longer, I am much, much more sensitive. There is never a time when I get up and speak ever that the moments before I get up, I confess everything kind of sin I have in my mind, anything that's there. I realize, I realize the kind of vessel that God's using.
You see, it's a very important part of our life. If I acknowledge my sins, he's faithful and just and notice there's a cleansing that takes place. Proverbs chapter 28 says this, He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will find compassion.
You see, I don't know about you, but I have to live in a perpetual state of forgiveness with my God. And the reason is twofold, what I'm like and what he's like. He's perfect. He's holy.
He's light. I'm none of those things. You see, I'm a forgiven sinner. And so if I'm going to have that kind of relationship and I want to have fellowship with him, he sets the terms.
I don't. Sometimes we think we can set the terms, but when we do, we're lying. We're deceiving ourselves and even making God out to be a liar. His conditions for fellowship is that I walk in the light as he is in the light. I live righteously and I acknowledge and confess my sins for him on a daily basis. The tense of that is if we keep on confessing, it's a present tense.
It never ends and it never stops. You know, our Christian life began. When we see our need and we own our sin and we put our trust in Jesus Christ and his finished work on the cross. That's how we become, Jesus said to Nicodemus, a born again Christian. But that call of salvation is calling us to have a relationship with God. A God who is light. And we are to live our life in that light.
And yet, sinful as we are, we continually stray, don't we? Into the darkness. I always say this, look, don't stay there. Keep short accounts.
You see, keep short accounts. And by the way, when you do, I forgive it. I'm like the prodigal son's father. I'll give you the hug, the kiss. I'll put the robe on you and let's have a party.
I'll cleanse you. That's the kind of God I am. Our job is to own it. Our job is to confess it. And to receive the cleansing of God's forgiveness and step back into the light.
Let's pray. Father, this morning my prayer is simple. If there's anyone here who knows that they have unconfessed sin, who knows that they are languishing in the darkness, who knows that they have redefined sin, or they pretend that they have no guilt for their sin, or they completely ignore it, that this passage in your spirit will convict them, that they have to own it.
They have to acknowledge it. That they have to agree with you and that they have to declare their sin before you. Father, when they do that, they receive this great cleansing forgiveness, this living forgiveness, this day in, day out forgiveness by which if we didn't have it, we would never have a close intimate walk with you. Father, I pray that this becomes our way of spiritually breathing every single day of our lives, that we have such a close relationship with you. We speak to you in prayer. You speak to us in your word. And we keep the slate clean. We pray this in Christ's name.
Amen. You've been listening to Pastor Bill Gebhardt on the Radio Ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts, or maybe you would just like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called OnePlace.com. That's OnePlace.com, and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online.
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That's fbcnola.org. At our website, you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for, or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for, you can listen online, or if you prefer, you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember, you can do all of this absolutely free of charge. Once again, our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt, thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word. .
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