God's Answer to the Problem of Sin

Welcome to this weekend's In Touch Podcast with Charles Stanley. As descendants of Adam, we have inherited a corrupted nature. But once we receive God's forgiveness through faith in Christ, we are free from sin's power. Stay with us for a clear explanation of God's answer to the problem of sin. How do you deal with sin in your life?

What would you say? Do you ignore it? Do you rationalize it?

Explain it away? Do you confess it? Are you grieved by it?

Or what is your response? One of the reasons so many of God's people live such defeated lives is because they don't understand the distinction between S-I-N-S in their life and S-I-N. And so I want to explain today God's answer to the problem of sin in our life. Now, I want to distinguish between those things we commit and that which abides within us, that which we have to deal with on an ongoing basis.

First of all, how did God deal with the problem of S-I-N-S in the life of humanity? The Bible says that, first of all, all of us have sinned against God. We have violated the laws of God, transgressed his laws, fallen short of what God required of us. So all of us are guilty of sin. That is, we have been made guilty because we were by nature sinners. We came into the world having inherited from Adam a sinful nature and therefore it was natural and normal for us to sin. So we have chosen to sin against God.

He says that if we say that we have not sinned, we're just deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us. And so all of us are aware of committing sins in our life. Before you were saved, it was your nature to sin against God.

And oftentimes you didn't even feel guilty because it was your lifestyle. It was your nature. That's just what you do. That's what you did. And so your idea of dealing with sin was just ignore it.

Don't let it get you down. Then you were transformed by the grace of God. You were saved by the grace of God.

God did a miraculous and marvelous work in your life. Then your attitude toward sins in your life changed. You didn't want things in your life that displeased God.

And yet, in spite of the fact that you didn't want them there, somehow you found yourself still sinning in areas. Sometimes it was omission, sometimes ignorance, but most of the time things that you and I know are acts of disobedience to God. Now, remember we said that disobedience to God is sin. Rebellion against God is sin. And that the bottom line of all sin is we choose to act independently of the will of God.

Now, sometimes we would like to move the will of God. If God says for you to perform a certain act or to speak to someone on Sunday afternoon at three o'clock and you decide that you're going to do it on Wednesday morning at 10 o'clock, the question is, have you sinned? Well, somebody would say no, because I did what God told me to do. But the question is, did you do what God said do when God said do it the way he said do it? You see, if I just do what he says do on my timing and my way, it is still an act of rebellion against God because I'm acting independently of the will of God. And what I tried to do is I've said, well, here's the will of God and I'm going to do the will of God, but I'm going to move it over here where I think it ought to be until it's convenient to me. So obedience is not just doing what God says when I want to, the way I want to, with my attitude, my motivation. Obeying God is doing what God says, when God says, the way God says it.

And with the right spirit, the right motivation. But the truth is, we all don't. Now, how has God provided for our sins? The Bible says in Romans chapter five that he, while we were yet sinners, sin is only begotten son and Christ died for our sins. So that God's provision for the sins in our life is the blood of Jesus. Now, that is initially for all sin in our life, the blood of Jesus. Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness, no redemption, no remission of sin. Now, so there is no forgiveness apart from the blood of Jesus Christ. Christ Jesus came into this world in order to die for your sins and mine. So when Jesus died, the Bible says in First Peter, God the Father placed all your sins upon him on the tree. He bore all of our sin there. So that the full penalty has been paid.

Now, I want you to listen carefully. On the tree 2,000 years ago, all your sin was placed there on Christ Jesus even before you were born. So how in the world did God do that?

The word is identification. And that is, and I want you to listen carefully now, that is God 2,000 years ago took all of humanity's sin from the cross back to Adam, from the cross to the last person is born and God took all the sin of all mankind and placed all of it on Christ, put all the sin of all man upon Christ and then he crucified him and dealt him the death blow which was the penalty of sin. Now, all of that happened 2,000 years ago. He said, well, how can that apply to my life now?

The word is identification. Here is what God the Father saw when 2,000 years ago God wrapped up all the sin from Adam to the cross, from the cross to the future, the last person is born. God put it all upon him, all of its wickedness, all of its violence.

Listen, think about this. All of the sinfulness and the wickedness and the vileness that your mind can conceive of. Of all of the races and all the tribes and all the civilizations past, all that presently is and all that shall be, God summed all that up and nailed it to the cross with him. Therefore, Jesus bore all the sin of all mankind upon himself and in the shedding of his blood, the shedding of his blood purchased, paid in full. God signed, sealed, paid in full all the sin of mankind so that you, my friend, do not have to pay for your sin. The wrath of God has been averted to all of those who will look back to the cross, accept the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal savior and in the acceptance of Jesus Christ as personal savior, you are saying, I accept Jesus Christ's death as full payment for my sin. I receive him as my savior, my Lord in my life. And from this moment on, I recognize that I belong to him and I choose to live for him. The moment you chose to place your faith in Jesus Christ as the full atonement for your sin, your sin has been paid for past, present and future.

You can't do anything about it. Notice what he did. He did two things very significant. Number one, the Bible says he brought you through a new birth experience. Except a man be born again, he can neither see nor enter into the kingdom of God.

Therefore, the transforming experience was not turning a leaf. It wasn't adding something to what you were, which is what many people believe salvation is. I'm just going to get something I didn't have.

No, you're not getting something you didn't have. You are becoming someone you were not previously. That's why he didn't say, except a man turn over a new leaf, except he start again, except he change his way of living. But he says, except a man be born again. And that is a revolutionary, life changing experience. And everything within the idea of birth speaks of newness. It speaks of a radical change whereby everything is to become new. That's why he says, therefore, we are new creations in Christ Jesus.

Why? Because something changed. Now, what changed? Well, my physical body with which I relate to the world hasn't been changed when I was saved. I certainly didn't get a new brain, a new mind.

What happened? I got a new spirit. And this is why what he says in Second Peter chapter one, verse four, that when you and I were born again.

Listen carefully. We became partakers. We became partakers of a divine nature. Now we've been born again.

We didn't change. Turn a new leaf, start a new beginning. God says we got a new life. We got a new spirit. We have become partakers of the divine nature so that every single believer is now indwelt by God. Why in the world would a holy, righteous God condescend to come and choose to live inside of folks like us?

I'll tell you why. Because he knew that if he didn't, we'd just be in a mess all of our life. Sins are forgiven. Wrath of God's been averted.

Wrath of God has been has been taken care of through the blood of Jesus. But I got to live. So how am I going to live in victory? How am I going to enjoy the Christian life? How am I going to overcome sin and temptation and the work of the devil? How am I going to be able to live victoriously and triumphantly and happily and peacefully and contentedly and fulfilled in this life?

Absolutely and essential. Jesus said to his apostles, it is expedient for you, absolutely essential for you that I ascend to the Father. If I don't go, the comforter will not come. But if I go, I will send him. He'll be in you with you and upon you. He says, I'm not going to leave you like a bunch of orphans because I know that it is essential not only for me to have lived and died.

It is essential that I come back and live in you to enable you to do what you're not capable of doing. That's why the whole crux of the Christian life begins with the blood of Jesus Christ, but then moves to the life of Christ. Now, I want you to go back and look at this verse because you'll overlook it if you're not careful. Romans chapter five. If you'll notice in the fifth chapter what he says in verse 10. Verse 10 says, for if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his son.

That's through his blood. Much more having been reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. Now, the blood of Jesus Christ atoned for my sins so that the wrath of God no longer abides upon us as believers. But he says we're saved by his life that is saved from ourselves. And that is, listen, not only that, but saved from ruining what God has so beautifully begun in the new birth experience. Most people believe somehow that the way you deal with sin in your life is to decide you're going to stop doing this and stop doing that and pray about this sin, pray about that thing so that the acts become, the acts of sin become the point of their thought and the focal point of their attention. God knows that the more that you focus on something, the more you're going to be drawn to it.

If you say, I will not steal, I will not steal, I will not steal, I will not steal, what are you doing but programming your mind for stealing? That's why his approach is the approach of remembering and providing the life of Jesus Christ within us. Now, when you were saved, he came to live within you. You may not feel him.

You surely can't see him and you can't touch him. But Jesus Christ is indwelling the life of the believer because he knows that in order for us to live in this life, the way we really want to live if we love him, and the way he wants us to live, we need him. Now, I want you to think about this in Colossians chapter 3, beginning in verse 1, and how he begins this first verse. He says, If or since then you've been raised up with Christ. Remember what Paul said? I've been crucified with him, yet not I.

All right? If then you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things where? Above.

Where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on the things that are on the earth. So let's think about something for a moment. Where is the focus of your attention? What have you set your mind on? What is the priority in your life?

Have you allowed the world to dirty you up with all of its stuff? He says, Set your mind on the things above. Focus your attention upon the Lord Jesus Christ, not upon the things of this world. Verse 3, For you have died, that is, you've been identified in the death of Jesus Christ, and your life is hidden with Christ in God, which makes you eternally secure in him. Your life has been hidden with Christ in God. That happened at the cross when you received the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal savior. When Christ, verse 4, who is our what? Our life. Why is he our life? Because he knew we'd never make it in this life unless he came to live within us. When Christ, who is our life, is revealed when he comes, then you also will be revealed with him in glory.

Now on the basis of that, he says, on the basis of what? On the basis that you've been saved by the grace of God, all of your sins have been atoned for at the cross. Now you're a child of God. Christ has become your life. Sin principle, we still have to deal with it. How do we deal with it? Listen to what he says in verse 5, therefore, consider, reckon it to be so, by faith reckon it to be so, consider it so that the members of your earthly body, eyes what you see, ears what you hear, lips what you speak, feet where they take you, hands what you handle, consider the members of your earthly body as dead.

How in the world can you do that? Not because your sins were forgiven 2,000 years ago, listen, but because the living Christ is dwelling within you in all of his supernatural power, ready at any given moment to enable you to carry out the will of God in any and every given circumstance in your life. Therefore, consider the members of your earthly body as dead to what? Immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire and greed which amounts to idolatry. For it's on account of these things that the wrath of God will come. Look at verse 7, and in them, in what?

Immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, greed. In them, you also once walked. It was your lifestyle.

When you were living, where? In them, but now you also put them all aside. Anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive speech from your mouth, why? Because you aren't who you used to be and things are not as they were. Do not lie to one another since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices. That again is in the aorist tense.

It's something that happened one time. When did you lay old self aside? When Jesus Christ died on the cross and you were identified in that and you received the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, God says, all that's over, all that's laid aside. You no longer have to sin against God and in the resurrection of Jesus Christ, the power of sin in your life was canceled. The penalty in your life, the wrath of God was canceled by his blood.

Jesus Christ's resurrection, he came to live his life within us. The power of sin has been broken so that now with sin's power no longer able to reign in your life unless you choose, unless you make a choice, he says, lay this all aside. Verse nine, do not lie to one another since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices and have put on the new self.

Who is that? The Lord Jesus Christ who is being renewed. That is, we are the new self, but because of his presence, we are now being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the one who created us. We need to update our thinking and begin to see ourselves the way God sees us. Now, my friend, in a world that is full of wickedness and sin and it's rampant and becoming worse and worse, if we don't understand the source of our strength and power to overcome sin, you won't be able to tell us from the rest of the world.

We're going to look like them and act like them. But you see, that's out of keeping with who you are. He says, update your thinking.

And what is that? Set your mind on the things above. Focus your attention upon the Lord Jesus Christ, holiness, righteousness, godly living.

Let me ask you a question. Would your friends consider you a godly person? I did not say church member. I didn't even say Christian. Godly, holy, upright, righteous. And I want to repeat something I've said again and again and again. You cannot separate purity and holiness.

You can't do it. Nor can you separate purity and power. You want the power of the indwelling Christ within you to make your life count? You want the joy, the peace, the happiness, the victory in your life, the contentment? You know the difference when you're right with God. I mean, things are right between you and God, and you're praying and reading the Word of God, and you're right with Him, and your sins are confessed up to date, and your desire is to live godly before Him. I don't have to tell you the kind of contentment and joy and happiness and peace and fulfillment you have. Nor do I have to tell you how it is when you get honorably before God, independent of Him, living in sin, disobedient to Him, blaming on everybody else and his brother and sister. There's no joy, no peace, no happiness, no contentment.

He knows we're not going to be perfect. But, my friend, don't try to lower the standard on God. Godliness, holiness, righteousness, and uprightness is God's standard. You want God's best?

You choose that, and God will give you His best. Thank you for listening to God's answer to the problem of sin. If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or In Touch Ministries, stop by InTouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.