"Tainted By Sin"

"They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one." (Psalms 14:3) 'I am a good person', is the defence of many who are approached with the question of sin in their lives. Yes, that might be true when compared to evil men, and those that practice wickedness; but compared to the holiness of God, and compared to the 'letter' of the Law, we all fall short of keeping sin out of our lives. Even in our purest state, that of being washed by the blood of Jesus Christ, we are subject to be tempted by sin, and to think upon things that are contrary to pure godliness; that is just a fact, and we need to get over feeling beaten by sin, and start walking in New Life! Sin is something that taints our lives and makes us feel dirty before God; and the sad thing is, we cannot wash that sin off, no matter how hard we might try, we cannot remove that sin from our lives; but Jesus Christ can!!! This is the whole reason that Jesus died on the cross for us; that He might take away that sin that has tainted us and made us dirty before God! This is the meaning of Romans 8:1, which says, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit." That does not mean we do not ever sin, because we do; even if you locked yourself up in a monastery, you would still need forgiveness for sin. What this means, is that we have the right to be free from the judgement of sin, as long as we are in Jesus and we are walking in the Spirit and not in the flesh; that includes the judgement of ourselves, as to say that we are unworthy of fellowship with God because of sin; because that is the whole reason to be cleansed of that sin in the first place, that we might have fellowship with a Holy God!!! On the other hand; we have the question of sinfulness, and that of living in sin; for which we are not able to do if we are truly in Christ. It is not to say that we will not sin, but that sin will no longer be something that we are comfortable in because it is no longer part of the New Creature that was created in Jesus Christ. This is what John was saying in 1 John 3:2-9, in that we have been made righteous before God, and therefore sin can no longer reign within us because His seed is in us; therefore, any sin that enters into us must be dealt with, because it does not belong in us any longer; which is why John starts in verse two and three, by saying, "Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as He is pure". What this means, is that there is a desire within us to be pure, and no longer tainted by sin; for sin no longer has place in us that are in Christ, because in Christ, there is no sin...