“Everyone who sins also commits lawlessness. Sin is lawlessness.”

The Apostle John is here clarifying what he means by being and staying pure and without the reign of sin in our life. Sin is basically rebellion against the person of God and His holy commandments. We do not want to know God or to enter into obedience to His Word. We are rebels and sinners, enemies of His holiness and bent of going our own way and doing our own thing. This is sin.

“Now the deeds of the flesh are obvious, which are: adultery, sexual immorality, uncleanness, lustfulness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, strife, jealousies, outbursts of anger, rivalries, divisions, heresies, envy, murders, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these; of which I forewarn you, even as I also forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit God’s Kingdom.”

Galatians 5:19-21

Sin is the desire to be free from all authority and restraint and to live libertarian lives to ourselves and our desires. It is the throwing off of all restraint and doing and saying whatever we want at any time we like. It is a hideous lawlessness, a complete turning ways from the legitimate authority of our loving God and Creator and wanting only self. Sin is the outworking of this lawlessness and justifies our own selfish inclinations and motivations. We are adept at it – born to it, but it doesn’t have to have the better of us. There is a way of escape from its deadly clutches.

We have a Saviour who can set us free and give us the powerful liberty of always doing the right thing and keeping the law of God. There is a power available to us so that we don’t have to always obey the voice of self, but can do what is right as God has laid down. We can know full forgiveness for every rotten thing we have ever thought, said or done, and have the freedom from the guilt that attends it all. Christ has died – what a glory and what a wonderful salvation to be possessed by us. Yet still, we may hear the gospel preached and offered to us and yet still cling to sin and self. It is so hard for us to break the chain, indeed we cannot. It binds us fast and holds us in hellish bondage to the inevitability of judgment and death. Only the power of God can free us. Only He can give the motivation to want to be rid of sin and lawlessness and follow God’s ways. Only God can give us the faith to believe and apply the cleansing of Christ to our souls. Only a loving Saviour can resurrect our soul and cause us to want God and want to be dealt with by Him.

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Romans 6:23

Sin is a powerful disease in our life and we must have it demolished and defeated. The dwelling place of sin has to go and all its dreadful effects on our soul, mind and body. We must deal with our deep rooted lawlessness and humble ourselves before the cross and repent. Only then can we be free from it and able to draw near to our Father in heaven and have fellowship with Him. Then we will want His ways and hate our disobedience and sin. This is the work of God in a life and the most amazing miracle of grace.

“He who conceals his sins doesn’t prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy.”

Proverbs 28:13

This is the path of peace. The only thing that blocks our personal and daily walk with God is our sin. It doesn’t matter how big or small it is (human perspective) either grumbling internally about someone or shouting at your partner! It will ruin our communion with the father. We continually repent of it and walk in peace – not lawlessness.