By Jon Beaty
I love the taste of good peaches.
For 10 years I tried to grow good peaches with half a dozen peach trees planted alongside my house. Every winter, I provided each tree with nutrients and natural fungicides and waited for the pink blossoms to produce a summer crop of sweet peaches. Every spring, the trees fell victim to fungus that curled the leaves and caused the trees to produce sad-looking, tart peaches.
This variety of peach trees adapted to our wet spring weather. It was not in their nature to thrive in this environment, you might say. No intervention on my part could change that or improve the peach production.
Mistaken Identity?
In the beginning, our Creator endowed humanity with perfection. This perfection included a natural desire in both man and woman to love and to be loved. Love cannot exist if the choice not to love does not also exist. To choose to disobey any of God’s commands is a choice not to love. By disobedience to God’s command to not eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, Adam and Eve chose not to love. This choice separated them from Divine love and introduced a defect into their DNA inherited by every generation since.
This defect in our DNA is written about in the Bible. Christians refer this defect as the “sinful nature.” The sinful nature inclines people to sin, and the Bible identifies people who sin as “sinners.”
Actions we routinely repeat we call habits. Our habits shape our identity. For example:
• We call people who have a habit of running for exercise runners.
• We call people who constantly complain complainers.
• We call people who play guitars guitar players--if they do it well.
If there is a mismatch between what a person does and how they identify themselves, we question their reasoning, or their sanity.
Following this logic, you would expect a person who identifies as a Christian to act like Jesus Christ. But the odd thing about Christians, is many identify as Christians and sinners at the same time.
Is it just me, or does this seem illogical to you? Isn’t a sinner a person who keeps on sinning?
Can a Christian be like Christ and keep on sinning at the same time, or is one of these a mistaken identity?
Let’s wrestle with this question together.
Don’t Make These Mistakes
The sinful nature is ingrained in our inherited DNA, referred to in the Bible as the “flesh” or “carnal mind.” It is so ingrained in our being that our natural response when we recognize sin in our behavior is to justify it, or to try to overcome it by our own power. It’s a mistake to believe we can do either.
The idea that Christians can keep on sinning and call themselves Christian is contrary to Scripture.
“Whoever abides in Him does not sin. Whoever sins has neither seen Him nor known Him.” (1 John 3:6 NKJV)
Some have taken this truth to mean that they can claim to be without sin. This is also a mistake.
I once took a class where the teacher allowed his students to grade their own tests. The only way this worked was if each student was honest and had the right answers. In the assessment of whether a person is without sin, our own integrity is in doubt. Only Jesus can declare a person to be without sin. Jesus is the only standard of righteousness. Jesus is the right Answer and only Jesus has the necessary integrity to judge justly.
A New Identity
When John wrote, “Whoever abides in Him does not sin,” the point made is unpacked a few verses later: “Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God.” (1 John 3:9 NKJV)
Paul makes a similar statement: “There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death.” (Romans 8:1-2 NKJV)
In Christ we are a new creation. In Christ we receive a new identity.
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new.” (2 Corinthians 5:17 NKJV)
The Holy Spirit uses the power contained in the written word of God to infuse us with new life. We become partakers of the Divine nature (2 Peter 1:4). By abiding in Jesus through the Spirit we escape the corrupting influence of the world and exist in a new climate that supports perfect growth, producing the fruit of righteousness. The climate that produces the fruit of the Spirit is the body of Christ—the church. Love cannot grow in solitude. We cannot keep God’s commandments outside of relationships with other humans.
If this seems impossible, if not discouraging, consider this inspired commentary: “Satan had claimed that it was impossible for man to obey God's commandments; and in our own strength it is true that we cannot obey them. But Christ came in the form of humanity, and by His perfect obedience He proved that humanity and divinity combined can obey every one of God's precepts.” Ellen White, Christ’s Object Lessons, p. 314
New Habits
Habits don’t only shape our identity. Our identity shapes our habits.
• A person who sits a lot and decides to become a runner will make a habit of running more and sitting less.
• A person who can’t strum a chord on a guitar will practice chords and rhythms.
• A person living in sin who decides to become a Christian will practice obedience to Christ.
In each of these examples, the person chooses to stop whatever they were doing before and to form habits that align with their new identity. Habits that violate God’s moral and natural laws are bad habits. Christians don’t keep bad
habits, unless they choose to continue to identify as sinners instead of saints.
My peach trees couldn't produce good fruit in an environment not suited for their DNA. I cut them down for firewood. Likewise, we cannot produce the fruit of righteousness while living according to our old, sin-damaged nature in an environment that encourages sinfulness. But God doesn't leave us bearing bitter fruit. In Christ, our sinful nature is cut down. In Christ, He gives us a new nature—a new spiritual nature that thrives in His presence and produces the
sweet fruit of righteousness. In Christ, we become part of His body the church, enabling us to thrive when it remains connected to Jesus.