I am struggling this weekend…I am struggling with anger at Christians who are choosing to live like the world. Maybe my standard of what being a Christian is supposed to be, is too high. Maybe their standards are too low, I really don’t know at this point. All I know is that I am struggling with anger over this.
There are other issues that surround this anger—such as why are larger churches asking people who follow the bylaws to leave, but keeping those in the church who are using salvation as a license to continue living in sin with out repentance.
When people cite Christian freedom, usually Galatians 5:1 follows. The Bible states emphatically in Galatians 5:1 that believers are free in Christ: “It is for freedom that Christ has set us free” (Galatians 5:1). Before Jesus died on a cross, God’s people lived under a detailed system of laws that served as a moral compass to guide their lives. The Law, while powerless to grant salvation or produce true freedom, nevertheless pointed the way to Jesus Christ (Galatians 3:19–24). Through His sacrificial death, Jesus Christ fulfilled the Law, setting believers free from the law of sin and death. God’s laws are now written in our hearts through the Spirit of God, and we are free to follow and serve Christ in ways that please and glorify Him (Romans 8:2–8). In a nutshell, this is the definition of Christian freedom.
The practice of willful sin, of any kind, can certainly be considered as evidence of an unredeemed life—even for a professing Christian.
Steve Gallagher, of Pure Life Ministries says “I cannot recount the times men have told me that they “struggle with” pornography or some other form of sexual sin, and, when I begin to ask them about their ongoing war with temptation, they recount a long list of failures. “Where’s the struggle?” I ask incredulously. “You have only told me about a life of defeat; you haven’t said anything that leads me to believe that you are actively fighting those carnal urges! The fact that you are using terminology such as ‘struggle’ only indicates that you are exaggerating your spirituality while minimizing the seriousness of your problem.”
One common denominator among those who successfully fight their way out of the terrible hold of sin is that they are always trying to move forward spiritually. They may have failures, but they never quit fighting. It may take some time for an individual saved out of a life of wickedness to find real freedom from it. The hold of sin can be extremely powerful, but one thing is certain: if this person has truly been converted, sin will not—cannot—hold him indefinitely.
There is something, or rather Someone, inside a bona fide believer that will not allow him to rest until he finds freedom from the hold of willful sin. How can the Holy Spirit indwell a professing Christian who regularly practices evil? Or as Paul put it: “How can light and darkness share life together? What common ground can idols hold with the temple of God? For we, remember, are ourselves living temples of the living God, as God has said: ‘I will dwell in them…’” (2 Corinthians 6:14b) The apostle John made a statement that at first glance seems to solve the mystery. “The one who practices sin is of the devil… No one who is born of God practices sin…” (1 John 3:8-9) Taken at face value, these statements could easily cause one to conclude that anyone bound in habitual sin is not truly a believer. But 20 years of ministering to sexual addicts causes me to hesitate to accept such a simple explanation. Instead, experience seems to tell me that there are two distinct groups of “Christian” men bound up in sin.
I am starting to think there are possibly two groups of “Christians” First, there are those who have truly been born anew but have not yet completely broken away from their past life of sin. As the man/woman draws spiritual strength through his relationship with Christ, the longstanding habit gradually loses its power. His growing love for God is displacing his idolatrous love for sin.
The second group would be constituted as “tares,” men/women who have had some kind of religious experience that hasn’t actually taken hold in their hearts: “they believe for a while, and in time of temptation fall away.” (Luke 8:13) It seems that they have drawn near to the Light, but have drifted away from it without having experienced a true conversion. I call them tares because they continue in church alongside true believers, even though they really cannot be considered such.
Jesus said, “Unless you are converted and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 18:3). Jesus is clear that if a person of this world is to be accepted into this other kingdom—the kingdom of heaven—he must be converted. What does the word conversion mean? In the biblical sense, conversion means a turning—a spiritual turning away from sin in repentance and to Christ in faith. It is a dramatic turning away from one path in order to pursue an entirely new one. This spiritual conversion is so profound that it involves many changes in a person. It involves a change of mind, which is an intellectual change; and a change of view, a new recognition of God, self, sin, and Christ. It involves a change of affections, which is an emotional change, a change of feeling, a sorrow for sin committed against a holy and just God. It involves a change of will, which is a volitional change, an intentional turning away from sin and a turning to God through Christ to seek forgiveness. The entire person—mind, affections, and will—is radically, completely, and fully changed in conversion.
To affirm true conversion implies that there is also false conversion. Put simply, there is such a thing as non-saving faith. Not everyone who says, “Lord, Lord” has entered the narrow gate (Matt. 7:21). People may know the truth and may have felt grief regarding their sin, but it is a selfish sorrow over what their sin has caused them to suffer, not how it has offended a holy God.
In a counterfeit conversion, there is no death to self, no submission to the lordship of Christ, no taking up a cross, no obedience in following Christ, no fruit of repentance–only empty words, shallow feelings, and barren religious activities. On the contrary, with a true conversion sin is abhorred, the world renounced, pride crushed, self surrendered, faith exercised, Christ seen as precious, and the cross embraced as one’s only saving hope.
The whole purpose of conversion is to bring men and women into a right relationship with God. This is why Christ came, and it is the reason for which He died. It was God who was “in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself ” (2 Cor. 5:19). Conversion is the crying need of the soul. Until one’s life is turned from sin to Christ, nothing else matters.
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