Sin is our problem, and Jesus is the cure.

And let me be perfectly clear- Jesus is not some cheap band-aid either, where you continue to ‘slap one on’ to cover it up every time you do sin. If we truly understood and believed in our hearts what it actually means to be ‘set free from sin’ (Rom. 6:18,22; John 8:34-36), it would change everything about the way you live and walk, day in and day out.

It’s amazing how many people tend to read 1 John 2:1 as saying ‘when you sin’, since it actually reads ‘IF’...you sin...and then we are reminded that we have an advocate to whom we can run to 'if' we do.

When I say that Jesus is the ‘cure’, I should also point out that it is not some complicated and expensive surgery one has to undergo in order to find this cure or freedom. Well, I suppose the case could be made that it is a bit on the ‘costly’ side, since Jesus does lay out it will cost us our ‘lives’ (Luke 9:23; 14:25-33), but not in the way you might think.

There is no getting around it though, sin brings death. Always has, always will (Rom. 6:23; James 1:15; Rom. 1:32).

So how exactly does this ‘Jesus Cure’ work? Well, His directions were pretty clear and simple- ‘repent...and follow Him’. (Matt. 4:17,19)

At the risk of sounding crude here, do you realize how many ‘gospel’ versions being preached today make it out to sound as if this 'cure' is more like a prophylactic condom?

I mean, think about it - we hand those out to young people today like candy, having the mindset that people are gonna still go out and ‘do it’, so at least ‘wear protection’ so nothing ‘bad’ happens to them...you know like maybe contract some deadly STD or even get someone pregnant and then really complicate their lives.

Nor was Jesus’s cure for sin some spiritual shot of penicillin where after the fact He told folks to go out and ‘try harder to sin less’, but don’t worry because I’m your ‘protection’.

His message was ‘repent, follow Me’...and ‘go and sin no more or something worse will happen to you’ (John 5:14). What part of that is so hard for us to understand? (John 10:27)

Actually, scripture does point out how the ‘god of this age has blinded the minds of those who are perishing ...from seeing the light of the gospel’ (2 Cor. 4:3-4) Paul even used the term how the ‘gospel is veiled’...to those who are perishing, but...”when one turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away” (2 Cor. 3:16).

I hope we all understand and are on the ‘same page’ in agreeing that ‘perishing’ is not... a good or positive thing to undergo. Jesus made it known that bad things did not happen to people simply because they were ‘worse sinners than anyone else’. He just drove home the point, twice in a row...that unless we ‘repent, we will all likewise perish’ (Luke 13:1-5).

And this you can be sure of: “God is long-suffering toward us, not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.” (2 Pet. 3:9)

I asked the question last week in wrapping up a lesson...if a person continues to repeat or fall in to the same sin over and over, one that they claim that they have ‘repented’ of/from, ...then have they truly ‘repented’? I even pointed out that ‘feeling really bad or sorrowful’ over committing that same sin...is not repentance. Turning away from it...and doing it no more, is.

How can a person be covered or redeemed by the precious blood of Christ if they continue to sin? We are told in 1 John 1:7 that we are to ‘walk in the light as He is in the light...’ and only then...does ‘the blood of Jesus Christ cleanse us from all sin.”

I took a short ‘detour’ yesterday in sharing a brief Easter-Resurrection Sunday message, but going back to where I left on from my message on Saturday, where we were talking about some of those ‘hard sayings’ of Jesus....one of those hard sayings was found in Matt. 6:14-15. That was where Jesus made it known that if we did not forgive others (from the heart), that He would not forgive us of our trespasses. And if that is indeed the case, how or why would we expect to be granted entrance into His eternal kingdom with all this unforgiven sin in our lives?

Paul did warn us that anyone who continues to ‘practice these things...will not inherit the kingdom of God’ (Gal. 5:19-21). Then, we read what happened to those in Matt. 7:21-23 who did many great things in the ‘name of the Lord’ and were told in the end...to ‘depart from Him’. Do you know why? Because they continued to practice sin.

I realize what I am going to share here in conclusion is not a popular or an often talked about detail, but God does have His ‘ways’ of ‘encouraging us’ to let go of these sins; and it’s because He does indeed love us and wants us to ‘be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth’ (1 Tim. 2:4; Heb. 12:6-12). But take a look at Matt. 18:22-35. It’s the parable of the unmerciful servant who was forgiven of a great debt, but then failed to do the same for another. He was called in to his master and rebuked, being called a ‘wicked servant’ simply because he was unwilling to forgive from his heart. And what was done to him? He was handed over to the ‘tormentors’...until he should pay all that was due to him’ (32-34). Care to guess who ‘they’ (the tormentors) are? Then Jesus drove home this hard fact: “So will My heavenly Father also do to each of you if...” (35).

And how did Paul advise the church at Corinth to deal with a man caught in sexual sin, and for what purpose was this action carried out? Take a look at 1 Cor. 5:5. Friends...let me say this again: You nor I can do this on our own, no matter how sincere we are or how hard we try. (John 15:4-5). Total surrender to Jesus AND...the cross...is the only way any of us can be recipients of His grace, through which we are saved. But ‘surrender’ to His lordship is key here. There is no point calling Him ‘Lord, Lord’, if we are not willing to do what He says. (Luke 6:46). Am I sounding like a broken record yet?