instructs you on how you should live and what you should believe with each new degree of faith you possess. Simply put, what you believe before you have accepted Jesus into your life will be different from what you believe after you realize what your faith in him has done for you.” He turned to look at me. “Do you understand?”
I nodded in silence.
“If so, we can move on.” He took a cookie from the plate before he asked the next question.
“Do you want to have a close relationship with God?”
“Yes.”
“Does sin exist in Heaven?”
“No.”
“Correct. Remember how Satan had to leave Heaven because God does not allow sin to be present in his home. Also, Adam was banished from the Garden of Eden because he broke God’s only law at that time, namely, ‘You must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.’ Unfortunately, Adam’s disobedience caused sin to enter into the world.”
“I’m with you,” I answered and reached for another cookie.
“Remind me, John, how did sin enter into man and the world?”
It was an easy reply, “Sin entered through his disobedience of God’s law.”
“Then, God’s law at that time was based on obedience, do you agree?”
“Seems right so far.”
Joshua stopped to take a sip of his drink before asking, “And why did Adam have to leave the Garden of Eden?”
This was another simple answer. “You just told me that God does not allow sin to be present in his home.”
“So…what caused Adam to be distanced from God?”
“It was sin. Sin hurt the close relationship Adam shared with God.”
“Yes!” He raised his fist for emphasis. “Therefore, being distanced from God is a consequence of sin. This happened to Satan as a permanent spiritual outcome because of the desires of this angel’s heart. This happened to Adam as his disobedience set God’s plan in motion for the redemptive reward of faith in Jesus. And unfortunately, this distancing from God also happens to you.” He turned to take a bite of his cookie and changed his voice to a more serious tone.
“Again, what is the single, most destructive thing that causes you to be distanced from God?”
My reply seemed mildly redundant, “Sin creates the greatest division between God and me.”
He nodded his head in agreement and revealed his spiritual bomb.
“If this is true, how can you have the closest possible relationship with God if you constantly believe you are a sinner?” He smiled, casually turned around, and took a few steps to give me time to think.
Wow! That’s a tough one!
I settled back in my chair with moderate confusion. My previous answers seemed obvious, but his current question could not be dismissed with such ease.
Was this really true? Was my continual belief that I was a sinner hindering my relationship with God?
He definitely had my attention and began reading from his Bible before I could answer.
“I John 3:1—How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him.” He closed the book in his hand.
“Are the children of God, sinners?” He paused for a moment, then continued, “Was Jesus, the Son of God, a child of God?” He opened the book to the exact page and read.
“I John 3:2-3—Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself, just as he is pure.”
Once again, he looked directly at me with his question, “Do you have the hope of God in you?”
I answered with mild belief, “I think so?”
He replied with another question, “Of what hope is he speaking?”
“I’m not sure.” I was struggling with my thoughts.
“Are you as pure as Jesus?” The seriousness of his countenance never changed.
“That’s a hard one to get a hold of, Joshua!” I took a deep breath while I watched inherent love return with his smile.
“No doubt, it is very difficult to think of yourself as being pure like Jesus, but I want you to realize that he says you are.” He walked to the whiteboard and began speaking from memory, as he wrote.
“1 John 3:4-6—Everyone who sins breaks the law; in fact, sin is lawlessness. But you know that he appeared so that he might take away our sins. And in him is no sin. No one who lives in him keeps on sinning. No one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.”
We each took another cookie before he returned to his teachings.
“Let’s look at these verses, line by line.
“Verse 4: Sin is breaking the law. Sin is lawlessness.
“Agreed?”
“Agreed!” I said and reached for my glass.
“Verse 5: Jesus appeared to take away sin.
“Are you with me?”
“Yep.”
“Now, the hard one.
“Verse 6: No one who lives in him keeps on sinning.”
I replied in contemplation, “Really? It says that doesn’t it.”
He smiled at my enlightenment, stating, “And finally it ends with the second half of verse six which says that if you continue to sin, you have not seen him or known him.
“Remember, as a Christian, you are to believe that Jesus lives in you, and you live in him. If he lives in you, I think that would surely classify as knowing him. But here it tells us that no one who continues to sin has either seen him or known him.”
Questions poured from his thoughts while my mind did its best to keep up.
“Do you continue to sin? Yes? Have you never seen him or known him? Maybe? You might even be thinking, ‘Yes, I have known God?’ Tough questions! Are you confused? Are you deceived?” He looked directly at me with a smile on his face and grace in his heart as I nodded in silent agreement.
“Okay, then let’s start at the beginning. What is sin?”
It seemed like an easy question, but I did not have a precise answer. Fortunately for me, he continued before I could speak. He set his glass down and
