- Another friend speaks. He doesn’t have much to say. Apart from several psalms, this chapter of the Bible has the fewest words. The only other one that comes close we’ve already past, the last chapter of Esther.
- He has one point: that man cannot be right before the great and mighty God.
- It’s true and not true.
- Romans 3:10 tells us there is none righteous. We are not right in God’s eyes. We are enemies of God apart from Christ.
- Romans 3:23 says all have sinned and fall short of God’s glory.
- But the next verse says, that those very people who have sinned and fallen short “are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”
- Jesus bought us out of our poor man’s debt we owed God for our sins. It was a gift and with it we were justified, made right before God.
- By the blood of Jesus, we are washed clean, made pure, the one thing this friend says can’t be done.
- By man, it can’t be done. With God, all things are possible.
- At the same time, John tells us to purify ourselves. How can we do that if it is impossible with man to be pure?
- We put off the old man and its deeds. We renew our minds. We put on the new man.
- What are those things?
- The old man is what followed after the desires of the flesh. It wanted what its eyes lusted after. The old man is after fleshly satisfaction. It desires entertainment and filling its appetites.
- We stop seeking after fulfilling those desires and put them to death. We renew our minds by studying God’s word, putting it in our minds and hearts, and then putting it into action by the Holy Spirit to do what is right in God’s eyes and walk in holiness.
- In other words, we stop living our way and start living His way and we learn what to do from His Word.
