It kind of seems like Scripture tells us that if we're in Christ, we shouldn't sin anymore. But, in my experience this really doesn't feel possible.
I just finished reading 1 John. In this letter, John seems to say that if we are in Christ, we don't keep on sinning.
"Dear children, do not let anyone lead you astray. The one who does what is right is righteous just as He is righteous. The one who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil's work. No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God's seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God." (1 John 3:7-9)
What does John mean when He says those born of God don't go on sinning? How is that possible given that we all still struggle with sin?
This seems especially strange for John to say in light of what John writes earlier:
"If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us." (1 John 1:8)
How does that fit?
I think John's point here is more about our attitude toward sin in our lives.
When we're not walking in God's ways, sin is no big deal to us. We're not bothered by it. Mostly, we don't even think about it. It's probably not even called sin in our lives. We just go on doing whatever it is we want to do.
But, when we're born of God, we're bothered by sin in our lives. We can't just merrily go along pretending it's all okay. We're bothered by sin and do something about it.
It's not that we never sin again. It's that we're not content to stay in our sin.
We decide to make different choices. We stop doing certain activities or going to certain places or hanging out with certain people.
We fill our time and our minds with choices that keep us from sin.
We seek out accountability and support from other Christians as we work to rid our lives of sin.
We do whatever it takes to remove that sin we've become aware of from our lives.
