This Scripture doesn’t say that you won’t sin. The promise is to those who do sin—who sin in spite of the fact that they are walking in the light. If people who are walking in the light can’t sin, then this promise would be out of order; but this promise is to those who are walking in the light, who are doing the best they can, and yet they sin. When they do so, the Bible says the blood of Jesus will cleanse them from all unrighteousness—keep them clean. In that sense, you see, you can stay in a saved condition all the time.
Suppose I were to ask you right now, how many of you believe, if you were to die at this minute, that you would go to heaven; I wonder how many would raise your hands. I find very few people who answer this question properly. They say, “Well, I hope I would. I’d like to. I don’t know.” People go through life in doubt about their own salvation. God didn’t expect his people to experience such uneasiness. He has written these things that our joy may be full. A lot of people have doubts and fears. They think if they were to die just after saying their evening prayers, confessing their sins, that they would go to heaven, but if they were to die five minutes before, that they would go to hell. If I felt that way about it, I’d want somebody to shoot me just after I’d finished my evening prayer so I’d be sure to go to heaven.
I’m not boasting when I say that I believe with all my heart that if I should fall dead in the midst of this sentence, I would spend eternity in heaven. That’s not because I’m so good; it’s certainly not because I have never sinned. But I can say this: if there is a single sin against me of which I have not repented, I do not know it. If I did know it, I would repent of it before I finished this statement. I wouldn’t wait till time for my evening prayer. The time to repent of a sin is just as soon as you become aware of it, right then and there. That’s what you have to do in order to be walking in the light. Never allow an unforgiven sin to hang over you for one minute for you might die during that minute, and have to spend eternity in torment.
God doesn’t expect his children to go through life having so many ups and downs, thinking one minute they’re on their way to glory and the next minute on their way to hell. It isn’t necessary to be like that. God doesn’t want you to be. He wants you to be full of joy. If you will read this verse, meditate upon it, and conform to the conditions stated, it will certainly help you to be full of joy.
I’m emphasizing the fact that you can go to heaven if you want to. I’d like to read one more Scripture and then we close. This is found in II Peter, chapter one, verse 5-10, “And beside this, giving all diligence; add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; and to knowledge temperance; and to temperance patience; and to patience godliness; and to godliness brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness love. For if these things be in you, and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But he that lacketh these things is blind, and cannot see afar off, and hath forgotten that he was purged from his old sins. Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure.” Do you notice that word “sure”? “Give diligence to make your calling and election sure”; it didn’t say to make it likely, or to make it probable, but to make it certain. It requires diligence, but if you will give the proper diligence, you can make your calling and election certain. “For if ye do these things, ye shall never fall. For so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.”
A man who does these things will not barely slip in by the skin of the teeth, but for him the gates will stand wide ajar. He will receive an abundant entrance into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior, inherit eternally a mansion which Jesus has gone to prepare for those who love him, for those who walk in the light, for those who do the best they can.
Do you want to go to heaven? I suspect if I were to take a vote on it and ask all who want to go to heaven to raise their hands, that every person in the house would raise his hand. You say you want to go, but do you? Are you on the road which leads there? A man driving toward Louisville, Kentucky, at sixty miles an hour, knowing that Atlanta is in the opposite direction, would have a hard time convincing me that he wanted to go to Atlanta. He may want to go some day but he doesn’t want to go now, because he is going in the other direction. The man who is going toward hell at sixty minutes an hour can’t convince me that he wants to go to heaven, unless he is just mistaken about his direction. Do you really want to go to heaven? If you do, let’s be on the way. The Bible reveals the road which leads there. Get up and follow the sign posts and some day you will get there. Why not start right now? Will you come to Jesus now?
FOOTNOTES
[1]Harry Emerson Fosdick “The Revolt Against Paganism” in Ladies Home Journal, February, 1946.
[2]For a similar discussion see J. W. Brents, Gospel Sermons, (Nashville: Gospel Advocate Company, 1891), pp. 282-298.