There is substantial agreement that Christians should be, and may be, free from dishonesty, lying, stealing, jealousy, strife, bitterness, evil speaking, fornication, covetousness, and a thousand other sins that might be named. Also it is agreed that it is not for Christians to grow out of such sins, nor to get rid of them gradually, but to put them off as wholly inconsistent with the Christian walk. How complete is the list of such sins that a Christian may be free from just now? Or to put the question in another form, how much sin is it necessary for a Christian to have?
“But,” some one asks, “is not everything that falls short of God’s absolute standard of perfection sin?” Our purpose in this study is intensely practical, and so it is not the intention to enter into a full discussion of theological terms. It may be suggested in passing that many who use such an expression as “God’s absolute standard of perfection,” would find great difficulty in explaining just what they mean. But we may here get at the problem as it presents itself in experience. All are agreed that there is no possibility of perfection of attainment in this body, meaning by such perfection an absence of all error or mistake in everything that is done. We may go further and say that by this standard of “perfection” every act falls short, and every moment of life is compassed with infirmity. If this kind of “falling short” is sin, then there can be full agreement that there is no such thing as freedom from sinning in this body. (It would not be entirely accurate to say, “if this imperfection is sin,” for “perfection,” like all words—and everything else human—is imperfect and relative and takes its meaning from the thought in the mind of the user.)
Is such falling short sinning? Or to reduce the question to practical everyday experience, “Is every act of the Christian sinful, as well as every word and thought?”
Three Bible teachers met together on one occasion to discuss the sin question; before they began their conference one of them suggested that they have prayer, and he led in petition for their guidance and blessing. This brother, a theological professor and a Christian noted for his holy living, contended that everything a Christian did was of necessity tainted with sin because it fell short of “perfection.”
“Doctor,” one of the others asked, “is there not a difference between the sin we committed when we prayed together at the beginning of our conference and the sin I should commit if I were critical or bitter against you?”
“Yes, there is a difference,” he replied (answering according to Scripture and his common sense), “but” (answering according to his theory) “it is a very dangerous thing to make distinctions between sins.”
It is a disastrous thing not to make distinction between these two things. With one stroke we would blot out the difference between light and darkness if we class together the act of a Christian who with a heart full of love pours out his petition in imperfect words for some needy one, and the act of a man who with his heart full of hate runs a dagger through the heart of that same needy one. There is the same infinity of difference between this “imperfect” prayer and the critical or unloving attitude that the praying Christian might later fall into.
Turning from men’s reasonings regarding sin to the Word of God, we find these plain statements:
“My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye may not sin” (1 John 2:1).
Something had been written, then, which revealed the secret of keeping from sin as a present, practical experience for the child of God.