Sinner or Saint?

What the Gospel of Christ teaches us is – while we were still sinners, Jesus died to save us from our sin. Most people grasp this concept fairly easily; however, it becomes more difficult when we dig further and understand that now that we are saved, we are to be holy.

1 Peter 1:13-16 – So think clearly and exercise self-control. Look forward to the gracious salvation that will come to you when Jesus Christ is revealed to the world. So you must live as God's obedient children. Don't slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. You didn't know any better then. But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy.”

You see, the point that most people miss is that Christ died to break the power of sin over us. Jesus' death on the cross, represents the death of our sins – our sinful self died with Him at the cross. When He rose from the dead, this represents our holy self being resurrected with Him. In Christ, you are now a Saint. This is the whole and complete point of the Gospel of Christ. If we do not teach this, we are not teaching the truth of the Gospel of Christ.

God wants us near Him, but in order for us to be near Him, we must be holy, because a holy being can not be near sin. Consider what would happen if a piece of tissue paper came in contact with the sun. The tissue paper represents sin and the sun represents God. A sinful person would be disintegrated if they came in contact with such a holy God. This is why there was a perimeter around Mount Sinai and Moses was the only person allowed to cross it.

Consider two marriages. In one marriage your spouse tells you how much of a loser you are and that you are completely worthless. In the other, your spouse tells you that you are a king and worthy of royalty and they treat you like you are a king – serving and honoring you in every possible way. The spouse who tells you that you are a loser, makes you feel like one, but the spouse who calls you a king, uplifts you and makes you feel worthy. This is what God is doing for us when he calls us to be saints. That voice in your head calling you a sinner is not God.

But, I don't feel like a Saint; instead, I still feel like a sinner? All Christians struggle with this. Satan will continue to work to convict us, using our sinful nature to make us believe his lies. Our desires of the flesh will continue to call out to us, begging us to worship them instead of God. But the plain and simple beauty of the Gospel of Christ says – when we truly believe in Jesus, sin has no power over us. This is what it means to believe in Christ. We were slaves to sin, now we are slaves to Christ. We were worshipers of sin, now we worship Christ. We were sinners, but now we are Saints in Christ.

So, now we must start acting like one. Now that we believe Christ died to save us and made us holy, our new life begins. We must no longer believe satan when he says to us, 'you are still a sinner.' Believe instead, what Christ said about who we are as His disciples.

We will suffer due to our flesh calling out to us and tempting us with desires and pleasures it has for us, but we must not listen. We must take control of our flesh. When we give in to our flesh, we are saying to God – I prefer these pleasures over those you have for me. Rest assured, the pleasures of the flesh are nothing compared to what God has in store for us when we believe in Him. So don't short change yourselves. Suffering for doing what is good and what is right, will be greatly rewarded by God. Jesus shows us a picture of that very clearly on the Cross.

Satan will also tell you that you are only human. Again, he does this to keep us believing that we can not stop sinning. God is greatly offended when we make this statement. Your human part is the part that dies and goes back into the dirt. This is not the part you should consider at all. This is the part that satan works to control. The part of you that is like God and is more beautiful than you can imagine is your spirit, where God lives in you. This is the part you must focus on. This is the part that is very powerful. This is the part of you that has love and courage and beauty. Know that you were created to be like God and His spirit lives in you. When you believe that, sin will have no power over you.

As our sinful nature dies and our holy nature grows in maturity, satan will work to make us look down on others and judge them. Do not fall into this trap either. Always love the sinner as Jesus did and work hard to help them to see. We show our love for each other by washing each other and by serving each other, just as Jesus taught us in John 13.