Does Jesus enable Christians to keep sinning?

No. While many think of Jesus as endlessly forgiving, the Bible teaches that He enables us through the Holy Spirit to overcome sin, not continue in it.

What does Romans 6:1-2 teach about grace and sin?

Paul teaches that grace is not a license to sin. Instead, believers who have died to sin through Christ must not live in it any longer.

What does Jesus mean in Matthew 7:23 when He says, “Depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness”?

Jesus warns that those who continue practicing sin, even while claiming to follow Him, will not inherit the kingdom of God. True discipleship requires obedience to God’s will.

Is Jesus The Ultimate Enabler? part 2

5 minutes

The Misunderstanding of Jesus as an Enabler

We ended part 1 with the question, “Does this not make Jesus the ultimate enabler to keep sinning?” Many of us repent of our transgressions only to continue in the same trespasses, or new ones. We pray for forgiveness because we know that we have disobeyed God’s laws but we don’t want our final destination to be hell, so we repent and repent and repent.

Our Savior is there to forgive us, right? He knows our struggle and understands. His compassion for us is unlimited, both fully human and fully God, He is our mediator with the Father and we are in His keeping now and forever, right?

Not completely. While being true, this is not properly what the Bible teaches us, but it is what many churches preach. If we see Jesus in this role, we can only see him as our enabler as we are always bailed out of our circumstances of sin and our faith in our doctrine is our guarantee we are on the right path that leads to eternal life. We think: most surely we will be perfected by Him when all is said and done, and that is the basis of our faith.

What the Bible Actually Teaches

The Bible teaches us a different Jesus, one that has triumphed over temptation and taught us to do the same. Yes, He enables us, but what He makes possible for us is to overcome the world and the sin that rules it. When Jesus returned to the Father after His resurrection, He sent us the Holy Spirit to dwell in us. He told us that we must be born again to enter the kingdom of God and the old man of sin, our former self, must die.

Paul taught us the importance of obedience in Romans 6:1-2, “What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it?”

The True Enabling: Power to Overcome the World

Some confusion surrounds Paul’s teachings, and some of what he said is used to justify not keeping God’s commandments, which we will be discussing in other articles yet to be written. But of this we can be sure, Paul did not endorse the continuance in “sin” which is trespassing the law, as we are told in 1 John 3:4, “Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness.”

We are to be set free from sin with the in-dwelling of the Holy Spirit, and without the Holy Spirit it is impossible because we remain in our flesh. It is one or the other, not both. If we believe the acceptable Christian life is somewhere in between, we have been deceived. Just as Jesus died, we too must die, to sin. Our rebirth in the Spirit is the new life we live apart from sin, free from sin.

So, we can say in truth that Jesus is the ultimate enabler if what we mean is that through Him we are able to overcome sin. As our Shepherd, we are to follow His example, and we really do mean “follow”. We don’t mean just pretending outwardly by saying so in our words of faith while failing to demonstrate it in how we live.

A person who claims to be a Christian and continues in their sins is either a hypocrite (if they know better) or just plain ignorant (they don’t know what the Bible teaches), and neither is covered by grace. When Jesus said we must be reborn, He speaks in absolutes! This is not negotiable, we don’t just give it our best shot and call it good enough. Too many pastors will preach along these lines, and they are wrong to do so.

Conclusion: The Ultimate Enabler of Righteousness

The Jesus we believe in told us in Matthew 7:21-23, –And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’ Didn’t we just quote John telling us that lawlessness is sin? Jesus says those who practice sin (continue in it) are to be cast away from Him. If this doesn’t seize our attention, what will?

If you read the whole passage, you learn He is providing us an example of judgment when high-profile Christians who did mighty works through the Holy Spirit are not welcome in the kingdom of God because they “did not do the will of the Father in heaven.” This is the Jesus we believe in. If your Jesus enables you to keep sinning believing all is well, you have the wrong Jesus. Our “Ultimate Jesus” enables us to overcome the world!