Jesus & Christ are one and the same person and that person is the
Son of God. Jesus was the name given to Him at birth, and
therefore speaks of His perfect humanity.
Christ is
the name that speaks of Him as God’s Anointed, the Messiah ~
Therefore in the name of Jesus Christ, we have a witness to His
humanity and to His deity. Jesus Christ is very God of very God
and very Man of very Man.
The world
is not capable of providing true and lasting joy for the human
heart; so joy can only come through proper relationship with the
Lord. When we are in fellowship with God and with the Lord Jesus,
we then have a deep seated joy that cannot be disturbed by earthly
circumstances.
Fellowship
describes a situation where two or more persons share things in
common.
God is absolutely Holy, absolutely righteous, absolutely pure.
God cannot look with favor on any form of sin. Nothing is hidden
from Him.
So in order to have fellowship with God there can be no hiding of
sin.
Light & darkness cannot exist in a persons life at the same time.
If man is walking in darkness, he is not in fellowship with God.
A man who
says he has fellowship with God and habitually walks in darkness
was never saved at all. If we are in the light, we are a member of
God’s family, but if we are in darkness we do not have anything in
common with God, because there is no darkness in God at all.
If we are
Christians and walk in the light and have fellowship with one
another there the blood of Jesus Christ continually cleanses us
from all sin. All forgiveness is based on the blood of Jesus that
was shed at Calvary. That blood provided God with a righteous
basis of fellowship which He can forgive sins. Of course,
believers must confess before they can receive forgiveness.
Fellowship
with God requires that we acknowledge the truth concerning
ourselves. To deny we have a sinful nature means self-deception
and untruthfulness. John makes a distinction between sin and sins.
Sin
refers to our corrupt, evil nature. Sins refers to evils that we
have done.
Praise the
Lord, Christ died for our sin and our sins!
Conversion
does not mean the eradication of the sin nature, but it does mean
implanting of a new divine nature, with power to live victoriously
over indwelling sin.
In order for us to walk day by day in fellowship with God, we must
confess our sins; sins of commission, sins of omission, sins of
thought, sins of act, secret sins and public sins.
We must drag them out in the open before God, call them by name,
take sides with God against them and forsake them. When we do that
we can claim that God is faithful and just to forgive.
The forgiveness John speaks about in
1 John-9 is parental, not judicial. Judicial forgiveness means
forgiveness from the penalty of sins, which the sinner receives
when he believes on the Lord Jesus Christ. It is called judicial
because it is granted by God acting as Judge.
As for fellowship in the family of God the sinning saint needs
parental forgiveness. That is the forgiveness of His Father.
He obtains it by confessing his sin.
We need judicial forgiveness only once, that takes care of the
penalty of all our sins, past , present and future.
But we need parental forgiveness throughout our Christian life.
When we confess our sins we must believe on the authority of the
Word of God, that He forgives us.
