Proverbs 20:7, “The righteous lead blameless lives; blessed are their children after them.”
I’d be a rich man by now, if I had a dollar for every time I told people that God expects them to live without sin and they gave me the excuse, “But nobody is perfect.” The Bible is absolutely clear from beginning to end that the children of God are to live blameless lives, “without sin.” This doesn’t mean that humanity is born perfect or is capable of making themselves perfect, however, by God’s grace (His active and enabling power) man can be born again and live without sin.
Jesus said in Matthew 5:48, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” Also, Peter reiterated in the New Testament what God said in Leviticus 11:44, “Be holy, because I am holy” (1 Peter 1:16). Do these passages teach us, “Stay messed up, because God is messed up” or “Be whatever you want to be because you’re in charge?” Certainly not. One might ask, “Well, what about my sinful nature?” Paul explained in Romans 6:6, that our sinful nature was crucified with Christ when we were born again, “For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin.”
Therefore what King Solomon, Moses, Paul, Peter and Jesus said concerning living a blameless life must be fully obeyed. Someone might now ask, “What happens if I do sin after being born again?” John the apostle gave the answer in 1 John 1:9, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”
If we do sin after being born again we are to repent and be forgiven. Being blameless and without sin should always be the default position of the disciple.
If we do not follow God’s command to be blameless, we will suffer. Jesus purchased our new identity, which is holy and blameless, and He sent the Holy Spirit to lead us not into temptation but deliver us from all evil. God warned in Hebrews 10:26-27 to not “deliberately keep on sinning” because if we do, “no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God.” Also, God said in 1 John 3:8-9, “8 The one who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work. 9 No one who is born of God will continue to sin, because God’s seed remains in them; they cannot go on sinning, because they have been born of God.” Adam Clarke wrote, “All sin, whether in power, guilt, or defilement is the work of the devil; and he, Jesus, came to destroy the work of the devil; and as all unrighteousness is sin, so his blood cleanseth from all sin, because it cleanseth from all unrighteousness.”
By God’s grace we, as righteous people, should live blameless lives just as Solomon described. Being blameless before God will be a tremendous blessing to our children. Children shouldn’t grow up watching us live in sin and make excuses to be defeated by evil. Watching God’s transforming and empowering grace in our lives should inspire them to be who God called them to be. Here are five ways to be righteous and lead a blameless life; (1) Be born again, (2) Be baptized with the Holy Spirit, (3) Believe and confess you are who God said you are, (4) Immediately repent of sin whenever you commit it, and lastly, (5) By the power of the Holy Spirit keep all of God’s commands found in the Bible.
Reflection
Action
- Believe and confess out loud that you can live without sin as the Bible teaches and lead a blameless life.
- Keep all of God’s commands (including His command to repent) all the days of your life for your children’s sake.
- Pray for your children to be born again and lead a blameless life.
