Mark Tabata’s Weekday Devotionals
Wednesday August 26 2026
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1 John 3:6-9-Whoever abides in Him does not sin. Whoever sins has neither seen Him nor known Him. 7 Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous. 8 He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil. 9 Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God.
Do Christians sin?
The Apostle John declared:
1 John 1:8-If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
Yet later, the same Apostle declared that whoever abides in Christ does not sin! He further states that whoever sins has neither ‘seen” nor “known” Jesus, and that whoever has been born of God cannot sin!
What’s going on here?
Let’s study.
In 1 John 1, John very emphatically declares that Christians do indeed commit acts of sin. Indeed, the blood of Jesus keeps on cleansing Christians of every sin as they continue walking in the light of God’s Word (1 John 1:7), which includes repentance and confession of sins to the Lord and trusting that He will continue forgiving (1 John 1:9). This hope is rooted in the fact that Jesus is our Advocate (1 John 2:1-2).
So what does John mean when he says that Christians “do not sin” and that they “cannot sin?”
Some believe that John is referring to a specific sin in these verses, and not to sin in general. They base this on what the Apostle wrote earlier.
1 John 3:4-Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness.
In the Greek of this passage, the definite article appears before both “sin” and “lawlessness” here:
“Whoever commits THE sin also commits THE lawlessness.”
This has led some to believe that John is referring here to a very specific sin (possibly the way that the Gnostics were so perverting the Gospel truth of Who Jesus is to try and justify their wicked lifestyles). What’s more, there is an Old Testament background to this which makes it possible.
The passage 3: 6–9 is part of the treatment of the fundamental connection between knowing God and doing righteousness found in 2: 29–3: 10, where the author provides a basis for distinguishing between those who are the children of God and those who are the children of the devil. The connection between sin and the devil is made three times in this passage, the connection being made both by explicit references to the devil (3: 8, 10) and by equating sin (hamartia) and lawlessness (anomia) (3: 4). Anomia is found only in this verse in 1 John, a letter in which the word nomos (law) does not even occur, suggesting that we should not jump to the conclusion that here it denotes specifically violations of the Mosaic law. As noted above, de la Potterie points out that in the LXX anomia translates about twenty Hebrew words and becomes virtually synonymous with hamartia. In some places in the LXX anomia has satanic associations, and in two places it is used to translate Belial (2 Sam 22: 5; Ps 17: 4 [ET 18: 5]). These things pave the way for the teaching in later Jewish texts that the sins of the people of Israel are brought about by the powers of wickedness—by Satan and his spirits (cf., e.g., Testament of Dan 5: 4–6; 6: 1–6; Testament of Naphtali 4: 1; Rule of the Community [1QS] 3: 18–21; 4: 9, 19–20, 23). People who commit sins are then called the children/ men of iniquity (1QS 3: 20; 5: 2, 10; 10: 20). 152 Among the Gospels, only Matthew uses the word anomia, and he does so consistently in association with false prophets or others who oppose God’s kingdom, always with some association with the last days or the final judgment (Matt 7: 23; 13: 41; 23: 28; 24: 21). In the Pauline corpus the singular form of anomia is in all cases but one used to denote a sinful power working in the world, one to which Christians must not submit themselves (Rom 6: 19; 2 Cor 6: 14; 2 Thess 2: 3, 7). In the NT anomia meaning transgression of the law is completely absent. 153 All this suggests that when the author of 1 John says “sin is lawlessness,” he does not mean sin is the violation of the Mosaic law, but rather that sin constitutes opposition to and rebellion against God, like the opposition and rebellion of Satan. If this is the case, then the author is really saying that those who claim to have seen God and know him, yet persist in sin, certainly do not know God and are in fact in league with Satan. So the point the author wants to make in the passage is clear enough, and this is all summed up in 3: 10: “This is how we know who the children of God are and who the children of the devil are: Anyone who does not do what is right is not God’s child, nor is anyone who does not love their brother and sister.” (Colin G. Kruse, The Letters of John (The Pillar New Testament Commentary (PNTC), 206-208 (Kindle Edition): Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company)
So Kruse (and others) are suggesting that when the Bible says that a person born of God “cannot” sin, it is speaking of committing a specific sin: one that is inspired by devotion to the devil and that the Gnostics were indulging in. This viewpoint also is espoused by some of the early church fathers. Augustine, for example, claimed that “the” sin that a child of God cannot commit is specifically “unbelief.” He also wrote that this “unbelief” is manifested in a lack of love from one Christian to another who is destitute.
However, the definite article here does not demand that John is focusing on one particular sin, a fact which several Greek scholars have pointed out over the years.
Although the Article distinctly takes sin in the sense of an offence [old English: missing . M.] towards God , and ἀνομία as an opposition to the law of God, and removes all indefinite generality, yet no qualification within this ethico-religious sphere is admissible. But we must not attach too much importance to this, since the Article is wanting in 1 John 3: 9: ἁμαρτίαν οὐ ποιεῖν and ποιεῖν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν and ἁμαρτάνειν ( 1 John 3: 4 ; 1 John 3: 6 ; 1 John 3: 8-9 ) are used promiscue , so that we must not attach too much importance to ποιεῖν. To this must be added that καὶ before τὴν ανομίαν conveys the idea that the doing of the ἁμαρτία is as such also as the doing of the ἀνομία. (Düsterdieck.) Quishquis committit peccatum, idem committit iniquitatem . (Erasmus.) Καὶ must neither be taken in a causal sense, nor changed into yea (Brückner); but we have to hold with Ebrard that the fuller idea, ποιεῖν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν, in the beginning helps to qualify the other terms, ποιεῖν ἁμαρτίαν, and ἁμαρτάνειν, and that the antithesis ἁγνίζειν ἑαυτὸν is also co& euml; fficient, and that the reference, so far from being to sins of haste or infirmity, is rather to sin, though only a single Acts, yet a voluntary act. Hence the following explanations cannot be received: that ἁμαρτία denotes peccatum mortale (Estius and the Roman Catholics), or grave, unrepented sins (Luther, al.), or that ποιεῖν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν is = peccare contumaciter (Aretius), contra conscientiam el impœnitenter (Rosenmüller), or peccato operam dare (Beza), peccare scientem et volentem (Spener), or the actual moral bias of life (Brückner). It is equally inadmissible to assume an intensification of the notion ἁμαρτία into ἀνομία (Baumgarten-Crusius, Bengel), or that ἀνομία includes crimes and vices proper, as if ἁμαρτία were the principle and source of the ἀνομία (de Wette). Paraphrases of ποιεῖν ἀνομιαν, such as Deum offendere (Grotius) and religioni adversari (Carpzov), do incorrectly weaken the idea. The two ideas, although distinguished from each other, are not convertible. We have here the general proposition: whoever doeth sin, of whatever kind it be, doeth also lawlessness, violates the Divine rule and order, which is not directed against Antinomians, but against all those who are loose on the subject of sin; the idea of ἀνομία imparts a peculiar severity to that of sin. (Johann Peter Lange, A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures: Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical, 42098-42099 (Kindle Edition): Omaha, NE: Patristic Publishing: emphasis added, M.T.)
John could simply be explaining to us that at the heart of it, all acts of sin are like the lawlessness which characterized Satan’s fall and which are described throughout the Old Testament.
Another weakness of this argument, in my understanding, is that it suggests a believer can never apostatize into unbelief. So then, it is argued, any Christian who falls from the faith was never really saved to begin with.
The problem with this is that there have been many persons throughout the Bible who were in a saved relationship with God, but who then chose to rebel against Him. We could mention a few examples here.
Satan (Isaiah 14:12-15; Ezekiel 28:11-19);
The angels who sinned (Genesis 6:1-4; Revelation 12:1-10);
Nicolas (Acts 6:1-5, who is said to have been filled with the Holy Spirit and who the church fathers claimed later formed the Gnostic group known as the Nicolaitans mentioned by John in Revelation 2:6, 15);
And of course, Simon the Sorcerer (Acts 8:12-13). In this passage, we are told that the Samaritans believed and were baptized, and that Simon did so “also.” This links his salvation with that of the other Samaritans. However, Simon then apostatized (Acts 8:14-23).
Furthermore:
Doesn’t Jesus Himself proclaim that there are some who believe and later fall away (Luke 8:11-15)?
Did Jesus not declare that some who are “in Him” are cast out as branches if they do not bear fruit (John 15:1-8)?
Was it not the Apostle Peter who declared that some who have been cleansed and delivered from the corruption that is in the world may again turn back to it and be lost (2 Peter 2:20-22)?
Did not the same Apostle also proclaim that there were even some who had been purchased/redeemed by the blood of Christ and later became false prophets (2 Peter 2:1-3)?
These are just two problems with this particular interpretation of 1 John 3:6, 9.
A much more likely interpretation of this passage rests in the chosen and abiding lifestyle of the persons here described, and as illustrated by the nature of the verbs. The Apostle in this passage is describing those who are trying to live for the Lord, versus those who have given themselves over to the demonic teachings of the Gnostics. John assured us that while Christians commit sins (1 John 1:7-2:2), they do not desire to live in sin as a continual way of life. This is because they continue to look to Jesus and grow in their relationship with Him (1 John 3:6), allowing His seed to abide within their heart (1 John 3:9).
One gentleman who used to believe in the doctrine of “once-saved-always-saved” describes this in detail.
“If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” What a precious promise! But John also warns, “Whoever remains in Him does not practice sin: whoever practices sin has not continued seeing Him, nor continued knowing Him.” The renderings of the Authorized Version make John appear to contradict himself: Whoever sins has an advocate-Jesus Christ; but whoever sins is a stranger to Christ and is of the devil (2:1 and 3:6, 8). There is no contradiction, of course. The Authorized Version fails to depict the difference between the punctiliar aorist subjunctive in 2:1 and the linear aspects of the verbs in chapter 3. It is the difference between sin as an isolated act, and habitual sinning as a deliberate pattern of behavior. For the man who follows such a pattern, Jesus cannot intercede before the Father’s throne of judgment. He cannot serve as Advocate for men while they deliberately consent sent to sin. Grace is for sinners; but not for wilful sinners who deliberately pursue sin. “My dear children, these things write I unto you, that you sin not. But if any man sin….” Despite our best intentions and holiest aspirations, we do sin. But thank God, “we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and he is the propitiation for our sins.” There is a remedy for the sins of the saints: “If we keep on confessing’ our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (I John 1:9) . An essential aspect of confession before our High Priest is the sincere intention of forsaking the sins we confess. We cannot not ask forgiveness for sins we have no intention of forsaking. “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we claim that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we [God and the believer-v. 6] have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin” (I John 1:5-7). There is no promise of forgiveness and cleansing from sin except for men who sincerely endeavor (though, at best, imperfectly) to “walk in the light, as He is in the light.” “Can two walk together, except they be agreed?” (Amos 3:3). We cannot walk with Him whose habitation is light unless we are willing to share His enmity against sin. If we consent to His conditions, if we come before Him with contrite heart, if we forsake the sins which nailed Jesus to His cross, we may know that we have an Advocate with the Father who is, Himself, the propitiation for all our sins. We may confess fess our sins in full assurance that “He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” He has given His word. Let us trust Him. (Robert Shank, Life in the Son: A Study Of The Doctrine Of Perseverance, 1472-1490 (Kindle Edition): Minneapolis, Minnesota: Bethany House Publishers)
As long as the child of God continues to look to Jesus, grow in relationship with Him, and allows His Word to abide in his heart, it is impossible for him-as long as he meets these conditions-to live a lifestyle of unrepentant and continual sin.
Father, thank You for our hope of salvation that rests in Your Son. Help us to always look to You for guidance and grace. In Jesus Name we pray, Amen.