1 John 3:9

Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. WHOSOEVER IS BORN OF GOD - `everyone that is begotten of God.' DOTH NOT COMMIT SIN - his higher nature, as begotten of God, doth not sin. To be begotten of God, and to sin, are states mutually excluding each other. In so far as one sins, he makes it doubtful whether he be born of God. HIS SEED - God's living Word, made by the Holy Spirit the seed in us of a new life: the continual mean of sanctification. REMAINETH - abideth in Him (note, 1 John 3:6; John 5:38). Not contradictory to 1 John 1:8: Th...

He says that they _sin not _who are born of God. Now, we must consider, whether God wholly regenerates us at once, or whether the remains of the old man continue in us until death. If regeneration is not as yet full and complete, it does not exempt us from the bondage of sin except in proportion to its own extent. It hence appears that it cannot be but that the children of God are not free from sins, and that they daily sin, that is, as far as they have still some remnants of their old nature. Nevertheless, what the Apostle contends for stands unalterable, that the design of regeneration is to destroy sin, and that all who are born of God lead a righteous and a holy life, because the Spirit of God restrains the lusting of sin. The Apostle means the same thing by _the seed _of God; for God’s Spirit so forms the hearts of the godly for holy affections, that the flesh and its lusts do not p...

3-10 The sons of God know that their Lord is of purer eyes than to allow any thing unholy and impure to dwell with him. It is the hope of hypocrites, not of the sons of God, that makes allowance for gratifying impure desires and lusts. May we be followers of him as his dear children, thus show our sense of his unspeakable mercy, and express that obedient, grateful, humble mind which becomes us. Sin is the rejecting the Divine law. In him, that is, in Christ, was no sin. All the sinless weaknesses that were consequences of the fall, he took; that is, all those infirmities of mind or body which subject man to suffering, and expose him to temptation. But our moral infirmities, our proneness to sin, he had not. He that abides in Christ, continues not in the practice of sin. Renouncing sin is the great proof of spiritual union with, continuance in, and saving knowledge of the Lord Christ. Be...

Verse 9. _WHOSOEVER IS BORN OF GOD_] γεγεννημενος, _Begotten_ of God, _doth not commit sin_: "that is," say some, "as he used to do, he does not sin _habitually_ as he formerly did." This is bringing the influence and privileges of the heavenly birth very low indeed. We have the most indubitable evidence that many of the heathen philosophers had acquired, by mental discipline and cultivation, an entire ascendency over all their wonted vicious habits. Perhaps my reader will recollect the story of the physiognomist, who, coming into the place where Socrates was delivering a lecture, his pupils, wishing to put the principles of the man's science to proof, desired him to examine the face of their master, and say what his moral character was. After a full contemplation of the philosopher's visage, he pronounced him "the most gluttonous, drunken, brutal, and libidinous old man that he had eve...

WHOSOEVER IS BORN OF GOD DOTH NOT COMMIT SIN - This passage must either mean that they who are born of God, that is, who are true Christians, do not sin habitually and characteristically, or that everyone who is a true Christian is absolutely perfect, and never commits any sin. If it can be used as referring to the doctrine of absolute perfection at all, it proves, not that Christians may be perfect, or that a “portion” of them are, but that all are. But who can maintain this? Who can believe that John meant to affirm this? Nothing can be clearer than that the passage has not this meaning, and that John did not teach a doctrine so contrary to the current strain of the Scriptures, and to fact; and if he did not teach this, then in this whole passage he refers to those who are habitually and characteristically righteous. FOR HIS SEED REMAINETH IN HIM - There is much obscurity in this expre...

EXPOSITION 1 JOHN 3:1 TO 1 JOHN 5:12 3. SECOND MAIN DIVISION. _God is Love._ 1 JOHN 3:1 (1) The _evidence of sonship. _Righteousness. 1 JOHN 3:1 The Divine birth is the outcome of the Divine love. 1 JOHN 3:1 BEHOLD WHAT MANNER OF LOVE! Ποταπός;_ _literally, "of what country," in the New Testament always implies amazement; but,

WHOSOEVER IS BORN OF GOD,.... In a figurative and spiritual sense; who are regenerated, or born from above; who are quickened by the grace of God, and have Christ formed in them; who are made partakers of the divine nature, and new creatures in Christ; which spiritual birth is not owing to men, to the power and will of men, but to the grace of God; and is sometimes ascribed to the Father, who of his own will and abundant mercy begets souls again to a lively hope, and saves them by the washing of regeneration; and sometimes to Christ, who quickens whom he will, whose grace is implanted, and image stamped in it, and by whose resurrection from the dead men are begotten again; and chiefly, to the Spirit of God, who is the author of regeneration, and of the whole of sanctification: and such as are born of him are alive through him, the spirit of life entering into them, and live to God and up...

I have read this chapter many times in your hearing, but we cannot read it too often, for it is full of the deepest and most important instruction. God grant that fresh light from above may shine upon it as we listen once more to the familiar words! 1 John 3:1. _Behold,_ If you never used your eyes to good purpose before, use them so now: 1 John 3:1. _What manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God:_ Let the truth of our adoption amaze us, the adoption of such unworthy ones as we were to so high a relationship «that we should be called the sons of God.» 1 John 3:1. Therefore the world knoweth not, because it knew him not.

IV. RIGHTEOUSNESS AND LOVE AS MANIFESTED BY THE CHILDREN OF GOD Chapter S 2:28-3:18 __ 1. The children of God and their coming manifestation (1 John 2:28 -1 John 3:3) 2. Sin and the new nature (1 John 3:4) 3. Righteousness and love (1 John 3:10) 1 John 2:28 -1 John 3:3 . The address to the babes in Christ ended with the 27th verse, and now once more he speaks of the teknia, the little children, by which all believers are meant. The exhorta

To commit sin is a breach of God's law, a frustration of God's work of redemption, and the manifestation of a principle which betrays kinship with the devil. A man begotten of God will be in moral affinity with God, for which reason righteousness and brotherly love will characterise him. 1 JOHN 3:4. SIN IS LAWLESSNESS: _ i.e._ not the absence of law, but opposition to it. Law does not cease to exist for the Christian, and all opposition to it, so far from being morally unimportant, is rebellion. 1 John 3:5. he was manifested: _ i.e._ at His Incarnation. Righteous Himself, the work of Christ is to make us righteous too (_cf._ 1 John 3:8)....