The Deceitfulness of Sin

by Mike Ratliff 

 

Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world–the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions–is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever. Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come. Therefore we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us.  (1 John 2:15-19 ESV) 

It is not very costly to profess Christ. Anyone can do that. Christianity becomes costly when the professing Christian stands and does not fall away in the face of persecution or pressure to conform to some position or stance that is clearly opposed in some way to God’s clear commands found in His Word. For the Christian to commit this sin will be either to disobey God in an act of commission or omission. In any case, when the professing Christian takes each step in disobedience a layer of scar tissue is burned into their conscience with the searing hot iron of deliberate sin. Over time those professing Christians will each have an inoperable conscience and the processes which caused this will have proven that these compromisers have become victims of the deceitfulness of sin and, therefore, they will become what the Bible refers to as apostate. Some of these will still believe they are Christians, but others will refer to themselves as ‘former Christians.’ The Word tells us though that they “went out” from “us” because they were never in Christ to begin with. All genuine believers “continue” in faithfulness to the end.