STE:How to overcome sin  By Charles Finney

   Edited and paraphrased by Keith Green

   "They said therefore to Him, 'What shall we do, that we may work the
works of God?' Jesus answered and said to them, 'This is the work of
God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent.'" (John 6:28-29)

   There are multitudes of anxious Christians who are inquiring what
they shall do to overcome the world, the flesh, and the devil. They
overlook the fact that "this is the victory that has overcome the world
- our faith" (1John 5:4) that it is with "the shield of faith" that
they are to "extinguish all the flaming missiles of the evil one."
(Ephesians 6:16) They ask, "Why am I overcome by sin? Why can't I get
above its power? Why am I the slave of my appetites and passions and
the sport of the devil?" They look all around them for the cause of all
this spiritual wretchedness and death. Sometimes they think they have
discovered the answer in the neglect of one duty, and at another time
in the neglect of another duty. Sometimes they imagine they have
yielded to one sin and sometimes in yielding to another. They put forth
efforts in this direction and patch up their righteousness on one side,
while they make a tear in the other. Thus they spend years running
around in a circle, making dams of sand across the current of their own
corruptions.

   Instead of at once purifying their hearts by faith (Acts 15:9), they
are engaged in trying to stop the overflow of its bitter waters.

   "Why do I sin?" they inquire; and looking around for the cause, they
come to the same conclusion: "It is because I neglect such and such a
duty!" "But how shall I get rid of sin?" Usual answer: "By doing my
duty, that is by ceasing from sin." Now the real question should be:
Why do they neglect their duty? Why do they commit sin at all? Where is
the foundation of all this mischief? But all this only brings us back
to the real question again:

   How are we to overcome this corrupt nature, this wickedness, and our
sinful habits? I answer, BY FAITH ALONE. No works of the law have the
least tendency to overcome our sins, but rather they strengthen the
soul in self-righteousness and unbelief.

   THE GREAT AND FUNDAMENTAL SIN WHICH IS AT THE FOUNDATION OF ALL
OTHER SIN IS UNBELIEF. The first thing to do is to give that up - to
believe the Word of God. There is no breaking away from one sin without
this. "Whatever is not of faith is sin." (Romans 14:23) "Without faith
it is impossible to please God." (Hebrews 11:6) Thus we see that the
backslider and convicted Christian, when agonizing to overcome sin,
will almost always try to use the works of the law to obtain faith.
They will fast and pray and read and struggle and outwardly reform, and
thus endeavor to obtain grace. But all this is in vain and wrong. Do
you ask, "Shall we not fast and pray and read and struggle? Shall we do
nothing but sit down in cheap security and inaction?" I answer: You
must do all that God commands you to do; but begin where He tells you
to begin, and do it in the manner in which He commands you to do it.
That is - in the exercise of that faith that works by love. (Galatians
5:6) Purify your hearts by faith. Believe in the Son of God! (1John
5:10)

   WHAT IS "FAITH"?

   The first element of saving faith is realizing the truth of the
Bible. But this alone is not saving faith, for Satan also realizes the
truth of the Bible, which makes him tremble. (James 2:19) But a second
element in saving faith is the agreement of the heart (or will) to the
truth understood by the mind. It is a cordial trust or resting of the
mind in those truths, and yielding up the whole being to their
influence. Now it is easy to see that without the consent of the will,
there can be nothing but an outward obedience to God. A wife without
confidence in her husband can do nothing more than outwardly perform
her duty to him. Works of law may be performed without faith, that is,
we may serve from fear or hope or some selfish motive, but without the
confidence that works by love, obedience from the heart is naturally
impossible.

   By what I've already said, I mean that to seek the grace of faith by
mere human works is an utter abomination. It is as abominable as to
attempt to purchase the Holy Spirit with money. (Acts 8:20) It is to
set aside the testimony of God's Word concerning our utter depravity
(helplessness) and attempt to pawn off our unbelieving, heartless works
upon an infinitely Holy God. It is an attempt to purchase His favor,
instead of accepting grace as His sovereign gift.

   To give any other answer to one in unbelief, and to tell him to
perform any work with the expectation that by it he shall obtain faith
is to confirm him in self-righteousness, to prolong his rebellion, to
lead him to settle down in a self-righteous hope to produce in the end,
discouragement and blasphemy.

   Because repentance, faith, love, and every other holy exercise both
IMPLY and PROCEED from faith - without confidence in the character and
requirements of God, it is impossible to repent. FOR WHAT IS REPENTANCE
BUT HEARTILY TO JUSTIFY GOD AND CONDEMN OURSELVES. So it is equally
impossible to exercise a trusting love in God without faith. Submission
to God implies the exercise of confidence in God and in His
requirements.

   Faith is the only exercise that receives Christ with all His
powerfully sanctifying influences into the heart. The Bible everywhere
represents the sanctified soul as being under the influence of an
indwelling Christ. Now the exercise of faith is an opening of the door
by which Christ is received to reign in the heart. If this is so, the
proper direction plainly is to do that which receives Christ. If this
is done, all else will be done. If this is neglected, all else will be
neglected, of course!

   SOME HELPFUL REMARKS

   You see why the Church is not sanctified. They overlook the office
and necessity of faith as that which alone can produce acceptable
obedience to God. They are engaged in efforts to obtain faith by works,
instead of first exercising faith which will produce within them a
clean heart. And in this way they seek in vain for sanctification. How
common it is to see Christians bustling about with outward efforts and
works - fasting and praying, giving and doing and struggling - and
after all this, they do not have the fruits of the Spirit: "love, joy,
peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness,
temperance, AGAINST WHICH THERE IS NO LAW." (Galatians 5:22-23)

   You see why the Bible lays so much stress upon faith. You see what
the difficulty is for those who are constantly in a complaining state
in their walk with the Lord. They seem to know they are wrong, but do
not understand what the foundation of their wrong consists of. They
sometimes think that a neglect of a certain duty is the grand
difficulty, and sometimes their mind fastens upon something else that
is the prime difficulty in their case. They set themselves to break off
from one sin and another, they practice this self-denial and that duty,
and all without that faith that fills the heart with love. Thus they go
round and round in a circle and do not see that unbelief is their
great, their damning sin, without the removal of which NO OTHER SIN can
be repented of or forgiven. All their efforts are entirely legal,
hypocritical, and vain until they exercise faith.

   If persons without faith, in an unsanctified state, set themselves
to obey the commandments of God, their efforts must necessarily be
legal, self-righteous, and destructive. To them the directions of the
Gospel, as well as the commandments of the law, are a horrible pit of
miry clay, the more he struggles the deeper he sinks. Every effort at
obedience without faith is sin, and as it confirms self-righteousness,
is sinking him further and further from God and rational hope. And the
more violently he struggles, the more desperate and alarming his case
becomes. The clay surrounds him and cleaves to him, suffocates and
kills him. Just so the commands of God to an unbelieving heart are a
snare and a pit. Without faith, there is ruin and damnation in them.

   To the careless, unawakened sinner who knows nothing of his
lostness, it might be important and proper to direct his attention to
the law of God to bring conviction - not with the expectation of
promoting holiness in him, but of convicting him of sin. Thus we find
Christ requiring the rich young man who is wrapped up in
self-righteousness to keep the commandments, bringing out before his
mind his supreme love of the world and of things. (Luke 18:18-23)

   You see how to the Jews and to all unbelievers, the commandments of
God are a stumbling block. All outward conformity to them is useless
and ruinous. Love without faith is impossible. And consequently, the
merciful directions and instructions contained in the dos and the
don'ts of the Bible are made the food of self-righteousness and the
snare of death. But to those whose souls are full of faith and love,
the commandments of God are just the instruction which they need when,
in their ignorance, they earnestly inquire what they shall do to
glorify God. "Do this and avoid that," and the like, are just the
things upon which hearts of love will seize as the needed directions of
their Heavenly Father.

   But someone may inquire, "Do not men learn to exercise faith by what
you call legal efforts and an obedience to the legal directions?" No.
They only learn by experience that all such directions are vain, and
that they are totally depraved and dependent, which they ought to have
believed before. They set themselves to pray and read and struggle,
expecting at every meeting they attend, with every prayer they make, to
obtain grace and faith. But they never do until they are completely
discouraged and despair of obtaining help in this way. And the history
of every self-righteous sinner's conversion and every anxious
Christian's sanctification would develop this truth: that deliverance
does not come until their self-righteous efforts are proved by their
own experience to be utterly vain, and abandoned as useless - and the
whole subject thrown upon the sovereign mercy of God. This submitting a
subject to the sovereign mercy of God is that very act of faith which
they should have put forth long before, but which they would not
exercise until every other means had been tried in vain!

   But perhaps you will say, "If by this self-righteous struggle they
learn their depravity and dependence, and in this matter come to prove
by their own experience the truth of God, why not encourage them to
make these efforts as at least an indirect way of obtaining faith?"
Answer: Blasphemy and drunkenness and any of the most shocking sins may
be, and often have been, the means of working conviction which has
resulted in conversion. Why not encourage these things to possibly
bring about ultimate salvation for some?

   The truth is, when a sinner's attention is awakened and he is
convicted and puts forth the inquiry, "What shall I do?" and when a
Christian, struggling with his remaining corruption, puts for this same
inquiry, why should they be thrown into the horrible pit of which I
have spoken? Why not tell them at once, in the language of the text,
"This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent"?
(John 6:29)

   Let me say to you who would make the inquiry, "How can I overcome
sin?" don't wait to fast, read, pray, or anything else - don't expect
to break off from any sin in your unbelief! You may break off from the
outward commission - you may substitute praying for swearing, or
reading your Bible for reading magazines, outward employment and
honesty for theft and idleness, soberness for drunkenness, and anything
you please - but this, without faith, is after all, only exchanging one
form of sin for another - it is only varying the mode of your rebellion
towards God. For remember that in unbelief, whatever your conduct is,
you are still in rebellion against God. Faith would instantly sanctify
your heart, sanctify all your doings, and render them in Christ Jesus,
acceptable to God.

   My dear friend, you inquire whether you shall obtain holiness by
reading the Bible, or by prayer, fasting, or by all these together. Now
let this sermon answer you and know that by neither nor by all of
these, in the absence of faith, are you to grow any better, or find any
relief. You speak of being in darkness and of being discouraged. No
wonder you are so, since you have plainly been seeking sanctification
by outward works. You have "stumbled over the stumbling stone." (Romans
9:32) You are in that pit of miry clay. Immediately exercise faith upon
the Son of God! It is the first, the only thing you can do to rest your
feet upon the Rock - and it will immediately put a new song into your
mouth!

   Contributed by The Manna System
