Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered outside the gate. Therefore, let us go forth to him outside the camp, bearing his reproach. For we have no continuing city here, but we seek one to come.
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The apostle Paul defined sin as “whatsoever is not of faith” (Rom. 14:23). The apostle John said that “sin is the transgression of the law” (1Jn. 3:4). Brother Jerry wrote to his friend that “sin is the transgression of God’s will at any given moment.”
I believe that what Jerry said is just as true as what Paul and John wrote. I believe that all three definitions of sin are absolutely true and that they were all inspired by the Spirit of God. There is no doubt in my mind that at some point in their many years of labor for the Lord Jesus, both Paul and John defined sin exactly as Jerry did; that is, whatever is contrary to the will of God at any given moment. The fact that such wording never appears in the Bible is absolutely irrelevant to whether Jerry’s is a true or false statement. There is much truth that is not specifically stated in the Bible.
What does this mean? This means that the Spirit, not the Bible, is what leads us into all truth. Once, when I was telling a Christian minister (I will call him James Bowman) about God’s revelation to me concerning the sacrifice of Christ, the minister scoffed at me and said, “I don’t believe anything unless it’s in the Bible.” Now, in this particular case, what Jesus taught me was in the Bible, but he refused to see it. And after God showed it to me, I would have known it was true even if it was not in the Bible. But the point is that there is much more truth that God has for us than what is written in the Bible. The Bible cannot possibly contain all the truth God has to give to us. That is why we need the Spirit. And the holy Spirit is of such vital importance to us that Jesus was willing to suffer and die to make it available for us.
There is not a believer on earth who believes only what is written in the Bible. And to prove the point to James, the Christian minister to whom I was speaking, I asked him, “Do you believe that James Bowman loves Jesus?” To which he quickly responded, “Yes I do!” And then I said, “That’s not in the Bible.”
So, Brother Jerry can speak truth just as Paul did – truth not found, in those words, any where in Paul’s writings. You, too, can do the same thing if you listen to the Spirit. The Spirit of God is called “the Spirit of truth”, and anyone among us may hear truth directly from God by His Spirit at any time. That is the very thing Christ died for! It should not be considered an unusual thing, then, for the Father to speak to His children. His Spirit is here, guiding us every moment. All we need is faith to believe Him when He speaks, and to follow where He leads.