David Diga Hernandez - How to Live Free from Sin

This is perhaps one of the greatest works that the Holy Spirit will ever do in your life. When you feel like a hypocrite, He reminds you that you belong to Him. When you feel like an orphan, He reminds you that you are a child of God. When you feel like you are a sinner who has gone too far and that you will never be able to make it, that you will always be stuck in these cycles of habitual sin, He reminds you that He has accepted you, He has forgiven you, and He has given you a clean slate. He reminds you of the mercies of God that are new every morning, and He says, «Come on, let’s try again. You’re My child. I’m not abandoning you. I’m with you. My Spirit is in you.» He joins as one with your spirit to affirm that you are a child of God. That is what the Holy Ghost does; He brings conviction. John chapter 16, verses 7 through 8 say this: «But in fact, it is best for you that I go away, because if I don’t, the Advocate won’t come. If I do go away, then I will send Him to you, and when He comes, He will convict the world of sin and of God’s righteousness and of the coming judgment.» Now, what is conviction? Conviction is either a strong belief or opinion, or it is the process of convincing. Now, I know in the context of court, «conviction» means a sentence being handed down, but as far as what it means here in the context of biblical text, the Scripture is describing the process of convincing, or that deep belief coming upon a person through the Holy Spirit’s convincing. So, the Holy Spirit doesn’t just convict of sin; watch this now, the Holy Spirit also convicts of God’s righteousness. So, He gives us these deeply held beliefs concerning sin, concerning righteousness, and concerning the judgment of God. Those are three things that He causes you to believe, that He convinces you of: He convinces you that A) sin is bad, B) righteousness is the standard, and C) judgment is coming. That conviction, that deeply held belief, when it gets into the core of who you are, causes you to pause and to consider before placing yourself in moments of temptation or before giving in to temptation itself. Second Corinthians chapter 7, verse 10 says, «For godly sorrow worketh repentance to salvation, not to be repented of, but the sorrow of the world worketh death.» Now, godly sorrow works repentance. It is not unbiblical to feel bad for sin. I think there is this unbiblical idea, this strange notion, that no one should ever feel bad for their sin, that if you preach a message that makes people feel bad for their sin, you are turning them off to the gospel. Now, this isn’t true. People aren’t turned off from the gospel because you preach on sin; people are turned off from the gospel because of their love for sin, period. So, it’s not that feeling bad for sin is a bad thing; it’s that people love their sin, and that’s why they reject the gospel. It has nothing to do with preaching righteousness. But the Holy Spirit gives us this conviction, this sorrow over the wrong that we do, and that is necessary because that sorrow produces repentance. Now, feeling bad for your sin is not repentance, and this is why some people get caught in this cycle: they sin, they say, «Lord, I feel bad,» but in the back of their mind, they have every intention of doing it again, whether they are aware that they have the intention of doing it again or not. See, they lie to themselves and say, «I’m never going to do that again.» What they really mean is, «I’m not tempted because I just did it, so now I’m not going to do it again until I do it again.» That’s really what the flesh is saying; that’s how deceptive the flesh is. It convinces you that you somehow have this intention of never doing it again. No, repentance is when that godly sorrow is so intense in me that I make the commitment: I’m not going to allow this tomorrow. I’m not going to allow this a week from now. I’m not going to allow this a year from now. I’m cutting it off. This sin is not allowed in my life—not to any degree, not in any amount, not under any circumstance—and I have every intention of setting up boundaries and doing what it takes to make sure that this sin gains no influence in my life. That is produced by the sorrow over sin. So, it’s not just feeling bad; it’s the sorrow that produces a turning from evil doing. Now, repentance means to change your mind. In the biblical context, repentance means that I have a change of mind that results in turning from sin. So, when you repent as a result of this godly sorrow, it produces that fruit in your life, and so godly sorrow is necessary. The Holy Spirit convicts you or convinces you of the fact that sin is bad, righteousness is God’s standard, and that judgment is coming. What many fail to realize is that when you know you’re forgiven, that produces this enthusiasm to live holy. It’s like you have a clean slate, and you’re thinking, «Wow, God wiped my record clean. God forgave me of all those sins. God is giving me a fresh start,» and that lifting of the burden, that sense of liberty and freedom, that sense of newness sets you free, and it motivates you to walk in holiness. Why? Because when you sin and you feel like you have this list that’s piled up, it looks like some insurmountable mountain that you’re never going to be able to overcome. So, you say, «Well, I’m…»