Why Do People Sin? How to Stop Sinning

Question: In my years of believing in the Lord, I have seen how everyone, whether pastors, elders or ordinary believers, has been living sinfully and never been able to escape the bonds of sin. This causes me a lot of distress. I just don’t understand: Why do people sin? What can we do to stop sinning?

Answer: Hello! If we want to understand why people sin, we should know where sin comes from. In the beginning, our first ancestors, Adam and Eve, were without sin. But later, they didn’t listen to God’s words, and they failed to resist Satan’s temptation and ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and were thus corrupted by Satan. Subsequently, people began to have sin as well as Satan’s corrupt dispositions such as fiendishness, jealousy, arrogance, maliciousness, selfishness, despicableness, crookedness, deceitfulness, evil and greed. We humans have been living by these corrupt dispositions for thousands of years, and we have become ever more evil and corrupt, losing the conscience and reason that a normal person should possess. We therefore can commit sin, oppose God and rebel against God at any time and in any place.

Maybe some people will ask: Why do people still sin after they believe in the Lord and have their sins absolved? In actual fact, what the Lord Jesus forgave was people’s sin of violating God’s laws. At the end of the Age of Law, people were unable to keep the laws and commandments, and so risked being executed by the law. The Lord Jesus therefore performed the work of redemption and took people’s sins upon Himself. So long as people trusted in the Lord Jesus, confessed and repented to Him, then their sins were forgiven, and they would no longer be put to death by the law. Neither did God see man as sinful any longer, and people could directly pray to and call on God, and enjoy God’s abundant grace, and continue to live. This is the true meaning of “Sins are forgiven.” Yet the Lord Jesus only forgave man his sins. Man’s inner sinful nature remains deeply rooted, so man can still commit sin. Let’s read a passage of God’s words, and we will understand more clearly.

God says, “Before man was redeemed, many of Satan’s poisons had already been planted within him and, after thousands of years of being corrupted by Satan, he has within him an established nature that resists God. Therefore, when man has been redeemed, it is nothing more than a case of redemption in which man is bought at a high price, but the poisonous nature within him has not been eliminated. Man that is so defiled must undergo a change before becoming worthy to serve God. … For all that man may have been redeemed and forgiven of his sins, it can only be considered as God not remembering the transgressions of man and not treating man in accordance with his transgressions. However, when man, who lives in a body of flesh, has not been set free from sin, he can only continue to sin, endlessly revealing his corrupt satanic disposition. This is the life that man leads, an endless cycle of sinning and being forgiven.”

We can see from these words that as we humans have been corrupted by Satan for thousands of years, Satan’s poisons and its rules of survival have been planted deep within our hearts. All of these are more intransigent and resistant toward God than sin. In rescuing us humans from the cross, the Lord Jesus only forgave our sins of violating the laws and commandments; He never absolved us of our satanic natures. Various satanic poisons and corrupt dispositions still remain within us. These satanic corrupt dispositions are the root cause of us committing sins and defying God.

For example, living by the satanic poison of “I am my own lord,” our natures become arrogant and conceited, and at home and in the church, we are always high and mighty, and wish to rule others, trying to make them obey us. Controlled by such satanic poisons as “As a tree lives for its bark, a man lives for his face” and “Man can achieve nothing without telling lies,” our natures become crooked and deceitful, and we often tell lies and cheat others for the sake of protecting our own prestige and interests, simply unable to be honest people according to God’s requirements. Living by satanic poisons like “We will not attack unless we are attacked; if we are attacked, we will certainly counterattack” and “If you’re not kind, I won’t be just!” our natures become insidious and malicious, and the moment someone else impinges upon our interests, we start to hate them and even want to exact retribution on them. We can see from this that satanic natures are the root of our resistance to God. If they are not resolved, even if our sins are forgiven a thousand or ten thousand times over, we will still continue to sin. In the end, not only will we be unqualified to enter the kingdom of heaven, but we will be condemned and punished by God. Just as the Bible says, “Whoever commits sin is the servant of sin. And the servant stays not in the house for ever: but the son stays ever” (John 8:34–35). “For if we sin willfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins. But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries” (Hebrews 10:26–27).

How to Resolve the Sinful Nature

We have known why people sin and that sinners can’t gain God’s approval. So how should we resolve our sinful nature and thoroughly cast off the bonds of sin? Actually, the Lord Jesus prophesied long ago, “I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. However, when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will guide you into all truth: for He shall not speak of Himself; but whatever He shall hear, that shall He speak: and He will show you things to come” (John 16:12–13). “He that rejects Me, and receives not My words, has one that judges him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day” (John 12:48). 1 Peter 4:17 says, “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the house of God.” And Revelation 22:14 says, “Blessed are they that do His commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.” These verses show us that the Lord Jesus promised to return in the last days to utter His words to us and use the truth to perform the work of judging and purifying man, enabling us to entirely resolve our satanic natures, so that we may break free of the bonds of sin and thus be purified.

In fact, the Lord Jesus’ prophecies have been fulfilled and the Lord has already returned as the incarnated Almighty God. Almighty God has been carrying out the work of judgment beginning with the house of God since 1991 and expressed millions of words to judge and purify man. All those who accept Almighty God’s work of the last days, and who go through His judgment and chastisement, have the chance to thoroughly cast off the bonds of their sinful nature. Then, how does Almighty God, Christ of the last days, carry out His work of judgment to purify man? Let’s read a couple more passages of Almighty God’s words.

Almighty God says, “Christ of the last days uses a variety of truths to teach man, to expose the substance of man, and to dissect the words and deeds of man. These words comprise various truths, such as man’s duty, how man should obey God, how man should be loyal to God, how man ought to live out normal humanity, as well as the wisdom and the disposition of God, and so on. These words are all directed at the substance of man and his corrupt disposition. In particular, the words that expose how man spurns God are spoken in regard to how man is an embodiment of Satan, and an enemy force against God. In undertaking His work of judgment, God does not simply make clear the nature of man with a few words; He exposes, deals with, and prunes over the long term. All these different methods of exposure, dealing, and pruning cannot be substituted with ordinary words, but with the truth of which man is utterly bereft. Only methods such as these can be called judgment; only through judgment of this kind can man be subdued and thoroughly convinced about God, and moreover gain true knowledge of God. What the work of judgment brings about is man’s understanding of the true face of God and the truth about his own rebelliousness. The work of judgment allows man to gain much understanding of the will of God, of the purpose of God’s work, and of the mysteries that are incomprehensible to him. It also allows man to recognize and know his corrupt essence and the roots of his corruption, as well as to discover the ugliness of man. These effects are all brought about by the work of judgment, for the essence of this work is actually the work of opening up the truth, the way, and the life of God to all those who have faith in Him. This work is the work of judgment done by God.”

“By means of this work of judgment and chastisement, man will fully come to know the filthy and corrupt essence within his own self, and he will be able to change completely and become clean. Only in this way can man become worthy to return before the throne of God. All the work done this day is so that man can be made clean and be changed; through judgment and chastisement by the word, as well as through refinement, man can purge away his corruption and be made pure. Rather than deeming this stage of work to be that of salvation, it would be more apt to say it is the work of purification.”

As is clear from God’s words, in the last days, Almighty God judges and purifies man by means of expressing a variety of truths. All of the words expressed by Him are all the reality of the truth we mankind don’t possess, display what God has and is, and contain His holy and righteous disposition. Whatever Almighty God speaks is judgment, chastisement, and purification for us corrupt humans.

During the judgment work in the last days, Almighty God has expressed millions of words of the truth, such as “The Essence and Identity of Man,” “In Your Faith in God You Should Obey God,” “What Viewpoint Believers Ought to Hold,” “To Whom Are You Loyal?” “To Have an Unchanged Disposition Is to Be in Enmity to God” and “All People Who Do Not Know God Are People Who Oppose God.” These words expose the essence of our satanic nature that resists God, plus the truth of our corruption, allowing us to recognize our own satanic dispositions, dispositions that are arrogant, conceited, crooked, crafty, selfish and ignoble, as well as the various impurities in our belief in God and intentions to receive blessings. At the same time, Almighty God directs us toward the path of practice and entry, such as “A Person Who Attains Salvation Is One Who Is Willing to Practice the Truth,” “Promises to Those Who Have Been Perfected,” “A Warning to Those Who Do Not Practice the Truth” and “The Commandments of the New Age.” From Almighty God’s words, we come to know what kind of people God likes and dislikes, and what kind of people He saves and punishes. We also come to have some understanding of God’s holy and righteous disposition, we begin to fear God in our hearts, and we are no longer willing to rely on our corrupt dispositions to do things and instead start to focus on practicing the truth and live according to God’s requirements. By constantly experiencing and practicing God’s words, our satanic corrupt dispositions then gradually change. This is the result achieved by experiencing the judgment and chastisement of Almighty God’s words.

Now, many believers who have accepted Almighty God’s work in the last days, through experiencing the judgment and chastisement of His words, have experienced cleansing and transformation of their corrupt dispositions to varying degrees. Some of their experiential testimonies are recorded in the book Testimonies of Experiences Before the Judgment Seat of Christ, and some have been made into videos and films. Among them, there are testimonies of undergoing God’s judgment and experiencing transformation of the arrogant disposition; there are testimonies of getting rid of lying ways and practicing being honest people; there are testimonies of devotedly fulfilling duties; there are also testimonies of being loyal to God even at the cost of lives when suffering persecution or tribulation. These true testimonies are enough to show us that Almighty God’s judgment work of the last days is the work of saving man, and it really can purify and transform people. This completely fulfills the prophecy in Revelation 14:4–5, “These are they which were not defiled with women; for they are virgins. These are they which follow the Lamb wherever He goes. These were redeemed from among men, being the first fruits to God and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne of God.”

It is therefore evident that only by accepting Almighty God’s judgment work of the last days can we have the chance to be freed from the bonds of sin, be cleansed, and become people approved by God.

Editor’s Note: Do you now understand why people sin and the path to stop sinning? If someone you know is just as confused as you, please share this article with them. If you have any more issues, please feel free to communicate with us using the online chat buttons at the bottom.