1 John 1:10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
The final conditional sentence resolves any doubts about the power and presence of sin. The protasis confronts those who are unwilling to confess their sins because they think they have not sinned or think they are above sin in some form of self-righteousness. The apodosis has two parts. The first shows how denial rejects God’s righteousness, which was just mentioned in verse 9. God has made the human problem clear in Scripture (Romans 3:10-18). If sin were not a reality for every person, then God has been playing with humanity, and the problems of this world are due to some other factor. Any honest person can see that humanity has a deep problem. If sin does not exist, then the whole story of redemption through Jesus falls apart, and he was only a martyr who died for no reason. Personal salvation is impossible without the realization of one’s need for forgiveness.
The second clause indicates the spiritual deadness of a person who does not realize he or she is a sinner. God’s wordwould refer to any form of revelation from God: Scripture, the preached word, or the conviction of the Holy Spirit upon our consciences. When God’s light shines in our hearts through the countless ways he speaks to us, we must respond; otherwise, we cannot experience his forgiveness and cleansing.
If we ignore the conviction of the Holy Spirit, we suppress the feeling of guilt and awareness of sin, essentially telling the Spirit that he is wrong and that God is a liar about our condition. We are in the right because we have the “right” to do as we want. God communicates the message of grace and hope in Jesus through the Spirit. The outcome of God’s word should be new life in response to his grace. By rejecting God’s word, we also reject life.
The bottom line is that we must acknowledge our debt of sin. Denial of sin is the worst disease because it eventually leads to death. As God told Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, when they ate of the forbidden fruit, sin and death would come. Like them, when we eat of what is forbidden, we experience death and decay within us. At first, we may not see the consequences. Death eats away at us, like rust, until it collapses something in our lives.