Colossians 3:1-5
If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry
If a gardener gets up every morning to weed his garden, the presence of weeds every morning is not evidence of him being a bad gardener; on the contrary, it is his daily presence in the garden to weed it that serves as proof of him being a good gardener. To be a good gardener is to be gardening; only a bad gardener gardened. To have gardened is to have had a garden. In other words, if you aren't gardening anymore, you no longer have a garden.
The presence of sin does a sinner make per se, but an absence of repentance does.
Romans 8:13
For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live.
A Christian man must walk his garden. He cannot call it a garden if it he cares so little for its health. He cannot expect fruit to grow where weeds are allowed to live. He cannot with confidence call himself a gardener if he with regularity ignores it.
“Let not man think he makes any progress in holiness who walks not over the bellies of his lusts.” ― John Owen, Mortification of Sin
You are not maturing in Christ if you are not mortifying your sins. You are not alive in the Spirit if you are not killing your sins. You cannot be at peace with both Christ and corruption. Enmity is inescapable. Sin is at war with God's Son, who gladly returns the favor.
Galatians 5:17-26
For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would.
If you are a Christian, you will desire to be sinless; but you won't be. Your holy discontentment will be made manifest in your daily repentance and ongoing diligence in working out what God worked in. Sanctification is continuous vivification, quickening that which pertains to the Spirit, and mortification, killing that which pertains to the flesh.
“Be killing sin or it will be killing you.” ― John Owen, The Mortification of Sin
There will be killing. There is no question. The only questions are "who?" and "what?" Will it be sin killing you or you killing sin? You cannot expect to be sinless. You cannot insist on it. To say that you are sinless is to be dead in sin. To deny today's need is to ensure tomorrow's destruction.
1 John 1:10
If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
If we insist on saints being practically sinless, we only ensure an embargo on saints. But if we insist on sinners being definitively, positionally sinless and daily, practically repentant, we confirm the Christian faith and the confession of every honest Christian.
1 John 1:9
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
The only way to win against sin is to confess it. You cannot hide it, cover it, or explain it away. The only thing you can do is confess that you can't do anything and that Christ has done it all.
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