The greatest torture in this life, and even in hell, is the burden of sin and guilt. The greatest joy in this life and the next is the forgiveness of sin. That is why the Word of God says, “Blessed is the one whose sins are forgiven.”
There was a letter sent to a pastor from a man in prison. He had come to the Lord and after some years, he had become a pastor in the jail for a few people. In the letter he writes:
“I am listening to your sermon tapes. Thank you; they are very useful for me. God saved me seven years ago. At that time, I was in a dirty and dark criminal jail waiting for a chance to commit suicide. My childhood was normal. My dad was killed in an auto accident when I was 12. My mom was pregnant when my father died, and she was left with me, my brother Tony, and my sister who was born later. We were poor and living in a small town where not too many people knew us. I went to school, and after graduation, I married the girl I loved. We both had good jobs, and a couple of years later, I became a police officer at the age of 21. By that time, God had given us two children, and we were prospering materially. We worked very hard. I had plenty of money now. My wife was making good money as a secretary. We had our own home, enough in our bank account, and I had a great name in the neighborhood and at work.
With all of these material benefits and carnal pleasures, as well as the satisfaction of being recognized among my friends in the community, I was empty and depressed. Bored with life, there was a deep emptiness. I was always looking for a new adventure, and nothing ever really satisfied me permanently. I had been born and raised a Catholic, but I never heard that being born again was necessary; I was just sprinkled as a baby. As I grew up, I hated the dry and dead church scene, so I stopped going. To satisfy my inner hunger and have some adventure, I started with obscene movies, which nowadays are always pulling everyone in, promising to give them what they want. I never thought that my good life and family would slowly lead me to adultery. It was terrible. I loved my wife and never thought I would do this. God’s judgment did not come upon me suddenly, though I had plenty of warning. I thought I was a big shot. Nothing or no one could touch me, and God was the furthest thing from my mind.
I felt bad about myself and ashamed that I had done this. Feeling defiled, very depressed, and guilty, I had sunk to this state. To forget, I began to use alcohol and drugs. I used pills and acid. I never shot any drugs because I was afraid of needles, but I had eaten, snorted, drunk, and smoked everything but the hard stuff because I had seen what that did to others. Drugs and adultery spoiled my life. Needless to say, my family life, as well as my job, began to suffer and deteriorate as soon as I began fooling with drugs. I couldn’t do normal work like others; I couldn’t concentrate. My family life was not right. I couldn’t play with my children or love my wife. I started hitting my wife and fighting. And like I said, it didn’t happen right away, but the Word of God says that if nothing else, we can be sure of one thing, and that is that our sins will find us out.”
“It took a period of about 10 years, but from the moment I began stepping out on my wife until the period when I did three things I never thought I could do, my sins were catching up with me and would eventually take their natural course: destruction. Even though I loved my wife so much. The first thing I never thought I would do was leave my wife and children. I took off for another city with a young girl and abandoned my family. Life became terrible. The drugs, my wounded conscience, and the sin made me paranoid, and I was always staying high. I became like a crazy person. I had never hurt or fought with anyone, even as a police officer; I had a very soft character. I would sometimes go on duty with an empty revolver because I could never see myself hurting anyone physically. I was just not a violent person. Yet, I started hitting people, fighting with everyone around me, becoming like a beast. And finally, I wound up murdering another person.”
“Life was going down and down with no stopping. The alcohol had completely ruined my mind. Finally, the only way out for me was to die. I wanted to die. I couldn’t live with myself. For three horror-filled days, I tried various ways to end my life in a motel room, but God didn’t allow it. I tried taking an overdose only to awaken 17 hours later after having vomited the poison. By all rights, I should have drowned in my own vomit, as is usually the case with overdoses of alcohol and barbiturates. When I awoke, I tried to electrocute myself in a bathtub. But I was too far gone. I was a man possessed. The devil was repeatedly telling me to go die, to jump, to fall before a car. I slashed myself up with a blade until I passed out from the loss of blood, only to awake to a third day of madness and horror. Oh, what a horrible life. God had been trying to reach me for a long time. My mom had become a Christian a few months before. Other people had tried to tell me about Jesus, but I wouldn’t hear them. I finally turned myself in to the authorities and confessed to a crime they weren’t even aware of. When I was taken to the jail, I was kept under observation for a few days because they knew I was suicidal, and brother, I had every intention of killing myself. I even took a spoon and was awaiting the right moment to sharpen it and stick it in my throat. And then a letter came from my mother.”
“‘Ray,’ it said, ‘Jesus is real. He loves you, and He wants to be your friend. He can make a way where there is no way. Do it for your family, Ray. Come to Jesus.’ Well, I believed that Jesus was real in her life and that He was her friend, but that He loved me? Never. I didn’t even like myself. How could Jesus love me? What way could he make? I had tried every possible way. What could I do for my family? I had abandoned and scattered them. The best thing I could do was go and kill myself and get out of everyone’s life. But God used that letter to stay my self-destructive hand, and people came and told me more about the love of God toward sinners, and even murderers like me. They told me about the good news of Jesus Christ and that he could give me a new life. ‘You must be born again,’ they told me, and they said, ‘if any person is in Christ, all things are passed away.’ I needed to have that old life put away. I needed a new life. Finally, out of desperation, with no other way out, I went down on my knees in my cell. I was contemplating suicide and really being pressed by the devil. I had been granted a phone call home. I confided in my mom and told her the devil was there telling me to kill myself. She handed the phone to another new Christian who was there with her, and instead of being gentle with me like I expected, he said, ‘Ray, you must repent before God. You must ask Him to give you a new life and forgive you.'”
“Well, that kind of shook me because I expected him to baby me. I realized that even though I had been sorry for the things I had done, I had not asked God to forgive me. I had the sorrow of the world that brings death, but godly sorrow works repentance unto salvation. So, on my knees, I cried to God and I asked Him to forgive me and to take away the burden of guilt which was driving me mad. I asked Him to forgive my sins. I asked Him to give me a new life. I told Him I didn’t even know if He was out there or not, but if He heard me, please, please forgive me and help me live a new life through Him. Well, for the first time in my life, I knew God heard me and that I had been forgiven. I knew He had forgiven me because the burden I’d been carrying, the burden of guilt and shame, was lifted off me. The great burden I was feeling all my life was gone. I felt a peace I had never experienced before. I sensed a freedom I had never known on the other side of those walls. I felt something that I had been searching for all my life in money, adultery, and drugs and in everything, but it is found in the forgiveness that Jesus gives. I could live with myself because I knew that my conscience was clean. I had been forgiven, and my conscience was purged. I knew what truth and reality were.
I had to face trial. I had done many things for which I had been ashamed, and there were consequences. People would not forgive nor forget, but I knew that my God had, and that for once in my life, I could be at peace with Him and with myself. From then on, I would serve Him, and all those who would be of a like mind would understand that I had been forgiven, that I was a new man. The old Ray was dead. The Bible came alive to me. I became a fanatic. And the guys warned me not to read the Bible too much or I’d go crazy. Man, I was crazy before. The Bible is the only thing that helps me to know the truth. Now I can understand God’s spiritual word, and it’s no longer the giant crossword puzzle that it once was to me. I had been born again, and now I could see the kingdom of God. I have been sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. This means I must serve a minimum of 15 years before I am even considered for parole, and then they don’t have to let me go.”
“But brother, the freedom Jesus Christ has given me I will not give up for anything in the world. What the world calls freedom outside is a terrible, terrible prison. I surely would love to be home with my family someday, but Jesus has given me something in this prison which many on the outside neither know nor have. My family had been scattered through those years. For two years, I cried out to the Lord and claimed the promise that my wife and children would come to Christ, for although I had not heard from my wife in all that time, I continued trusting Him and serving Him. He gave me a ministry. For three years, I read nothing but the Bible—no books, no commentaries, no newspapers, no magazines, just the Bible day and night, and His word became real to me. And finally, God reached out and saved my wife, and she came to see me. Later, she brought my first daughter, and I had the pleasure of leading my own daughter to the Lord, and my nine-year-old, Christine, received the Lord too. Brother, what can I say? Forgive my lengthiness, but there’s so much more that I could say. God has given me a ministry teaching and preaching His word. I want to serve Him to the fullest until I die. What joy and freedom are in the forgiveness of sin! I’ve seen many broken and desperate men come to know our Lord and be transformed. Praise God. Your brother in Christ, Ray.”
What a testimony. The greatest torture in this life, and even in hell, is the burden of sin and guilt. The greatest joy for a fallen person in this life and the next is the forgiveness of sin. Last week, we saw the physical need of people. Just think for a moment: if a person has food, clothes, and a house, they should be happy and fulfilled. But why are there so many mental tortures, no peace, emptiness, hopelessness, depression, and a tremendous burden in life, no matter where they go or what they do? Why is there no joy or peace? What is the cause of depression for so many educated, rich, and famous people? Why is it that when you have eaten your fill and have everything you desire—money, fame, and wealth—there is no peace, joy, and rest? The richest man, famous and successful, at the top of the country, was asked, “What do you now know that you wish you had known when you were a young man?” He said, “I wish somebody had told me then that when you get to the top, there is nothing there.” Some of the great actors and Olympic champions claim their greatest struggle in life is the battle with suicide. There is no meaning in life. People who achieve everything in life feel empty, lonely, and fearful. They are not happy with themselves, and this also affects their relationships with others. Why do people get upset with others? Husbands yell at wives, wives lash out, and children are like animals. Why are relationships with others not good? Why are people always irritable, bitter, and lashing out at others? Why are all these people in the world in terrible conflict inside? What is the problem?
What is the problem with people that causes so much internal war? It is the same problem Adam had. A person is not just a body. If you give them all their physical needs and a full stomach, they will be temporarily okay, but they will never be permanently satisfied and fulfilled. They have a soul. That soul is suffering from a tremendous weight of the guilt of sin. Their conscience is blood-scattered and wounded. That is the primary cause of all a person’s internal miseries.
Sin has a two-fold effect. It damns people forever, which is its future effect. Its present effect is that it robs people of the fullness of life by bringing a continuous, merciless, and relentless guilt to their conscience. So, sin brings immediate consequences: guilt, a loss of meaningfulness, and a loss of peace, joy, and life. From the beginning, this has been the problem. Immediately after Adam sinned, he became fearful, filled with shame and guilt. He felt lonely. You see how he acted. He covered himself with fig leaves like a fool. He, who once sang a song when he saw his wife, was now irritated and angry with his wife whom he had loved. He blamed his wife, God, and his surroundings. He had no peace with himself or with others. A guilty conscience with unforgiven sin will never leave a person in peace. It will always trouble them, like a scorpion inside their pants. Every child of Adam in this world is living with that tremendous burden. Guilt affects our balance in life; we cannot have inner peace, we are fearful, empty, lonely, and bored. It deeply affects our physical bodies. As David said, his “vitality was turned into the drought of summer.” His body and bones dried up. Many health problems are caused by guilt. John R. W. Stott, the head of a large British hospital, said, “I could dismiss half of my patients tomorrow if we can remove their guilt and they are assured of forgiveness.” Why do 70% of people not get sleep at night? Sleep from a good conscience is such a sweet thing. A mind at rest. What a terrible torture not to be able to sleep! A scorpion pricking the mind does not allow you to rest because you bear a heavy guilt that nobody knows about. You live a terrible life. The cause of all mental troubles is guilt. Many psychologists realize that this is the cause of all people’s mental diseases and weaknesses. Sadly, many Christians today lead miserable lives because guilt has a hold on them, and they do not know the need for daily confession and forgiveness. It is so important to realize this need for us.
Guilt is not at the same level; the scorpion pain will grow and grow. That guilt grows and grows to the level that it often leads to many other sins. People go deeper and deeper into sin. Cain’s guilt led to depression and finally murder. David’s guilt caused him to murder Uriah. Judas, with a terrible burden of guilt, was remorseful after Jesus was condemned, but his guilt caused him to take his own life so terribly that all his insides came out. It will not leave a person until it kills them and pushes them into hell.
Oh, how can I explain more the horror and the terribleness of the burden of sin and guilt, and the great blessing of the forgiveness of sin? We have to realize the great scorpion tortures in our minds because of unforgiven sin and realize what guilt and condemnation in our own conscience does to us. It is the cause of all mental troubles and lack of peace. A clear conscience is a sample of heavenly peace on earth. If guilt is the greatest problem of our life, then forgiveness is a person’s deepest need now and in the future, for health and for heaven. Thus, it is the first petition related to a person’s soul here in this prayer, after talking to us about daily bread, which is physical needs. We saw that it is not just for people in famine or for poor people. It is for us who are fattened by God’s providence, who forget that it is God who gives every meal to us and never thank him for every meal. What an ungrateful thing not to thank God for your food. It is so important to realize that every bread comes from his hand and to pray that prayer. I will never pass a day without praying “Give us our daily bread.” It really fills my heart with gratitude, my eyes with tears, and my mouth with praise. What a prayer! How much we are indebted to God! As I think about this, I am melting, filled with so much gratitude to God. Every second of energy I have is because of the food you gave me, and how ungrateful it is not to honor your name. How many meals have I eaten? In 40 years, more than 50,000 times I have eaten food. Each time, I have not honored him as is due to him. I have not hallowed him by thinking highly of him with gratitude and esteem. What an ungrateful debt! This melts me to tears every time I see food. I am melting in that.
Next comes this. This will not only melt us, but it will make us pour out like water. The forgiveness of sin, and the absence of it, makes for a terrible life. Oh, what ungrateful beings we are! If we have to thank him with tears for every meal, which comes from his creative hand, when he uses thousands of things in providence to bring every meal, and he has done it for 30 or 40 years, what about the sins that we have committed and the forgiveness for all those innumerable sins? “Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget none of his benefits. He forgives all your sins, heals all diseases, and satisfies your mouth with good things.” The forgiveness of sins is a great blessing. Do you realize it? Do we have a sense of it? I am pouring myself before God. “Lord, I am filled with a sea of debt. How much can I thank you? The rest of my life, I will continuously praise you, and it will not be adequate. I am indebted to you.” And very aptly, the Holy Spirit uses the word “debt.” Oh, what a debt it is. Oh, how much debt we owe and have no sense of it. What big debtors we are.
Surely, if you think about it, you will agree with me that the most essential, the most blessed, and the most difficult thing that God ever did was provide for the forgiveness of sin. It is most essential because it not only delivers us from a terrible burden of guilt and gives us joy in this life, but it also keeps us from eternal hell. It is most blessed because it introduces us into a fellowship with God that goes on forever. And it is most difficult because for bread, he created everything and gives out of his mercy, but to forgive my one sin, it cost the Son of God his life on a cross. But the most essential, the most blessed, and the most difficult thing is the forgiveness of sin. It is the greatest need of the human heart.
If we should thank him with tears for bread that comes from his creative hand, how much more should we thank God for forgiveness? He had to make so much sacrifice for this. It was not easy for a holy God, for God is a holy God with eyes too pure to behold evil, and he cannot look upon iniquity. “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God,” said Isaiah. And there is no way that an absolutely holy God can possibly easily forgive one sin. Oh, what ungrateful hearts we have.
Let us look at the second petition. We will just see the introduction today.
“And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.”
God made us to need bread, but we have made ourselves to need pardon. “Give” and “forgive” refer to our deepest wants. However, many people who feel the great need for bread are completely unconscious of the other: the great need for forgiveness. That is the problem.
The prayer says, “And forgive us our debts.” Verse 15 uses the words “trespass” and “trespasses.” Both of these words describe sin. Sin is the problem of every person. Only when we know how big sin is, will we know how great the forgiveness of sin is. Sin is the culprit in every broken marriage, every disrupted home, every shattered friendship, every argument, every pain, every sorrow, every anguish, and every death.
Tragically, from the viewpoint of human resources, absolutely nothing can be done about sin. It’s an incurable disease. You can cry all your life, shedding a sea of tears, and punish yourself as much as you want, but it won’t change anything. As Jeremiah said, “Can the Ethiopian change his skin? Can the leopard change his spots?” Sin brings people under the control of Satan. Sin brings people under divine wrath, so they become children of wrath. Sin makes a person’s life utterly miserable. Isaiah 54:21 says, “There is no peace to the wicked.” Sin makes our lives meaningless and empty. Romans 8:20 says, “The creature is subject to emptiness,” through disease and death. Sin takes us to hell. The wages of sin is death.
So, every person has a deep, deep problem. Sin is the problem! It’s a deeper problem than our need for bread or anything else. And so, our Lord says, when you pray, you must relate your petition to your sinfulness. It must be brought before God, for it is your deepest need. It must be dealt with. So, as we pray, there must be this element of a recognition of our sinfulness. That’s what He’s saying.
Why is Sin Called a Debt?
The word used for debt here is “opheilēma”. It is a very interesting word.
1. Cultural Meaning: The Rabbis and Jews of Matthew’s day most commonly used the Aramaic word “koba” for sin. “Koba” means a debt because, to a Jew, the primary responsibility in life was to obey God. When you disobeyed God, you owed Him a debt for your disobedience. When you read the Lord’s Prayer in Luke 11:4, it says, “Forgive us our trespasses or our sins,” because Luke speaks in a more classical manner. But Matthew, with his Jewish orientation, focuses on the concept of debt because he knows his Jewish audience will understand that. We owe a debt. Sin, then, is a debt to God.
2. Sin Accurately Resembles a Debt:
- Non-payment: A debt arises from the non-payment of money, or not paying what is due. We owe God exact obedience because He is our Creator and provider. He created us not to live as we want, but for His glory and obedience. By not paying what is due, we have sinned, and we are in debt.
- Consequence: In case of non-payment, the debtor goes to prison. Similarly, by our sin, we become guilty and are exposed to God’s curse of damnation. Though He grants a sinner a reprieve for a time, that person remains bound for eternal death if the debt is not forgiven.
When you sin, you owe God a consequence for your sin. You have violated His holiness, and you owe Him for that. It’s like when you tell your kids, “If you do that, you’ll get one smack. If you do it again, you’ll get two smacks.” They keep doing it, stacking up a few smacks, and now they have a debt to be paid.
In a sense, that’s what God is saying—that sin becomes a debt. When you violate God’s holiness, a record of your debt is kept. At the end of time, Revelation tells us that at the great White Throne Judgment, God will judge the ungodly from the books. What books? The books that record the unpaid debt they owe. They are sentenced to an eternal hell to pay that debt. Any person who honestly faces the reality of their character cannot be anything but conscious of their debt to God and their need to be forgiven. Being in debt is terrible. You may have experienced many debts, but sin is the worst debt.
Why is Sin the Worst Debt?
- We have nothing to pay. If we could pay the debt, what need would there be to pray, “forgive us”? We can pay neither the principal nor the interest. Adam made us all bankrupt. Before the fall, Adam had a stock of original righteousness to begin with; he could give God personal and perfect obedience. But by his sin, he was completely broken and left all his posterity beggared. We have nothing to pay; all our duties are mixed with sin, and so we cannot pay God in current, acceptable currency or coin.
- It is against an infinite majesty. Sin is the worst debt because it is not against another person, bank, or even a government, but it is against an infinite majesty. An offense against the person of a king is the crime of high treason, which enhances and aggravates the crime. But sin against God is an even greater crime. Sin affects God, and so it is an infinite offense.
- It is a multiplied debt. Sin is the worst debt because it is not a single debt but a multiplied one. “Forgive us ‘our debts'”; we have debt upon debt, interest upon interest. The due date is over, and it has become compound interest—interest on interest, which is horrible. “Innumerable evils have encompassed me about” (Psalm 40:12). The more we live every day, the more we sin against our Creator and provider and add to the debt book of our life. We may as well reckon all the drops in the sea as reckon all our spiritual debts; we cannot tell how much we owe. A person may know their other debts, but they cannot number their spiritual debts. Every vain thought is a sin. “The thought of foolishness is sin” (Proverbs 24:9). And what swarms of vain thoughts we have! The first rising of corruption, though it never blossoms into an outward act, is a sin. Who can understand their errors? We do not know how much we owe God. Even if we gave Him everything we have our whole lives, sacrificed our wealth, our jobs, and worked like animals day and night, we could never clear the debt.
- It is an inexcusable debt.
- No denying it: We cannot deny the debt of sin. If we say we have no sin, God can prove the debt. “I will set [your sins] in order before your eyes” (Psalm 50:21). God writes down our debts in His book of remembrance, and His book and the book of conscience agree exactly, so the debt cannot be denied.
- No shifting it off: Other debts can be shifted off. We can get friends to pay them, but neither man nor angel can pay this debt for us. Even if all the men and angels in heaven were to make a purse, they could not pay one of our debts. Other debts, if the debtor dies, cannot be recovered; death frees them from debt. But if we die in debt to God, He knows how to recover it. God will not lose His debt. In other debts, people may flee from their creditor, leave their country, and go to foreign parts, and the creditor cannot find them. But we cannot flee from God. He knows where to find all His debtors.
- It carries a person to a fiery prison. Sin is the worst debt because it carries people, in case of non-payment, to a worse prison than any on earth—even to a fiery prison. The sinner is laid in worse chains, chains of darkness, where he is bound under wrath forever.
We are the worst debtors.
- We don’t want to be called to account. A bad debtor does not like to be called to account. A day is coming when God will call His debtors to account. “So then, every one shall give an account of himself to God” (Romans 14:12). We have no sense of being so indebted. We should live for God, pleading every day for Him to forgive us and serving Him day and night. But we play away the time and do not like to hear of the day of judgment; we do not like when ministers remind us of our debts or speak of the day of reckoning. What a confounding word that will be to a self-secure sinner: “Give an account of your stewardship”—for every minute of your life, every amount of money spent, every bit of health, every opportunity, and every time you heard the truth, how you obeyed.
- We are unwilling to confess our debt. A bad debtor is unwilling to confess his debt; he will put it off or make it seem less. Similarly, we are more willing to excuse sin than confess it.
- We hate our creditor. A bad debtor is apt to hate his creditor. Debtors wish their creditors dead. So, wicked people naturally hate God because they think He is a just judge and will call them to account.
Forgiveness
We often ask for forgiveness; do we have any definite notion of what we are asking for? If sin is our greatest curse, forgiveness is the greatest blessing. What a marvelous reality! But do you really understand what forgiveness is? What does verse 12 say? “Forgive us our debts,” forgive us. And you notice again the collective nature of the prayer, the “us” rather than the “me,” encompassing all other believers. There’s a sense of community here. We’re all in the same boat.
What is forgiveness of sin? It is God passing by sin, wiping off the debt, and giving us a discharge. Micah 7:18. Basically, forgiveness is God passing by our sin. It is God wiping our sin off the record. It is God setting us free from punishment and guilt. He passes by our sins.
The nature of forgiveness will appear more clearly by opening some Scripture phrases:
- To forgive sin is to take away iniquity. “Why do you not take away my iniquity?” (Job 7:21). The Hebrew word means to lift off. It is a metaphor taken from a person who carries a heavy burden that is ready to sink him, and another person comes and lifts it off. So, when the heavy burden of sin is on us, God, in pardoning, lifts it off from our conscience.
- To forgive sin is to cover it. “You have covered all their sin” (Psalm 85:2). This was symbolized by the mercy seat covering the ark, to show God’s covering of sin through Christ.
- To forgive sin is to blot it out. “I am He that blots out your transgressions” (Isaiah 43:25). The Hebrew word to blot out alludes to a creditor who, when his debtor has paid him, blots out the debt and gives him an acquittance. So, when God forgives sin, He blots out the debt. He draws the red lines of Christ’s blood over it and thus crosses the debt book. The same verse means that God forgets our sins. Once He forgives, He never remembers that we sinned.
- To forgive sin is to scatter our sins like a cloud. “I have blotted out as a thick cloud your transgressions” (Isaiah 44:22). Sin is the cloud, an intervening cloud, which God disperses so that the light of His countenance may break forth.
- To forgive sin is for God to cast our sins into the depths of the sea. This implies burying them out of sight so that they shall not rise up in judgment against us. “You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea” (Micah 7:19). God will throw them in, not like a cork that rises again, but like lead that sinks to the bottom.
To sum it up in four simple statements, forgiveness is:
- Taking the burden of our sin from our conscience and freeing us.
- Covering our sin.
- Blotting out our sin and forgetting it.
- Burying our sin so it never rises again.
God literally eliminates our sin. Do you understand this? If you ever get to a place in your Christian life where this becomes commonplace stuff and you have lost that inestimable joy of understanding forgiveness, then you’ve hit a dry place in your life. We should be so thankful for such forgiveness. And, listen, it’s only possible because of Christ. God couldn’t just pass by your sin unless He placed the punishment for it on someone else, and that is exactly why Christ Jesus died.
God is a holy God, and He sees sinful people and a sinful society, but God is also a merciful, loving, and forgiving God, so forgiveness is offered to sinful people. Although they are guilty and stand in judgment, God is a forgiving God. All throughout the prophets and the apostles of the Scriptures, there is this unceasing promise that God is a God of forgiveness. He wants to forgive us our sins.
How can a holy God do this? He can’t just do that. He has to take the penalty for our sins and bring it to its fullness. Why? Because a just, righteous, and holy God cannot forgive sin unless sin’s penalty is paid. Who paid the penalty? Christ. So Christ took our place. God as a judge sees us as guilty under judgment and condemnation, and says, “There’s got to be punishment.” But when we believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, the same judge says, “On the basis of Christ’s death, He bore your punishment; He took your guilt; He paid for your sin; the debt is paid. I declare you to be forgiven. Fully, completely, perfectly, and eternally forgiven.” The Bible says He will remember our sin no more. He will pass by our iniquities. He will bury them in the depths of the sea. He lifted it from our conscience. He will remove them as far as the east is from the west. This is called positional forgiveness. In this, all your sins—past, present, future, committed, being committed, and uncommitted—are totally, completely, and forever forgiven, and you are justified from all things forever. God never sees you as a sinner. You are righteous before a holy judge. No one can condemn you. What mercy!
You say, “Wow! When does that happen?” It happens the moment you invite Jesus Christ into your life, the moment you are redeemed. The moment you place your faith in Christ, your sin is put on Him. His righteousness is put on you, and God judicially declares you to be justified. That’s Romans 3. Declared righteous. Positionally and forever, all sin is covered, passed over, blotted out, and forgotten. Oh, what a thought! Isn’t that great?
And He just keeps on doing it. This is because of Christ, beloved. This is what He did on the cross! In Matthew 26:28, when He beheld the cup, He said, “This is My blood of the New Testament, which is for the forgiveness of sins.” In Ephesians 1:7, Paul said, “In Christ we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.” In other words, because Christ took all our sins and paid the penalty, when we believe in Christ and accept His sacrifice, God appropriates it on our behalf. Judicially, we are declared righteous and just forever and forgiven for sins past, present, and future.
This is good news. Praise God forever. I want to finish with two questions.
- How many of you have experienced this forgiveness in your life? This is the greatest experience in your life. Don’t live one day without it. If you have not truly experienced it, go after God, even if it takes months or years. Plead with God to give you forgiveness. He forgives in a second, freely, when you believe in Christ.
- Christians, how grateful we should be for the forgiveness of Christ! Shouldn’t we live as slaves to God? What else do we need? He has met our greatest need. “Blessed is the man whose sins are forgiven.” How ungrateful it is to forget this and not think of it daily and praise God eternally.
Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore 