Forgiveness and Resurrection

I wrote an extensive post on forgiveness last night and decided that I'm not quite done with it. Being forgiven is simply the highest attainment in this life. It really is, because only by the forgiveness of our sins do we have the hope of eternal life. It's what Jesus died for, and it's what he is set at the right hand of God for until he returns from heaven to raise to life those who... you guessed it, are forgiven! You can always back up a day and read the post from last night, but tonight I would like to focus on the absolute power and newness of being forgiven. To be forgiven and to be redeemed are the exact same thing. Through faith in Christ and his monumental price he paid at Calvary for our sins, we are forgiven OF our sins, which means we are redeemed FROM our sins. The apostle Paul stated this truth very plainly: "In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins" (Col. 1:14). If we are redeemed and forgiven then we are going to inherit eternal life, so that is why being forgiven is the highest attainment known to man. 1 John 1:9 clearly tells us, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." That exhortation was written for those who are already in Christ, even as all the epistles and scriptures were. If we are forgiven and cleansed from all unrighteousness then we are right with God, and we can't do better than being right with God. We can't improve on being redeemed. If we are redeemed then we are without sin. Where a lot of folks get snagged is, if they have sinned big or sinned often after they've been born again, which is to say baptized with the holy Ghost by Jesus [see last night's post], they begin to feel unworthy to be forgiven. But Jesus and the apostles all taught explicitly about forgiveness for people who are already believers, the same as for sinners who have repented for the first time. In teaching his disciples how to pray, Jesus said, "And forgive us OUR debts [sins], as we forgive our debtors" (Mat. 6:12). John said again, "My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world" (I Jn. 2:1,2).

The new birth experience is all about our having power to live free from sin, but the cost that Jesus paid is so great that it certainly covers any and every sin that we could commit if we do fall short, even as John said. The apostle Paul instructed the saints in Galatia with this admonition: "Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted" (Gal. 6:1). Again we are talking about 'restoring' someone who has fallen short. The Gospel is all about restoration, and Jesus saw to it that we could never wear out the capacity to be restored, regardless of how greatly or how often we may fail. These exhortations and instructions to believers were given because God knew that people would fall short, but again, the all time great cost paid by Jesus at Calvary was so great that it covers absolutely any and every sin that could possibly be committed. So here is the point I want to make here: As long as we remain honest of heart about what we're doing, we will be able to confess any kind of sin that we have done. And as long as we can honestly confess any sin that we've done, then we are going to be forgiven and cleansed from all unrighteousness. It's that simple. We must forget about what we've done once we've confessed it to Jesus, and be minded of what Jesus did at Calvary, and what the scriptures tell us about this matter, as we've seen. This Gospel is about what Jesus did at Calvary, and about what he's made available to us as the result of his death and resurrection. He died for people who have sinned, meaning everyone who's ever lived. He did not die for certain sins, or certain kinds of people, or a limited number of sins. He died for ALL sins by ALL men for ALL time! Period! If we're talking about sin, and I mean any sin by anyone, any number of times; then we're talking about why Jesus hung on that cross and suffered a slow, agonizing death. This was not a 'great man' who paid that price. It was God's only begotten Son, meaning the only being in existence who came directly out of God, and because of that he is God as well. Praise God! "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God" (Jn. 1:1). That was God that died on that cross my friend, and that is why that price can never be matched by any kind or any number of sins!

Look at what the scripture says about God's promise to Abraham: "For when God made promise to Abraham, because he could swear by no greater, he sware by himself... For men verily swear by the greater: and an oath for confirmation is to them an end of all strife. Wherein God, willing more abundantly to shew unto the heirs of promise the immutability of his counsel, confirmed it by an oath: That by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we might have a strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us: Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil" (Heb. 6:13,16-19). So God swore to Abraham with an oath, but in the case of the Gospel he made an even greater commitment than an oath, having his Son die, both in the Father's place, and in ours. God himself could not become a man or die either one, but when his Son suffered that gruesome death, he suffered it with him to the maximum degree. The death of God's Son Jesus Christ at the cross of Calvary was quite simply the most powerful statement of God's love for man that could possibly be made. And he made that statement to assure us that we could be forgiven and redeemed from our sins by believing, trusting, and honoring his Son for what he did for us. Like I said in the post last night, when a sinner turns away from their sins and does exactly that, then Jesus himself baptizes them with his very life substance, which is the love and holiness of both himself and the Father. And brother when he does that we are truly cleansed! I remember when Jesus first baptized me with his Spirit. I was in my bed, and when that power from heaven basically exploded out of my being with a joy from beyond this world, I laid on my bed for about twenty minutes with the words 'clean as a whistle' planted in my brain; while softly weeping and thanking Jesus for this marvelous experience. Not only so but I learned a long time ago that if I fall short in any way, to just get it out of the way and move forward with God. I learned that because Jesus taught me that, and because I learned that powerful reality I've never allowed anything to stop me in my tracks. I learned that my Savior is far greater than anything I could possibly need to be saved from.

The apostle Paul told us in simplistic terms what the difference is between those who will be saved and those who will be lost: "Some men's sins are open beforehand, going before to judgment; and some men they follow after" (I Tim. 5:24). All we have to do is be certain that our sins go before us to judgment by confessing them to Jesus, and that they don't follow after us by keeping them to ourselves: "He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy" (Prov. 28:13). It comes back around to what John said, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." If we are cleansed from all unrighteousness then we are in as good a state as we can be in, whether it's the first time we've been cleansed, or the ten thousandth time. It's really a matter of focusing on Jesus, and not on ourselves. Jesus is not focused on any failures that we've given to him, and he's not reserving the right to hold them against us. He's focused on where he's taking us in his righteousness from there. He IS our righteousness and as long as we abide in him through honesty, humility, and faith in his righteousness we are righteous because of what he's done to make us righteous. Period. We simply must forget about any failures we've made after we've rectified them, and move forward with God, because that is what JESUS DESERVES! If we stay discouraged about something we've done wrong, then we are not letting Jesus have what he paid for, which is all our life. "What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?" (I Cor. 6:19) If we are thinking that maybe we don't deserve something from God because of some failure, then we are not thinking like Jesus. In that case we are measuring things by us instead of by what Jesus has done FOR us. So if we have sinned, regardless of how big or for how long, let's just give it to Jesus and let him make us righteous by cleansing us from all unrighteousness. Then let's let him keep what we've given him so that we can keep what he has given us, which is "newness of life" in him (Rom. 6:4). Let's not steal from Jesus what he paid for, by thinking more highly of what we've done wrong then what he has done right. Amen.