We Stand Forgiven at the Cross

The sermon in church today was on forgiveness and called Freed to Forgive. Pastor Jon Krick based it on the passage:

Matthew 18:21 – 35 21Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, "Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?" 22Jesus answered, "I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. 23"Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. 25Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt. 26"The servant fell on his knees before him. 'Be patient with me,' he begged, 'and I will pay back everything.' 27The servant's master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go. 28"But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii. He grabbed him and began to choke him. 'Pay back what you owe me!' he demanded. 29"His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, 'Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.' 30"But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31When the other servants saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed and went and told their master everything that had happened. 32"Then the master called the servant in. 'You wicked servant,' he said, 'I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?' 34In anger his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed. 35"This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart."

This passage was written for believers and teaches us we are to forgive as God forgave us. He forgave us a debt that was so big we could never have paid it off ourselves. What we owe Him from this is our obedience. We prove ourselves to be believers by our obedience. And obeying Him means we are to forgive others. Because He told us to.

The part where we are to forgive as He forgives us is really important though. He chooses to forget our sins once we’ve repented and asked for forgiveness. This means we aren’t to bring up someone’s sin against us ever again. Even to ourselves.
Mostly this is for our own good. Failing to forgive someone causes us to become bitter. It eats away at us.

It’s not easy to forgive this way, but someone once said, “We are never more like God than when we forgive.”

I talked about this in a post almost two years ago here

Click here to see all Forgiven Christian T-shirts and Gifts

God Can Change Your Life

I just did a lesson on the book God Can Change Your Life by Rick Warren. I think what’s written below is so important to understand!

Jesus Christ offers us the power we need to become what He wants us to be. And He does it by giving us the Fruits of the Spirit.

So first we have to know Christ, which is the most important thing in life, and then experience the power of His resurrection. The Bible describes resurrection power as the power to cancel our past, the power to conquer our problems and the power to change our personality.

Think about what it means to cancel our past. All of our failures, mistakes, sins and regrets. Most people have trouble letting go of the stupid or bad things they’ve done in the past. Or other people or the consequences from those mistakes won’t let them!

So as humans we have a hard time understanding how God can “forget” our sins. But, He does. If we confess them and turn from them His forgiveness wipes them out completely. We’re the ones who keep digging them up and stewing over them again. And doing that short-circuits the power God offers us so it limits our future. We spend all our time saying, “I blew it – I’ll be paying for that the rest of my life”. Well, if that’s the way we think, we will be paying for it the rest of our life!

But, it’s not God who says that. God wipes the slate clean. He allows us a fresh start – a second chance, a new beginning. In Jeremiah 31:34 God said to the Israelites that He “will remember their sins no more.” How can that be? How can the God who created the universe “forget”? Because He chooses to! He chooses to forget our wrongs, our mistakes and our failures.

When we come to Him, admit our sins and ask Him to forgive us He cancels our past. We are new people. And He does it because of Jesus, not us. When we know that, we can better understand. It’s not about us. It’s nothing we do or don’t do, deserve or don’t deserve. God said that His Son’s dying on the cross for our sins is enough. If we believe that, we’re saved.

When Jesus died He said, “It is finished” He paid the price in full for every sin we have ever committed and Romans 8:1 tells us “Therefore there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus”. We don’t need to keep crucifying ourselves over our past because Jesus was crucified for all of us. When we can get a grip on that and start living without digging up our past mistakes – God’s power will surge through our lives.

Our Vocation as people of God

Our vocation as the people of God is to proclaim the good news of Christ. To show mercy like He does and to demonstrate forgiveness in love no matter how much someone has hurt us. It’s when we show mercy and forgiveness we demonstrate our obedience to God and submission to Jesus Christ.

1st John 2: 12-14

1 John 2:12-14 “I write to you, dear children, because your sins have been forgiven on account of His name. I write to you, fathers, because you have known Him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. I write to you, dear children, because you have known the Father. I write to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God lives in you, and you have overcome the evil one.”

John has been warning his readers the perils of the dark and the necessity of walking in the light. Now he says, that in every case their best defense is to remember what they are and what has been done for them.

Since they believe: no matter who they are, their sins have been forgiven. No matter who they are, they know Him who is from the beginning. No matter who they are, they have the strength, which can face and overcome the evil one.

The man who is a forgiven man, the man who knows God, the man who remembers that he can draw on a strength beyond his own strength has a great defense against any temptation by simply remembering who he is and what Christ did for him.

There are three gifts from God mentioned here: the first is forgiveness. In verse 12 some Bible translations say, “I write to you, dear children, because your sins have been forgiven on account of His name.”

Remember in Bible times the name described the nature of a person. And the names often were changed in the Bible: Simon became Peter, Jacob became Israel. So John is assuring his readers of forgiveness because we know the nature and character of Jesus. We know Jesus is the image of God and what we see in Jesus we know must be the same in God.

We see Jesus’ sacrificial love and patient mercy so we can be sure we are forgiven.

The second gift is increasing knowledge of God. And knowing isn’t just intellectual. It’s personal; as a friend. In Genesis “to know” is the most intimate of all relationships.

The third gift is victorious strength. Jesus doesn’t speak in general about conquering evil. He speaks about conquering the evil one. He sees evil as a personal power, which seeks to defeat us and to seduce us and to seduce us away from God. A commentator wrote that we all know there are some people in whose presence it is easy to be bad and some people in whose presence it is necessary to be good. When we walk with Christ, always remembering Him, always conscious of His presence with us, we are walking with the one in whose company we can defeat the assaults of the evil one.

Some thoughts to reflect on

If life is running smoothly at present be prepared for trials and tests to come. Faith is not true faith until it has been tested and proved in times of trial. Pray before trouble comes so we are ready to go to God for help.

God sends upon us sufferings and sorrows to wean us from the world and draw us nearer to Him and heaven.

Can I forgive? Can I put a spouse’s interests above my own? Can I grin and bear certain things? Fight my way through depressing events without losing hope or becoming bitter? Face old age with bravery and even cheerfulness?

With God’s help, yes.

We are to have a relationship with God and Jesus…"Tragically many people will miss heaven by 18 inches” (the distance between head and heart knowledge.)

God promises to forgive

1. Jeremiah 31:34
“No longer will a man teach his neighbor, or a man his brother, saying, “Know the Lord” because they will know me, from the least of them to the greatest.” Declares the Lord. For I will forgive their wickedness and remember their sins no more.”

2. Isaiah 1:18
“Come now, let us reason together,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.”

3. Psalms 103:12
“As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”

4. Ephesians 1:7
“In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace.”

Confessing Our Sins

John 13:10 Jesus’ dying for us already gave us a bath, but we need to have our feet cleansed daily – by daily confession and repentance of the sins we still commit.

If you are honest and thorough in confessing your sins, then you are ready for God’s full cleansing power. Sins that are admitted and forsaken are fully cleansed. It is important to trust in God’s promise of forgiveness, not your feelings. (1 John 1:9) Some sins will require a process of frequent confession and claiming Christ’s fullness – don’t be discouraged and never give up. Don’t ever say you can’t change when God says you can! (Phil.4:19)