Forgive Us Our Sins
“Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.”
Matthew 6:12
When we ponder things like death and how we live our lives, it is not long before the issue of forgiveness rises to the surface.
For Jesus’ earliest followers, to sin was to “miss the mark,” much like an archer might fail to hit the bull’s-eye. Sometimes an archer hits it dead on, but that is the exception and not the rule. We modern archers know we miss the mark most of the time. Many of our lives are peppered with the dark grains of sin. How then can forgiveness become more than a word?
From time to time, I read of someone who boldly proclaims that the concept of a need for forgiveness is outdated. The modern mantra of “live as you please” taken to the extreme means there is no right and wrong, as long as you are happy with your life. Yet, the longer we live, we find it is not hard to begin to feel what can only be described as a burden of guilt. In an interview with the BBC shortly before her death, well-known secular humanist, Marghanita Laski said, “What I envy most about you Christians is your forgiveness; I have nobody to forgive me.”[1]
John Claypool wrote, “You cannot ignore sin just because it is distasteful. Disposing of guilt by evasion is a way of dealing with it, but an utterly disastrous one; you might as well gather up the termites you find in the living room and deal with them by turning them loose in your basement!”[2] How then do we begin to wrestle with forgiveness?
Christians affirm a kind of universal forgiveness offered in the death of Jesus Christ. It is hard to understand and even embrace for several reasons. Once we have gotten past the naïve belief that when we hurt others it does not matter and there is no need for their forgiveness, then it is a human tendency to try to “pay up” for our mistakes. That is why in the Lord’s Prayer, the request “forgive us” is sometimes accompanied by the word debt. A debt is something that has to be paid, but who pays it?
Perhaps one of the real misunderstandings about Christianity is that our acceptance by God is based on balancing some kind of great ledger. If the good marks outweigh the bad, then you pass the test (bull’s eye!), but if the bad outweighs the good, the trap door opens and down you go (you miss the mark). That kind of Christianity is not based on who you are, but on what you do. And if God’s love depends on what we do, then we are no doubt already behind the curve. Yet, if it is based on who we are, then there may just be a chance — if we understand who we are. And who are we?
In the last meditation we saw where Jesus brought it all home for Nicodemus with some words well known to Christians and non-Christians alike: “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life. Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”[3] All of that love, life, non-condemnation and promise of salvation business sounds more like a God who is offering forgiveness, does it not?
So where do we take our sins? I take them to the Cross of Jesus Christ. On the Cross, Jesus was willing to absorb all the evil, sin and guilt of the world; He was willing to take them on Himself. Theologians call this “substitutionary atonement,” meaning the atonement that might be paid through any other form is transferred, and substituted by a stand-in: Jesus Christ. That is why Jesus’ first cousin, John the Baptist, called Him “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”[4]
Perhaps the place to begin understanding forgiveness is to give up some old misconceptions about it: that we somehow pay the price for our own sins, that forgiveness is unnecessary or that God is more like a celestial accountant than a heavenly parent. I will unpack this more in the Daily Words to come, but for now, let go of the Divine Accountant and let the Loving God take hold of you.
Another Step…
When you read or hear the word “guilt,” what first comes to mind? And the word “forgiveness?”
Prayer
O My Lord, since it seems you are determined to save me, I ask that you may do so quickly. And since you have decided to dwell within me, I ask that you clean your house, wiping away all grime of sin.
Teresa of Avila, d. 1582
[1] John R. W. Stott, “The Contemporary Christian: Applying God’s Word to Today’s World” (New York: InterVarsity, 1995) 48.
[2] John Claypool, “The Light Within You: Looking at Life Through New Eyes” (Waco: Word Books, 1983) 186.
[3] John 3:16-17.
[4] John 1:29.
