The Good News of God's Forgiveness

(Note: this piece was originally written and published as a devotional column in my town's local newspaper)

I recently had a conversation with someone who was vexed with a common question: “Can God forgive what I’ve done?” We’re all familiar with the feelings of guilt, confusion, and regret that often accompany a question like that. Even if we’re not really aware of what it is that God asks of our behavior, we can readily understand what it feels like to fall short of society’s expectations of us, or our family’s expectations, or—perhaps most commonly of all—our own expectations of ourselves. And if we are falling short of our own goals for how we ought to behave, then how must our behavior compare to God’s standards?

The Bible is very clear about these questions: its answers are bluntly honest, but, at the same time, wildly and surprisingly joyful. On the one hand, our sense of guilt tends to be accurate. While there is a sense in which guilt can be an unhealthy emotion, it is sometimes also a very honest emotion. We feel guilty because we have something to feel guilty about. There’s a problem with our behavior. We know it, and God certainly knows it. The Bible declares that “All have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). We fall below the standards that God has set for human behavior; standards that are in place not to limit us or keep us from having fun, but rather to ensure that we can grow in faith, love, goodness, and, ultimately, joy. And the sad fact is that we all fall short of that. I, and all Christians, and everybody else in the world, are all in the same boat in that regard: I have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and I desperately need his grace as much as anyone else. But even though we’re all together in that, it still leaves us with the hard truth that we have indeed fallen short, and nothing we can do on our own can set it right.

Thankfully, our failures and shortcomings are not the end of the story. If that were all there was to it, then the message of God would be “bad news” of a particularly cruel sort. But the Gospel of Jesus Christ is good news! (In fact, that’s what the word “gospel” literally means). The Bible teaches that God, out of an infinite abundance of love for us, made a way to do what we could not do on our own. He sent his own Son Jesus Christ to take all of our failings upon himself. By dying on the cross, he accepted the cost of our sins—being cut off from God, the source of all life—so that we could go free. In him we have forgiveness of all of our sins, even the ones that we imagine God might never be able to forgive. The truth is, he can and will forgive all your sins—all, without exception—if you come in faith to Jesus and accept his offer of salvation. There’s nothing you have to do to earn this gift; it is freely given, simply because God loves you more than you can possibly imagine. If you set your trust in God’s gift of grace through Jesus’ death and resurrection, you will be forgiven. And if that’s not enough, it gets even better: not only do you get a clean slate; you also get to experience the love of God as you enter relationship with him, your Creator and Lord; and he will empower you with grace to learn how to live beyond your sins. But the bottom line is this: Can God forgive me for what I’ve done? Oh, yes, he can, and will, and wants to. Simply come to him. As an old hymn-writer once put it in describing the measure of God’s forgiveness:

Your goodness and your truth to me, to every soul, abound: 

A vast, unfathomable sea, where all our sins are drowned. 

Its streams the whole creation reach, so plenteous is the store; 

Enough for all, enough for each, enough forevermore!

The Evangeliad (12:40-41)

(Click here for an introduction and previous installments of the Evangeliad)

Section 12:40-41 (corresponding to Matthew 9:35-36)

Christ walked up and down all Galilee’s roads,

And in every city and town he would go,

He taught in their synagogues, and he proclaimed

The Kingdom’s good news, declared in his name.

Not only was he a teacher of truth,

He amazed the crowds by what he would do:

Offering healing, abundant and free,

From every sickness and every disease.

Multitudes followed after the Lord,

Drawn by the power and grace of his words.

When Christ saw these multitudes gathered, he was

Moved with compassion and fullness of love.

Like shepherdless sheep, they wandered alone:

No one to guard them, no way to find home.

But now the Shepherd had stepped on the scene,

And was calling his flock to safety and peace.

Photo of the Week

Lord, even as Thou all-present art,

O may we still with heedful heart

Thy presence know and find!

- from "A Hymn" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Quote of the Week

Why, therefore, should we do ourselves this wrong,
Or others, that we are not always strong,
That we are ever overborne with care,
That we should ever weak or heartless be,
Anxious or troubled, when with us is prayer,
And joy and strength and courage are with Thee!

- Richard Trench, from his poem "Prayer"

Saturday Synaxis

My Jesus, from all eternity you were pleased to give yourself to us in love. And you planted within us a deep spiritual desire that can only be satisfied by yourself. Indeed, we can only be satisfied by settling our hearts, imperfect as they are, on you. We are made to love you. And my Jesus, how good it is to love you! Let me be like your disciples on Mount Tabor, seeing nothing else but you. I love you, Lord, and the only grace I ask is to love you eternally.

- from the prayers of Jean-Baptiste Marie Vianney, 19th century

Hymn of the Week: We Lift Our Thanks and Praise

My new hymn for this week, as we enter into the Thanksgiving season here in the US, is a song of thanks for all the blessings that are ours in Christ. The tune comes from a 19th-century hymn called "The Great Physician." 

We Lift Our Thanks and Praise

We lift our thanks and praise today
Unto the name of Jesus,
For grace that will not cease to save
And for the love that frees us.

     (Chorus):
     With every breath we breathe this day,
     With every step along the way,
     May each word that we will say
     Render praise to Jesus!

We lift our thanks and praise today
Unto the name of Jesus,
Who teaches us to walk in faith
And heals our diseases.

     (Chorus)

We lift our thanks and praise today
Unto the name of Jesus,
For all the good things God has made
To bless and charm and please us.

     (Chorus)

We lift our thanks and praise today
Unto the name of Jesus,
For in his providential ways
Our Lord supplies and feeds us.

     (Chorus)

We lift our thanks and praise today
Unto the name of Jesus,
For whether on the hill or vale,
Our Shepherd will be near us.

     (Chorus)

Stealing Muffins

(Note: this piece was originally written and published as a devotional column in my town's local newspaper)

When one of my sons was in preschool, they had a day in which a local police officer came in to talk with the class about his job and answer any questions the youngsters might have. (I wasn’t in the class with them, but was later told this story by the teacher.) My son already knew from books what policemen were and what kind of work they did. He listened attentively to the officer as he spoke, but didn’t ask any questions until after the other children had dispersed. Then, before the officer headed out the door, my son sidled up to him and made a confession. “Sometimes,” he said, “my brother and I sneak into the kitchen and steal muffins!” I’m not sure what motivated him to confess this, nor what he expected the officer to do about it—in any case, there were no arrests made over the stolen muffins, so the story has a happy ending.

It strikes me that my little son’s freely-offered confession was probably driven by a need that all of us carry inside: the need to be heard and known, even in our flaws and imperfections. Sometimes our failings, mistakes, and sins place an awful burden our hearts. We feel like we can’t show these things to anyone else, because we’ll get a response of disappointment, shock, or even hatred. We worry that no one will like us if they really knew the shadows that linger in our hearts. But there’s something you should know: we were never meant to carry that burden alone. The grief and guilt of sinfulness is simply not something you can hold onto and expect it to keep out of sight; it will end up poisoning the well of your emotional and spiritual life every day of your journey.

In our church, we’re currently going through a study in the biblical book of Acts in our morning services. There’s one story that pops up frequently: the telling and re-telling of the conversion of the Apostle Paul, from a hate-filled terrorist intent on destroying the church to a devoted follower of Christ. In one of the re-tellings, Jesus says something intriguing to Paul: he says, “It’s hard for you to kick against the goads.” (That’s an old Greek idiom that refers to the difficulty of struggling against divine power.) As I was studying this story, it struck me that Jesus was expressing pity, even sympathy with Paul, even in the midst of his darkest sins. “It’s hard for you.” One can almost imagine him saying next the words he used in the Gospel: “So come to me, you who are weary and heavy-burdened, and I will give you rest.”

Sometimes we think that going to church and following God’s ways are hard, burdensome, and difficult. Maybe that’s what keeps many away from church. Already struggling with the grief and pain of sin-wracked living, perhaps they fear a further burden of guilt from going to church. But that’s not what the life of following Jesus is about, not at all! Instead of shaming us for our guilt, Jesus looks at it and says, “It’s hard for you to live the way you’ve been living, isn’t it? Come to me, and I will give you rest.” And of course, Jesus is absolutely right—it is hard to live in sin. It imposes on us tremendous amounts of pain, brokenness, guilt, and—if we have no one to share those spiritual wounds with—loneliness, too. But you don’t have to be lonely anymore. Come and answer the call of Christ, who looks with sympathy on your burdens. He will take your guilt and replace it with the freedom of his forgiveness and the joy of the unhindered pursuit of a good, soul-satisfying life. Whether you’ve been stealing muffins from the kitchen or wrestling with some other kind of misdeed, come and find the grace of Jesus Christ, freely offered in his Word and in his church. There is no sin that’s too big for the infinite grace of God.