To Encourage You

1 John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Do you realize that only God can forgive sins?  This was very clear to the scribes in Jesus’ day as we can see from the following exchange from Mark 2.   Jesus had just healed a paralytic, but then He said this: “Son, your sins are forgiven.”  To this the scribes replied “Why does this man speak like that? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” Then this from Jesus: “And immediately Jesus, perceiving in his spirit that they thus questioned within themselves, said to them, ’Why do you question these things in your hearts? Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ”Your sins are forgiven,“ or to say, ”Rise, take up your bed and walk”? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’—he said to the paralytic— ’I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home.’” 

Only Jesus had the power to raise a paralytic to perfect physical health with a word, and only Jesus has the power to forgive sin and thus heal the spirit and soul.  That’s why it says “he is faithful and just to forgive.”  You see, every sin is ultimately a sin against the holy and just God Who gave us His law. While people can forgive each other and cancel the debt caused by interpersonal injustice between them, people can’t cancel the debt of that same sin against God. But how is this done? What’s the process?  We have our ways to deal with lawbreaking and sin in society both through the confession and forgiveness that restores interpersonal relationships – which is the process that has been given to us by God – and through the courts as a function of the government, an institution that God has ordained. But what about the damaged relationship that results between us and God? How is that relationship restored? 

The verse above gives us the answer. The first step is that we must confess our sin to Him. To confess means “to say the same thing” about our sin. Rather than to hide our sin, neglect it, or dismiss it as “not that big a deal” by our own very flawed personal view of justice, we must agree with God about our sin. It’s a very big deal with Him. We have no right to disobey Him and the laws He has established. Besides the fact that He’s our Creator, He’s also a righteous lawgiver and judge. 

But then, when we do this, when we confess and repent of our sin, it says that He is faithful to forgive us.  Do you realize how wonderful this is, i.e., faithful to forgive?  That means that if we come to Him in true confession and repentance, He is always faithful to forgive us. He is always faithful to what He has told us in this verse.  No matter how big the sin, and no matter how many times we do it, if we turn to Him in confession and repentance – He will always forgive. Remember these wonderful words of Jesus in His exchange with Peter when Peter asked, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times” (Matthew 18:21-22). Some versions put it this way “seventy times seven.”  The point is, our forgiveness of a brother’s sin who honestly and sincerely comes to us for forgiveness should be without limit, for that’s how our awesome heavenly Father forgives us.  How often I’ve turned to these verses when I feel defeated by the sins I’ve committed yet again! 

But then the verse above says that God is “just” to forgive us.  God is the perfect judge. He never sweeps a wrongdoing under the rug. He doesn’t ever say about a sin – “just forget it, I know you’re weak.”  Just as we are not satisfied when we see a criminal walk away scot-free, God isn’t either.  In fact, He judges every sin justly. That’s why He has told us that we can be sure our sins “will find us out” (Numbers 32:23), and “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap” (Galatians 6:7).  And then Jesus said this “I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak, for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned” (Matthew 12:36-37).  Pretty grim – every word, let alone every action, will be judged by God.

What hope does anyone have then?  The fact is we have much. That’s because God has made a way for us to be forgiven justly, because He permitted someone else to pay the just penalty for all our sin.  And that One was Jesus.  Of Jesus, we are told, “He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly. He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed” (1 Peter 2:22-24).  That’s the one and only reason that any of us can be “cleansed from all unrighteousness.”  It’s been called “the great exchange,” in that “For our sake he made him (i.e., Jesus) to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21). What an overwhelming and awesome truth this is!  What a indescribable and precious gift!

So, what about you?  Are you holding onto, hiding, and even loving your sin? If so, you can be sure that you will reap what you sow from a holy and just God. Or, on the other hand, will you confess and forsake your sin before the God Who waits and Who is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness?