God’s forgiveness is complete, but it doesn’t erase every consequence of sin. Exploring the guilt offering in the Book of Leviticus reveals how God’s grace calls us to confess, repent, and take action to restore what our sins have broken.
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forgiveness
Everybody knows the command to honour your father and your mother, and Jesus called us to love our enemies. But what if our enemy is also our abuser? What if the parent we’re called to honour is mistreating or exploiting us? Some say the Christian response is to turn the other cheek. Others follow the recent explosion in articles advocating that you cut off all the toxic people in your life. The biblical tension is somewhere in between.
“If there is a God, surely, He’ll just forgive everyone. The idea of judgment is just religion trying to scare people.” Ever heard that? Ever thought it yourself? It seems reasonable, right? Or does it?
I’ve had people express to me the feeling that they could never be forgiven. As a result, they can’t forgive themselves, and their past continues to haunt them. There’s hope in the Bible but it comes as we confront an even greater sin that most people aren’t even conscious of.
We hear sin talked about in terms of its eternal consequences and the wonder of Jesus’ forgiveness so much that we can start to think that there’s nothing more to it. The problem with that is that it can make us feel as if there’s no reason to deny ourselves. In a moment of weakness, Christian grace can feel like a hall pass that nullifies all the consequences of sin. That’s not helpful.
Maisie Williams has accomplished more in the first 25 years of her life than most of us could hope to in a lifetime. Knowing that, it’s surprising, perhaps, to hear her admit that she often lies “in bed at night telling myself all the things I hate about myself.” How do you deal with feelings of shame that seem to punish and condemn you?
Both Catholics and Protestants see Jesus as central to forgiveness and salvation. They differ, though, in their understanding of what we can contribute to our salvation and forgiveness. Does Jesus pay the bill, or does He ask us to split it with Him?
In the days following Will Smith’s slap of Chris Rock at the Academy Awards, almost every aspect of the altercation was dissected. Did Chris Rock know that Pinket Smith had alopecia? Did the domestic violence that Will Smith witnessed as a child trigger his passion in defending his wife? Was the Academy to blame in not removing Smith from the ceremony? Fellow actors have rushed in to express their feelings of outrage or support. Analysts plot Smith’s next moves. And everybody seems to love “being concerned.” But there’s a question that nobody’s bothered to ask.
There are many things that make work hard. There are pressures, deadlines, expectations, and crises to deal with. While those things make work difficult, it’s almost always the people problems that make work unbearable. Conflict with coworkers keeps you up at night and makes you dread getting up in the morning. So, what can you do about it?
I was speaking to someone recently and I could see that they were struggling to understand what felt like mixed signals in the Bible. On the one hand, there are verses that speak of believers as being clean, washed of their sins, forgiven, and made holy. On the other hand, there are verses that speak of God being grieved by our sins and disciplining us for them. When the Bible speaks of our forgiveness and cleansing is God just trying to inspire us? Or when the Bible speaks of the ongoing presence of our sins is God just trying to scare us? When God sees His children is He shaking His head in frustration? Or is He graciously looking away from the areas where we still falter? How should believers understand God’s attitude toward them when they sin? Let me suggest that there are two hats that can help us make sense of the Bible’s competing descriptions of God’s attitude toward us.