This week’s post is primarily directed at Christians. If you are an atheist or a committed secular humanist, you may find it helpful……..in understanding what is going on in our heads……in understanding what drives us……in making sense of what looks like foolishness.
Human beings do bad things…….little bad things……horrible bad things. Some of us do them occasionally…….some of us do them constantly. But, we all do them. Some of them we can rationalize…….justify. Some of them we do because we just enjoy them.
My homework assignment for this week will be hard, but potentially very rewarding. I want you to meditate on something that you have done……something that was wrong. You could choose something small……the parking meter that you didn’t feed. But, if you take the easy way out, you will gain very little. Rather, I want you to meditate on the big screw-up…….the worst thing that you have ever done. Worst, not because of the consequences…….worst because of the wrongness of it. This will probably be something that you have been dragging around for years….possibly decades. It may be something that you have never shared……something that nobody else even knows about.
Next, I want you to visualize your death. You float above your body. You move toward a bright light. You see old friends and relatives. And then you meet Jesus. And he walks up, gives you a hug, calls you by name, and says “welcome home”. And his welcome is absolutely sincere and completely defined by love. Because he either doesn’t know about your big screw-up…….or he doesn’t care. Because your big screw-up and all of your other screw-ups have been forgiven……forgotten……erased.
What’s the point?
The point is that the bigger your screw-up, the more precious the forgiveness of Jesus is. And that is the second part of your assignment. I want you to meditate on the worth of that forgiveness.
I once read an essay by a pastor. As young man, he got his girlfriend pregnant and pressured her into an abortion that she didn’t want. Decades later, he shared this with his congregation…….and was shunned. This severely damaged his ministry and may have cost him his job. He concluded, “Jesus has forgiven me……why can’t they”.
We are all dragging around past sins. We don’t talk about them because we are embarrassed. We don’t talk about them because others won’t forgive us. Even worse, we don’t let go of them because we can’t forgive ourselves. Everybody thinks that we believe we are pure…..better than everyone else…….but we know.
And yet, Jesus, the creator of the universe, has forgiven us.
When we drag around past screw-ups, we devalue what Jesus did for us on the cross. In a way, what we are saying…….is that we don’t trust in his forgiveness……..or we don’t believe in it.
This doesn’t hurt Jesus……he loves us unconditionally. But it is devastating to us.
So the final part of this week’s assignment?
Forgive yourself……and prepare for that hug……from a guy who loves you absolutely and unconditionally………..from a guy who either doesn’t know or doesn’t care about your big screw-up. Because what he really cares about is the relationship that you and he share.
That relationship is the most important thing in your life. And failure to embrace Jesus’s forgiveness interferes with your ability to embrace Jesus.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west,
so far does he remove our transgressions from us.
David, Psalm 103:11-12, ESV
In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace,
Paul. Ephesians 1:7, ESV
“What I envy most about you Christians is your forgiveness; I have nobody to forgive me.”
Marghanita Laski, an atheist, reflecting on forgiveness