Soulfood

“God is a spirit, infinite, eternal, and unchangeable…”

God can’t forget our sins in the sense that He has no memory of them. God can’t forget anything. He is infinite and eternal. A being who exists outside of time, whose mind is infinite and eternal, has no memory. Everything is present for God the Father.

He isn’t waiting to see how we turn out. He doesn’t have to concentrate to remember what we did 25 years ago.

God chooses not to hold our sins against us, and especially for those who are in Christ Jesus, He counts us blameless. God chooses not to treat us as if we are sinners. He doesn’t act towards us as we have acted towards Him. He chooses not to dispose Himself towards us according to the way we have acted, and will act again, in rebellion against and disregard for Him. He chooses to act towards us as though we are, and always have been, and always will be sinless.

For those of us who are in Christ Jesus, we must forgive others and forget their offenses against us just as God through Christ Jesus forgives us and forgets our offenses.

We must not let the way we act towards one who offends against us control the way we act towards them. If we do, we not only reject Christ but we harden our hearts toward Grace.

This is hard. And it requires strength and confidence that I rarely find within myself. I have a quote from Gandhi on my wall: “Forgiveness is an attribute of the strong. The weak can never forgive.”

If I am weak, I can’t afford to forgive out of fear of what it will cost me. But those who are strong can be hurt and survive. Refusing to forgive doesn’t make me strong. It’s me trying to control things because I’m too weak and afraid to accept things and people the way they are. It’s allowing the way I’ve been treated in the past to control the way I treat people in the future. That’s not being strong. That’s being weak and fearful.

(There are situations and circumstances in which it is wise and prudent to act fearfully towards someone! It’s okay to be weak as fearful, when you have cause. But don’t pretend it is strength, and don’t let it control all of your life. The goal is always to become strong in Christ, strong enough to forgive when you are able, by God’s grace!)

The world tells us (and I see it here on Facebook all the time) that being a strong, independent, confident person means we control others by holding grudges and refusing to forget offenses committed against us. That’s good enough for the world, which is perishing. For those who are not of this world, who are journeying to Zion, don’t fall for it. Don’t follow the lie.

In Christ you are strong enough to forgive, and like your Father in heaven you can choose to forget and overlook offenses committed against you by your fellow creatures. Don’t harden your heart. Never in Scripture does anyone who hardens his or her heart get commended by God.

Remember how much you have been forgiven. And pray as we have been taught, “Our Father… forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.”

These thoughts were prompted in reflecting on this section of Mark Vroegrop’s book /Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy/