Sin Forgiven

Romans 4:25; 1 Corinthians 15:17-20

Have you ever done that experiment in which you look at your feet through binoculars backwards as you walk across a rope or balancing beam? Though you are entirely safe, walking across a solid floor, when you look down at your feet through the binoculars backwards, you feel uneasy and unstable – perhaps even scared – as though you’re going to lose your balance and fall, because your feet and the floor below seem as if they’re very far away, even though they’re very close, instead. You may even feel dizzy.

This experiment with binoculars illustrates how we so often and so easily walk through life as followers of Christ. Though we know that we have a relationship with God and that our sins are forgiven through Christ, we still see our relationship with God differently than how he sees us. Have you ever known people like these?

• A wealthy man who worries about paying his bills.
• A healthy woman who obsesses over small aches and avoids social events.
• An intelligent man who stresses out over assignments and exams at school.
• A woman in a loving, stable marriage who fears her husband will leave her.

As a pastor, I interact with many people who say they believe on and follow Christ by faith. We know our sin has been forgiven by Christ, but we still think, feel, and act as though this is only kind of true but not completely true. Here are eleven evidences or indicators that this may be the case for you:

• Avoiding Closeness with God and Other Christians: Do you distance yourself from private and public worship, Scripture reading, or prayer, feeling as though you have failed too much or are too sinful or imperfect to participate?
• Chronic Apologizing: Do you repeatedly say “sorry” to God or people for things which have already been admitted and forgiven?
• Doubt in Prayer: Do you hesitate to approach God confidently in prayer, feeling unworthy or disqualified due to past failures, even though Christ has forgiven you?
• Fear of Exposure and Punishment: Do you hide your struggles from others even though you’ve been forgiven by God or live with constant feelings of being judged or about to be judged by God?
• Judgmental Attitude: Do you judge other people’s sins (or perceived sins) harshly, while ignoring the fact that you’ve been forgiven of the same or worse by God?
• Legalistic Tendencies: Do you cling to strict man-made rules or traditions as a way to feel "clean," rather than simply resting in the freedom of Christ’s forgiveness?
• Persistent Guilt: Do you carry a heavy sense of shame or self-condemnation over past sins, or the sins of people in close relationship to you, even after confessing them to God, as if Christ’s forgiveness isn’t enough to erase the debt?
• Rehashing Past Sins: Do you frequently bring up old mistakes in conversations or thoughts, treating them as still defining your identity, the way that God and other people view you, even though he has forgiven you?
• Reluctance to Forgive Others: Do you hold onto others’ sins against you and refuse to move on, believing they must suffer more for their sin more than they already have?
• Unwillingness to Accept Love: Do you impulsively deflect compliments, blessings, appreciation, or kindness from others, feeling undeserving due to a lingering sense of unworthiness and false humility?

In this message, I hope to encourage your heart with a simple but powerful truth – that the death and resurrection of Christ means provides full and real forgiveness, nothing less. And I hope that this truth will encourage you to live a more genuinely free, joyful, and peaceful life.

Apart from Christ, we are genuinely guilty of horrible sin against God.

First, let’s acknowledge that to overcome the anxiety, uncertainty, and insecurity that so easily clouds and controls our lives, we sometimes try to redefine the problem. We play mind games, trying to view the problem in an easier, safer way.

We may do this by either reducing our view of God’s holiness and justice or by minimizing our view of the awfulness of our sin. We say, for instance, that since God is loving, then he will tolerate my sin as long as it isn’t too bad or, at least, isn’t as bad as the sins of other people who are worse than me. Or we say, for instance, that my sin, though frustrating and not ideal, isn’t necessarily horrible or terrible – at least, not as horrible or terrible as other people’s sins which are worse than mine.

The problem with these mind games, though, is that they aren’t true. And even if they were true, they would only reduce the problem, not solve it. As Paul tells us in Romans 6:23, “the wages of sin is death.” This means that in the end, all sin of any kind deserves the death penalty from God and should genuinely concern us. Because God is perfectly good and just and because all sin is horrible and intolerable in his sight, everyone who sins in any way and to any degree deserves to die and spend eternity in the Lake of Fire.

With Christ, we are entirely innocent of sin before God.

Remember that example of looking at our feet backwards as we walk across a rope on the floor? In that example, we struggle to walk properly because our feet and the floor seem much farther away than they actually are. But when it comes to the forgiveness of our sin by God through Christ, the problem is not that we see our sin as farther away than it really is. The problem is that we even see our sin at all because when we believe on Christ as our God and Savior, our record before God changes from entirely guilty to entirely innocent before him. Here’s how David describes God’s forgiveness.

“As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.” (Psalm 103:12)

Bible teacher Jordan Hamilton explains the “east from the west” description of God’s forgiveness this way:

“David says that the Lord has removed the transgressions of his people as far from them as the east is from the west. The place of sunrise will always be as far as the eye can see from the place of sunset. The two points will never be brought together, east will never become west, nor west east. The transgressions of God’s people, then, are gone from them never to be brought back. Their sins will never again provoke God’s wrath, never again incur consequences, never again torment the conscience, never again disrupt relationship. The transgression has been removed.”

Then also hear what the prophet Jeremiah says about how God forgives us.

“I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.” (Jeremiah 31:34)

Here we see that God knowingly, intentionally chooses to forgive our sins.

Here he uses the words “forgive” and “remember” to describe what happens when he does this. To “forgive” means to “pardon” or “release.” It’s what happens when a judge tells an accused person in court that they are innocent and free to go. It means a person is freed both from the accusation of wrongdoing and the consequences that go with it.

To “remember,” then does not mean to “have information in the mind,” since God always has and knows everything in his mind, for he is omniscient, all-knowing. So, sorry to disappoint you, but God cannot and does not delete information from his all-knowing mind. Instead, he does something more meaningful and profound. Though he will always know about your sin and wrongdoing, he will never bring your sin to mind in any way. He will never bring it up to you, bring it up to someone else. He will never accuse you of it, remind you of it, mention it to someone else, or treat you in a way that is influenced by your sin. Your sin will never affect how he views and treats you in any way.

How do we receive such forgiveness from God? It’s not an automatic condition. The good news is that he offers this forgiveness to everyone! The bad news is that not everyone receives it. Why? Because not everyone is willing to meet the one condition he requires.

“Whoever believes in him will receive remission of sins.” (Acts 10:43)

For God, the one and only condition he requires in order to forgive a person’s sins is that a person believe on Jesus Christ as God and Savior. The person who does this, Peter teaches, “will receive forgiveness of sins.” In other words, for God to remove your sins as far as the east is from the west, to remove your sin and its consequences from your record, and to never allow your sins to affect his view and behavior towards you ever again, you must first and only believe on Jesus Christ as your God and Savior. This is the only condition. Whoever does this will be completely forgiven and whoever refuses will not be forgiven but will experience the full judgment and consequences of their sin forever.

The difficult of believing on Christ, though, is that this seems too simple, too easy, too good to be true. It feels somehow disrespectful to God and/or somehow minimizing sin, but in reality, it does neither – in fact, it does the opposite.

This is true because Christ genuinely died for my sin in my place.

This is the basis – and only possible, legitimate basis – for God’s forgiveness of our sin. The
cross of Christ is both awesome and brilliant at the same time because it masterfully and perfectly maintains the full goodness and justice of God, reducing or minimizing God in no way at all. At the same time, the cross neither excuses, minimizes, nor overlooks our sin in any way or to any degree whatsoever. Here’s how Paul describes it:

“Who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification.” (Rom 4:25)

By “delivered up,” we see that the just and good God himself offered up himself in Jesus Christ. The judge of the universe provided a representative to take our place in judgment. He did this because of our offenses, which means that his death was due to our sins, not his own, for he had no sins.

Furthermore, why was Christ offered up? He was given because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification. In other words, when he died on that cross, your record of sin became his record. Your consequences for sin became his consequences. He took and assumed full responsibility for your guilt, shame, and the consequences of your sins in full, in your place. So, his death was your death. His grave was your grave. His burial was your burial.

So, as far as God is concerned, he has already judged and punished your sins in full on Christ. There is no more judgment left to give, no more consequences let to carry out, no more sin remaining on your record in his sight.

No matter how much sin you’ve committed, how much guilt and shame you feel, and no matter how many consequences you deserve, all of that is already accomplished, accounted for, and resolved in Christ’s death. To look at Christ’s grave is to look at your own grave – and here’s the most amazing thing about it, that grave is empty!

Because of Christ’s resurrection, I can live entirely free from guilt and shame!

Just as Christ’s death completely and fully fulfilled all necessary judgment and consequences for my sin, guilt, and shame, so Christ’s resurrection grants me a new life and a new identity before God that is entirely free from guilt and shame. Just as I died when Christ died, so I rose when Christ rose – in a real and spiritual way. Now that Christ has risen from the dead, Satan has no right to accuse Christ of anything, Christ has nothing to be ashamed of, and there are no consequences or judgment that he can or will ever receive from God. All of that happened at the cross and in the grave.

“Who was delivered up because of our offenses, and was raised because of our justification.” (Rom 4:25)

Now that he is resurrected, he is entirely free from the record and penalty of our sins, and therefore, so are we. We are as free from the accusations of Satan, our conscience, and God himself because Christ died and rose again, and because his death was our death, and his resurrection was our resurrection. God fully judged your sin, there is nothing left to judge. Therefore, since Christ’s rose again, you are totally free and completely forgiven from any accusation or judgment of sin from God. Do you realize what this means? Christ’s resurrection means that you as entirely forgiven from sin just as he is entirely free from deaths power.

Today, I want to encourage you to live with a different mindset if you are a follower of Christ. I want you to do more than know in your mind that you are forgiven by God. I want more completely, deeply, and personally understand what this truly means.

For this to happen, we need to focus our hearts and minds more frequently and seriously on the close, intimate connection between Christ’s death and our sin, Christ’s resurrection and our forgiveness. For this to happen, we must learn to identify in our attitudes, feelings, words, and actions all the ways that reveal to ourselves that we don’t fully appreciate how fully and completely we’ve been forgiven by Christ. We must learn to grow in these ways to an opposite mindset that lives as though such forgiveness is really and actually true.

This is hard to do, isn’t it? Consider the story of Sara and see if you can relate.

Sara Cook was a single mother from Michigan who owed an overwhelming amount of money due to medical expenses. In her early 40s, she went through eight back surgeries and over two dozen hospital visits, racking up thousands of dollars in bills she couldn’t pay on her small income as a part-time office worker. This unpayable debt was a constant source of stress as she juggled raising her teenage son and keeping food on the table. She felt like a failure, ashamed that her health struggles had put her family in such a hole.

One day, Sara received an unexpected letter saying that her medical debt had been completely forgiven—no strings attached. A nonprofit which buys up and pays of medical debt through donations, including this time from a local church in her area, had discovered and paid off her debt. At first, she thought it was a scam. When she confirmed it was real, she was flooded with both relief and disbelief. She’d spent years beating herself up for not managing better, and now someone had lifted that burden without her even asking.

Accepting this forgiveness was tough for Sara. For years, she kept waiting for the catch, feeling as though she didn’t deserve it because she hadn’t “earned” the help. She’d always prided herself on being self-reliant, and the idea that strangers saw her as worthy of this gift clashed with her self-image as someone who’d failed. Over time, though, she began to see it as a chance to move forward. She started volunteering at her church, wanting to pay it forward, but admitted it took months to stop feeling guilty and to fully embrace the fresh start, realizing she had nothing to pay back – nothing at all. She was free and fully forgiven.

As followers of Christ, we must learn to accept that we really have been forgiven and that because of Christ’s resurrection from the dead in dying for our sins, we have received full forgiveness before God forever. What does living with this in mind look like?

• Avoid Closeness with God and Other Christians? Now, you eagerly seek closeness with God and fellow believers through worship, Scripture, and prayer, confident that your sins are covered by Christ’s forgiveness and do not bar you from participation.
• Chronic Apologizing? You now trust that all confessed sins are fully forgiven, moving forward without repeatedly apologizing to God or others for what has already been settled. And you no longer habitually apologize for things which aren’t a sin, too.
• Doubt in Prayer? You now approach God confidently and regularly in prayer, assured of your worthiness and acceptance through Christ’s forgiveness, free from hesitation over past failures.
• Fear of Exposure and Punishment? You now openly share your struggles when appropriate, resting in the security of God’s forgiveness, and you live without dread of divine judgment, knowing Christ has taken your punishment. Even when others fail to respond to you with forgiveness and grace, you move on knowing that your forgiveness in God’s sight is not based on the approval of others.
• Judgmental Attitude? You now freely extend grace to others, recognizing your own forgiveness in Christ, and you refrain from harsh judgment, aware that all followers of Christ are equally and fully forgiven by God, just as you are, so you want them to experience the freedom that you also enjoy.
• Legalistic Tendencies? You now embrace the freedom of Christ’s forgiveness, relying on his grace rather than man-made rules or traditions to define your standing before God.
• Overcompensating Works? You now serve and worship God wholeheartedly and joyfully out of gratitude, not obligation, fully trusting that Christ’s sacrifice has already secured God’s favor and canceled your sin debt.
• Persistent Guilt? You now release shame and self-condemnation after honest and frequent confession, accepting that Christ’s forgiveness is complete and sufficient to erase all debt, for yourself and those close to you.
• Rehashing Past Sins? You now let go of past wrong choices, viewing yourself as defined by Christ’s redemption rather than your past failures, confident in God’s forgiveness.
• Reluctance to Forgive Others? You now freely forgive those who wrong you, mirroring the complete forgiveness you’ve received from Christ, and you gladly release others from prolonged suffering over past offenses.
• Unwillingness to Accept Love? You now warmly receive compliments, blessings, and kindness, embracing your worthiness in Christ without false humility, knowing that God’s forgiveness has completely restored your worth.

Does thinking, feeling, and living this way seem foreign to you – undeserved, unreal, and just a little too hard to believe and fully accept? May this change for us all.

My friends, let this truth sink deep into your hearts today: Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died and rose again to make you fully forgiven—completely free before a holy God who loves you beyond measure.

If you’ve never believed on Christ as your God and Savior, I urge you now—trust Him! He’s the only way to stand innocent before God, not because of what you’ve done, but because of what He’s done for you.

And for those of you who do believe, hear this encouragement from God’s heart to yours: you are not kind-of forgiven, partly forgive, or forgiven with strings attached— you are wholly, perfectly forgiven. Christ’s empty grave is your proof.

Don’t let guilt or doubt twist your view like those backward binoculars. Your sin is not close in God’s sight, neither is it far away. It is gone – as far as the east is from the west, never to be brought into view again by God.

May you step boldly forward into the joy and peace of this reality—living as the fully forgiven sons and daughters you are. Your debt of sin is gone, the burden lifted, and there’s nothing left “‘to pay back.” Embrace that freedom completely, lean all the way into God’s grace, and walk confidently in the light of a forgiveness that’s already yours—forever. Because he lives, you are forgiven. You are free. Amen.