Sermon on Lord’s Day 21 Q&A 56⤒🔗

56. Q. What do you believe concerning the forgiveness of sins?
A. I believe that God, because of Christ's satisfaction, will no more remember my sins,[1] nor my sinful nature, against which I have to struggle all my life,[2] but He will graciously grant me the righteousness of Christ, that I may never come into condemnation.[3]
[1] Ps. 103:3, 4, 10, 12; Mic. 7:18, 19; II Cor. 5:18-21; I John 1:7; 2:2. [2] Rom. 7:21-25. [3] John 3:17, 18; 5:24; Rom. 8:1, 2.

Scripture Reading: Isaiah 53; 1 Timothy 1:12-17

Singing: (Psalms and Hymns are from the "Book of Praise" Anglo Genevan Psalter)
Psalm 25:4,5
Psalm 65:2,3
Psalm 103:4
Psalm 130:2,4
Psalm 32:1,2

Beloved Congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ!

The first two Questions & Answers of our Lord’s Day this afternoon concerned themselves with the church. Hard on the heals of the church’s confession about the church comes three Questions & Answers detailing particular gifts the Lord Jesus Christ has given to the church. The first of these is the forgiveness of sins, the second the resurrection of the body, and the third is life everlasting. These three form the concrete and specific treasures the Lord has given to His church, given to each of His children.

Today we may speak of the forgiveness of sins. Yet it will not do to speak of the forgiveness of sins in general, as a rich doctrine that may be true for others but not for me. As we speak about the forgiveness of sins we need to keep in mind that God’s gifts are personal, are given to specific individuals. The Catechism reflects that by asking what you believe concerning the forgiveness of sins, and then laying a personal answer on our lips: "I believe that God … will no remember my sins." The gift confessed in our Question & Answer is a gift given to the church – and we by God’s grace are members of that church. As we talk about forgiveness this afternoon, we are talking about something given to us.

That is also why there are two questions we need to consider this afternoon. What God thinks of us gets to the heart of what forgiveness of sins is all about, and so that becomes our first point. But the application of that gospel compels us to consider what we think of ourselves, and so that becomes our second point.

I summarize the sermon with this theme:

The forgiveness of sins is God’s gracious gift to his church

1. What God thinks of us,
2. What we think of us.

What God thinks of us←⤒🔗

What, congregation, is forgiveness of sins? We know what ‘sins’ are. That word captures whatever we do or say or think that contravenes God’s commands. In the Garden of Eden we committed no sins, for we were perfect. As a result of the fall into sin our hearts have become "desperately corrupt" (as Jeremiah says it, 17:9), so much so that sin covers whatever we do; even our best works, says Isaiah, are as "filthy rags" before God (64:6).

God’s reaction to our sins is revulsion. The Holy Spirit says through Habakkuk that God is of purer eyes than to behold evil (1:13). So, when the people of Israel built their golden calf in blatant transgression of God’s expressed command, God was ready to destroy the people, and begin a new nation with Moses. That is holy God: He cannot stomach sin.

From eternity God has chosen certain persons to life eternal. These are the ones whom the Father has given to the Son (John 17:2). And those whom the Father has given to Him, the Son gathers into His church – persons of any tribe and tongue and race, of any culture and behavior pattern. The church Christ gathered in Corinth consisted of persons who used to be fornicators and idolaters, adulterers and homosexuals and sodomites, thieves and drunks and extortioners (1 Cor 6:9ff). The members of the church of Ephesus used to conduct themselves "in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and the mind," and so were "by nature children of wrath" (Eph 2:1ff). Peter says to the saints whom he addresses that "we have spent enough of our past lifetime in doing the will of the Gentiles – when we walked in lewdness, lusts, drunkenness, revelries, drinking parties, and abominable idolatries" (1 Pet 4:3). These, though, are the sorts of people God has given to Christ, and so these are sorts of people Christ gathers into His church, yes, these are the sorts of people who receive the gift of the forgiveness of sins.

What, now, is ‘forgiveness’? The Bible uses a variety of images to convey the notion of forgiveness. There is, for example, the word ‘lift up’. Then sin is pictured as a burden, a weight lying on one’s shoulder. The sin is ‘forgiven’, and that’s to say that the sin is lifted off the person and put to one side – so that the person can walk straight up again. Another word used for ‘forgiveness’ is the word ‘let go’. The same word is used of a stone in a slingshot. The stone is ‘let go’ from the slingshot and flies away. So too sin; it is ‘let go’, and that’s to say that it may fly away and so be gone from the life of the transgressor.

Besides its choice of words to describe forgiveness, the Bible also draws pictures of what forgiveness actually is. Ps 103 gives us this well-known passage: "As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us" (vs 12). In our day of rapid transportation and communication, east and west are not all that far apart, and so what is moved as far west as you can go can be retrieved. But that was not the case in David’s day. East and west were the farthest extremes of the world, and it took you a lifetime to travel as far east as you could go, let alone as far west. And then you certainly had no opportunity to retrieve what you’d hidden on your travels to the farthest east. The point: when God removes transgressions from us "as far as east is from the west", those transgressions are gone, completely gone.

Micah uses different imagery to describe what forgiveness is. He first describes what God is like: "Who is a God like You, Pardoning iniquity And passing over the transgression of the remnant of His heritage? He does not retain His anger forever, Because He delights in mercy. He will again have compassion on us, And will subdue our iniquities" (7:18f). That, he says, is God: pardoning iniquity, forgiving, merciful and compassionate. Then the prophet draws a specific picture of what forgiveness actually is, what God actually does with our sins. He adds: "You will cast all our sins Into the depths of the sea" (vs 19b). In the eye of our mind we may picture the Lord piling Israel’s sins into a boat, rowing that boat into the middle of the sea, and tipping its load overboard. In today’s technology one can retrieve what falls into the depths of the sea; they’ve been down to pick up pieces of the Titanic, and that’s more than 3 kilometers down. Israel did not have that kind of technology. Anything buried in more than 3 meters of water was irretrievable. That’s the point of Micah’s comparison: when God pardons iniquity and passes over transgression, the point is that those sins are gone, completely gone.

What, then, beloved, is forgiveness? It is this: our sins are gone. They’re lifted from our shoulders, they’re let go, they’re removed from us as far as east is from west, they’re dropped into the depths of the sea: all those terms and pictures describe the glorious wealth of forgiveness – our sins are gone! So: that which kindles God’s anger against me –my iniquities- is no longer there to infuriate Him! So His thoughts and His words and His deeds to me are not driven by anger anymore; His thoughts and His words and His deeds to me are instead driven by His mercy and compassion. In the words of our Lord’s Day: "God … will no more remember my sins." Instead, He "will graciously grant me the righteousness of Christ, that I may never come into condemnation." Or in the words of Lord’s Day 23.60: Forgiveness means that God instead sees me as righteous, "as if I have never had nor committed any sin."

Yet, says the Catechism, there’s more to it still. It’s not just that my sins themselves are gone, that God will no more remember my sins. The Catechism adds the remarkable line that God also will no more remember "my sinful nature against which I have to struggle all my life." Our Lord’s Day works here with Paul’s struggle in Romans 7. He could, he says, "will what is right," but he could not do it (vs 15, 19), and so he sins day by day, and so needs forgiveness day by day. The reason for those sins, he says, is because of the evil that is present within him (vs 21). He doesn’t become a thief when he actually reaches out his hand to steal; no, he is a thief by nature, and the act of stealing shows what’s actually in the heart. One doesn’t become a slanderer when one actually gossips; no, says Paul, one is an slanderer at heart, and the act of gossiping is simply the fruit of what is actually in the heart already. This is what God said already of the human race in Noah’s day: "the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually" (Gen 6:5). But if holy God can stand no evil, then it’s not just evil deeds He cannot stand but also evil thoughts, yes, and evil tucked away inside the heart where you and I cannot see it. He sees through the walls of the heart, and is repulsed by the evil He sees. And that’s enough for the Lord’s holy fury to break out upon us!

But, says the Catechism, God’s forgiveness extends not just to the actual sins we commit (be they of deed or of word or even of thought); God’s forgiveness extends also to our sinful nature. That nature also God wants to forgive! And we can be most thankful for that, beloved, for we’d otherwise perish – despite our best efforts. For whose heart is totally free of transgression?

God no more remembers my sins, nor my sinful nature against which I struggle all my life long. On what grounds, now, does God forgive? On what grounds does He lift our sins off our shoulders, remove them as far as east is from west, dump them overboard? The answer of the Scripture is emphatic: this is simply and only because of Christ’s work on the cross. The people of Israel had to bring sacrifices to the temple time and time again, and always their sin offerings had to be accompanied by laying the hand upon the head of the sacrifice (Lev 4). The point was that sin was transferred from the sinner to the animal, and the animal –now with sin on board- died in place of the sinner – and so the sinner could go home free. Isaiah refers to that ordinance when he says of the coming Christ that "He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities" (vs 5) and "the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all" (53:6). ‘For’, says the prophet, and the point is that Christ suffered and died for us, in our place; our sins were piled onto Him so that we might go free (cf Rom 5:6ff). Result: God "has reconciled us to Himself through Jesus Christ" (2 Cor 5:18). That’s the gospel Paul and all preachers may proclaim: "God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses to them" (vs 19). In the words of our Lord’s Day: "I believe that God, because of Christ’s satisfaction, will no more remember my sins…." Or in the words of the Lord’s Supper Form: Christ is the only ground of our salvation.

That statement has implications. If our sins are forgiven "because of Christ’s satisfaction," it follows that there are no other grounds for our forgiveness. We do not, brothers and sisters, have forgiveness of our sins because we go to church. We do not have forgiveness of sins because we help the poor in the community. Nothing we do earns us forgiveness; forgiveness of sins is totally and only God’s grace through Jesus Christ.

It’s something for which we may be so very thankful. Martin Luther was taught that forgiveness could be his if he did the right thing – and you can fill in the blank as to what that right thing might be, whether paying enough indulgences or crawling up a hundred stone steps on your bare knees or even repenting, feeling guilty and rotten about your sins. But Luther learned that such a doctrine never gives peace, for the devil will always have you doubt whether you have done enough, whether you have gone to church often enough or sincerely enough, whether you have paid enough or feel rotten enough or repented truly enough or made sufficient restitution for your sins, etc. The gospel of redemption drives us to look to Christ alone; only His work on the cross obtains forgiveness for our sins. And that work is so perfect, so complete, that the Christian need never doubt whether his sins are really forgiven. That’s the gift Christ gives to His church, to those whom the Father has given to Him.

Can one and all automatically claim this gift? Can even every person who comes to church claim this gift? Says the Holy Spirit through John: "He who believes in the Son has everlasting life; and he who does not believe the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides on him" (3:36). Faith: that is the means by which we draw God’s gracious gifts to ourselves and make them ours (cf Lord’s Day 7, 23). That is why the speaker in our Lord’s Day says emphatically that he believes that God for Christ’s sake no more remembers his sins. Only by faith is this gift of God ours. So that is the question: do you believe this gospel? And do not say right away that of course you believe it, for Jesus tells us that you know the tree by its fruits (Mt 7:15ff), and James adds us that "faith without works is dead" (James 2:26). The good news of forgiveness is for those who believe, but faith is always accompanied by fruits. And those fruits, those evidences of faith includes turning from sin, fighting against sin, heartfelt sorrow for sin. That is why the Scriptures insist that there is no forgiveness without repentance. The evidence of faith must be present –repentance, sorrow for sin, seeking to make good the damage done- before one can repeat sincerely the words of Lord’s Day 21.

How, then, brothers and sisters, does God see you? You do believe the gospel, do you not, and you are sorry for your countless misdeeds and transgressions, isn’t it? Well now, does God see you as all sin, wicked so that His anger is directed against you? Does He see you as a little bit sinful, somewhat forgivable because you have shown your remorse but the remorse isn’t quite deep enough and so a bit of His anger remains? Beloved, if God were to grant us forgiveness on the basis of what He sees in us, we’d have no forgiveness! Who can claim to be without sin? Who can claim to see all his sins and confess them all, be repentant of them all? Who can claim that his repentance is complete, and his remorse perfectly sincere? No, beloved, the Lord tells us that when He looks at us He does not look at our accomplishments, whether good or bad, but He looks at the cross of Calvary. He assures His own that He, because of Christ’s satisfaction, will no more remember their sins. So the Christian embraces God’s promise in faith, and he repeats it after God, and says with the words of A 56: "I believe that God, because of Christ’s satisfaction, will no more remember my sins." And go ahead, beloved, fill in your name there and the details of your iniquities. And then say it again: I believe that God, because of Christ’s satisfaction, will no more remember that particular sin of mine that keeps coming back to haunt me. I believe the forgiveness of sins, believe that that sin is gone, gone! When God sees me, He sees no trace of that sin – because Christ paid for it!

We come to our second point:

What we think of us←⤒🔗

If God, then, sees us as righteous, our sins gone, how should we now look at ourselves? If God for Christ’s sake no more remembers my sins, should I keep on remembering them?

In actual fact, brothers and sisters, we would dearly love to forget the wrongs of which we’re guilty. We realize that we can’t wind the clock back and undo the past, but the shame we feel on account of what we’ve done can be so strong that we’d give much to forget it. And yes, there are various tricks available to help forget our sins. You can dull your memories through drug or alcohol abuse. There are counselors who will give you shock treatment to help you forget, and there are churches that will try to exorcise a demon from you to get you to forget what you’ve done. The common denominator in all these is the effort to erase your memory, and so get you to see yourself in a better light. At the end of the day, it’s a form of denial, an effort to escape the reality of our sins.

In the face of this inclination, beloved, Paul’s words to Timothy are so instructive. Paul wrote this letter towards the end of his life, as a relatively old man. And behold now what he does: without any prodding he speaks openly about the sins of his youth! Try to hide them? Try to belittle them? Try to forget them? None of it! His sins were in the open, common knowledge, and now Paul doesn’t skirt around his iniquities but mentions them by name. Vs 13: "I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man." Notice the footnote beside the word ‘insolent’; you could also translate the term as ‘violently arrogant’. We recognize Paul’s allusion; he’s describing the material of Acts 8, how he consented to Stephen’s death (vs 1) and "made havoc of the church, entering every house, and dragging off men and women, committing them to prison" (vs 3). Or, in the words of Acts 9:1: he breathed threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord (vs 1). But the Lord had mercy on him, met him on the road to Damascus, confronted him with the risen Christ, and compelled him to repent and believe. As a result Paul’s lifestyle changed, changed radically; no longer did he do the things he used to do (cf Eph 2:3). More, because of his conversion he recognized how horribly evil his behavior had been. In the passage before us the apostle calls a spade a spade: he acknowledges that he "was formerly a blasphemer" – and there was no sin to a Jew more evil than blasphemy; recall that Jesus was condemned on the grounds of alleged blasphemy. Paul goes further, and dares to say that he was a "persecutor" – and to a Christian what can be worse than hounding Christ’s church, and therefore Christ Himself? He adds that he was "an insolent man", "violently arrogant", and that too is anything but flattering. He paints no gentle picture of himself, but describes his sins in terms of the evils they were.

Now, why, congregation, does he do that? And this is not the only time he recalls his sins; he does it more often. Is he some sort of sadomasochist, a person who enjoys the pain that recollection of sin may bring? No, congregation, the point is totally different. The reason for bringing it up is the material of vs 12. "I thank Christ Jesus our Lord who has enabled me, because He counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry." Putting who into the ministry? Me – who was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, an insolent man! Talk about grace on Christ’s part! Vs 14: "the grace of our Lord was exceedingly abundant!" What a God this is, to take such an unworthy man as Paul, and give him –with his repugnant track record- such a central place in His New Testament church! Truly, salvation is not by works, lest any man should boast, but by grace alone (cf Eph 2).

There, brothers and sisters, you have the reason why Paul mentions his past. He wants Timothy (and you and me) not to tut, tut over Paul’s evils, but he wants one and all to delight at the mercies of God! And the first to delight in those mercies, of course, is Paul himself. He knows what he was, and he won’t downsize his evils, but he’ll describe the evils as they were in order to spell out the more clearly how great God’s grace to him was in Jesus Christ! White is never so white as against a background of black, and so Paul is happy to paint his background truly black so that the whiteness of the gospel might stand out the sharper.

How, brothers and sisters, do you see yourself? Will you try to forget your sins of youth, or perhaps downplay them, take the edges off? It is O so tempting, because we do not appreciate the look of ugly sin in ourselves. But we shall never repent of our sins if we do not dare to acknowledge that our wrongs were sins, evil. More, we shall not praise God as we ought if we fail to recognize what sort of sinners we used to be. Recall Jesus’ words to Simon the Pharisee: the more one is forgiven, the more thankful one is (Luke 7:42,47b). The more sharply we see our sins, the more we’ll join Paul in thanking Him that He had mercy –not on sinners in general- but on me.

Notice now also, congregation, how Paul speaks about himself in the present. Vs 13: "I was formerly a blasphemer…." But what is Paul now? Still a blasphemer? Still an arrogant persecutor? Does he think of his past as still haunting him today? Not at all! He looks at himself through the same lens as God does. God looks at him through the blood of Christ’s sacrifice, and so sees Paul as righteous before Him for Christ’s sake; Paul looks at himself also through the blood of Jesus Christ, and so also sees himself as righteous-before-God for Christ’s sake. That is why he can confidently put his sins into the past, and he can describe the present in terms of God’s mercy and grace. See himself as a sinner still? Walk around with the weight of his past sins still on his shoulders? No, no! God has forgiven him for Jesus’ sake, and so sees himself as righteous, and therefore Paul knows himself forgiven and does not walk around with guilt feelings, puzzling as to whether or not God is happy with him. To say it in the words of the Catechism: Paul knows he has "the righteousness of Christ" so that he "may never come into condemnation" – not in this life or in the life to come.

How does God look at you, brothers and sisters? He has worked faith in your hearts, has joined you to His church, even instructs you to come to His table. Point: you may believe that God sees you not as a sinner, but as righteous – forgiven! True, the devil wants you to doubt that God has really forgiven your sins. So the devil would have you keep staring at your sins instead of at the cross of Christ. Or the devil would have you forget your sins, belittle them – so that you don’t really need Christ’s cross so much after all. But the Lord would have us delight in the cross, delight in His mercy. So we’ll look our sins in the face, acknowledge them with shame. And for every one look at our sins in all their horror we’ll look ten times at the cross of Christ – and so thank God the more for His marvelous mercy! Amen.