FORGIVEN; BEING FORGIVEN; NEVER NEEDING FORGIVENESS
by Ebunoluwa Omodara
When I was a child, the concept of the rapture was always a scary sight. Imagine being caught in a single lie after living years of being a good Christian all your life and then boom, you never make it. The idea of facing the antichrist’s torment without escape was terrifying.
Why will a good God blow the trumpet catching me in just one lie?
The concepts of mercy, goodness, and justice all conflated as one. A just God wouldn’t, shouldn’t throw away all my ‘good living’ for that one lie. And as a child, I couldn’t understand why a good God would judge still.
Recently, a colleague asked me a question “Do you think it’s unbiblical/wrong to preach grace and what it does..”, he then followed it with “Are future sins forgiven?” The timing of these questions couldn’t have been more scripted as I was presently studying a book on hyper-grace at that time.
Sin is a big deal. It was such a big deal that Jesus came to die. No other atonement could make a permanent, one fix-all for the penalty of sin except Christ’s death. His death was the only tenable atonement, and it truly was so efficacious that it made us stand before Christ like someone who never sinned before this is -justification by faith. Believing in this finished work of Christ is the only way to be saved.
To be saved, you have to believe first that you are utterly helpless to save yourself, that God only in his sovereignty can and the means to achieve that was in believing in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ and that this was enough for all men.
There are three main terms with which the context of salvation is dispensed; Justification, Sanctification, and Glorification.
When we became justified, he looked at us and the Bible referred to us as those whom God does not impute sin. We were made righteous, the debt was paid. The efficacy was such that this blood could atone for sins committed by those who lived in the present and those to come. It covered past sins, and present and future sins to come in this regard.
This is the crux of the gospel. It is the message of Christ’s death and resurrection. In his death my death was buried, in his resurrection, I come alive and I am justified and now I live for him.
There is an eternal assurance of this salvation. His seal is upon your heart. Saved and sealed. This salvation is unto good works, works of righteousness. A new life is imputed to us, the Zoe kind. Now dead to sin and made alive in Christ. This means we do not have the privilege to remain in sin, yet call ourselves Christian. However, with true discipleship, it is expected that daily you grow. And believing to the end with your heart, whilst continuously producing works of righteousness is what keeps you saved.
This is why Salvation is beyond just the confession of your mouth, conversion is in your heart. You must believe, this is what it means to have faith.
Now that you are saved, what happens when a believer sins after giving their life to Christ? It is simple- you repent. 1 John 1:9: “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”
When I was a child I broke a lot of mugs and plates, but every time I did I didn’t just throw the pieces away, I took them to my mom and said I was sorry. Neither did I go and pick up my birth certificate and think I didn’t deserve to be her child anymore nor did she tear it up. At salvation I became a child, the one I called Abba can keep that which was committed to him till that resurrection morning.
No Christian should get up from the bed of fornication and chant, “I am the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus”, you are on the back end sliding farther and farther from home. You are taking a moonwalk on the faith.
What repentance does every single time is to keep your heart childlike and your conscience pure. This was why John writing to believers admonished and told us that we have an advocate with the Father. This repentance serves to work in your Sanctification. Sanctification is both a complete and ongoing work. You were made set apart at Calvary, but daily you are being set apart. This is why every time the Lord convicts you of something you must repent. The continuous work of grace in us is Sanctification. Being set apart, constantly changing to look more like our savior, in character, works, deeds, and power.
A straw man will be to believe that the work of your salvation was ultimately naught and lost at every point in time. Or that God is unable to keep you. You have the assurance of salvation. An even worse one will be to believe that because you will be on this side of the divide, sinning and rising life is the constant lifestyle of the believer. It is not. God forbid that we make cheap what our savior has wrought.
No man born of God makes a continuous habit of sinning and living the life he was called out from. To continue is to stay dead in what he redeemed you from, and to do that is to make naught his work.
The life which we were given gives us the grace to live above sin. And even when we struggle with habits, scratch that, especially when we struggle with habits this should be a comfort, that the life in us can empower us to live above it. It isn’t to cuddle that sin. This is how you work out your salvation with fear and trembling, this is part of what it means to serve God in reverence. Believers do not pamper sin.
Which is why you cannot leave your faith unattended. To backslide is to first do nothing about your faith and continually do nothing. To a believer, the gospel is still taught for continuation, for he must abide. You must seek the fruits of righteousness. And receive its workings in you through grace.
One day we will stand before the one whom we have believed and we will be forever changed. We will leave this flesh, we will behold him in his beauty, the one whom our mouth has professed and our heart has longed for on the other divide. Every single seeming struggle will fade away. We will stand forever perfected, and worship over and over. On that day we will never need Forgiveness, but till that day we rest assured in the fact that we aren’t slaves to the old life, we live above sin and the world, and ‘if’ we do stumble not ‘when’ because we are not sinners by nature and we aren’t looking forward to it, we will come with a mixture of boldness that forgiveness has already been attained and brokenness that we are sorry and obtain it.
Dear sibling in Christ do not harden your heart to reproof because continuously living in sin will receive God’s judgement. Get up, and do the right thing by going home. Validating your sin will lead to lethargy and coldness. Do not look alive yet be dead. Get up, go home.
