If you have placed your faith in Jesus Christ then all of your sins (past, present, and future) have been forgiven. There is nothing you can do to earn that forgiveness. Jesus paid the price for your sins and the sins of the whole world when He died on the cross. Psalm 103:12 says, “as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.” In other words, God looks upon us, His children, as if we have never sinned at all. But how do we reconcile this knowledge of Christ’s forgiveness with the reality that we still sin every day?
License to sin?
If all of our sins have been forgiven, should we use that as a license to sin? In Romans 6:1-2, the apostle Paul answers, “By no means!” When we become Christians, our relationship with sin changes. Once we were slaves to our sin, but now we are slaves to God. 1 John 3:6 states that “no one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.” True believers do not make a habit of sinning, rather they confess their sins to God. The Bible says in 1 John 1:9 that “if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” When we confess our sins before God and acknowledge that we were wrong, God restores our relationship with Him, our everlasting Father.
Perfection of Jesus
Many Christians wonder how God could forgive them when they fail Him every day. It is important to understand that God’s forgiveness is not based on our goodness, but on the perfection of Jesus. When we mess up, we need to confess our sins, but we never have to doubt that God has truly forgiven us. Is there something you’ve been trying to hide from God? Won’t you confess it to Him today?