Forgiveness

Welcome to disciple making: (Karl Payne):

"I believe that God did love me once, but could He still love me now? After all I've been doing He must hate me."

Anyone who knows Christ as Savior knows just how bad you can feel when sin occurs. The real issue concerning sin is not how it makes us feel, but rather, knowing what God promises in His Word concerning how we should respond when we do miss the mark. What does Scripture tell a Christian about struggles with sin after he or she has been truly born again?

1 John 8-9 reveals three ways that Christians can deal with sin. Think of this like an oreo cookie.

verse 8 (the dark side of the cookie): one may deny the existence of sin.

verse 9 (the white center of the cookie): one may confess and receive forgiveness.

verse 10 (the dark side of the cookie): one may deny the commission of sin and portray God as a liar.

Everyone sins, even sincere Christians. However, growing Christians consistently make a volitional, conscious decision to deal with their sin (1 John 1:9), whereas carnal or worldly Christians are typically just as conscious and consistant in their volitional attempt to deny their sin (1 John 1:8, 10).

The word "confess" means to agree with God that I was wrong and His way is right. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to cleanse... Confession implies that I am not only sorry the sin occurred, I don't want it to happen again. What should I do when I sin - any sin - no matter how big or small? I need to confess that sin as soon as possible. The word "all" is also extremely important in this verse. God has promised to forgive all sin that is confessed.

There is a distinction between "biblical confession" and "confession."

Biblical confession - I agree that God's way is the right way and I need to change and go His way.

False confession - I'm sorry that you caught me. My way is still the right way.

Should I confess the same sin over and over to show God I mean it?

No! Why would you ask God to forgive something that is no longer there?

If we confess our sin, He is faithful and righteous to cleanse us... It's gone in God's eyes - you're clean - let it go.

A simple exercise to illustrate God's forgiveness:

1. Ask the Holy Spirit to convict you of all the sins between you and your Heavenly Father.

2. List the sin(s) that you are convicted of and write them on a piece of paper.

3. Confess each sin - agree with God that it is wrong and make a conscious decision to do things God's way.

4. Write or recite 1 John 1:9 across the list (your guarantee, explain sale, receipt).

5. Thank God for His promises - you confessed - He cleansed.

6. If you need to apologize or make restitution - do it.

REMEMBER

• Two options - We can deny our sin (1 John 1:8, 10) or deal with it (1 John 1:9).
• Two words:
• "Confess" - I agree with God. He is right, I am wrong.
• "All" - God has promised to forgive all my sin. As long as I have breath, God must still have a plan for me.
• The cookie illustration.
• The previous lesson's train illustration. The ultimate basis for the forgiveness of our sin is the character of God and the fact of His Word, not our performance or subjective feeling.
• Because God is truth (John 14:6) and God cannot lie (Titus 1:2), He must keep His promise to forgive and cleanse. Therefore, confidently thank God that through confession, you are forgiven and cleansed.

Karl Payne's personal note: I grew up in a home that would have been considered moral and ethical, but not religious. Both of my parents were teachers. Dad was a Mathematics / Science specialist for the Sacramento City School District and my mom taught grade school. My Dad would occasionally pray for our food, but we did not read the Bible or discuss religious topics. I decided my first Sunday of seventh grade that I had no real interest in church or Sunday school and informed my parents that I would no longer attend either. I assumed I was a Christian because I had been baptized as a child at my mom's request, but my primary interests were baseball, football and music.

On June 17th, 1970 I became a Christian while attending a youth retreat sponsored by Young Life, a Christian ministry focused upon reaching high school students. The two biggest hurdles I faced in that decision both related to honest assumptions. My first assumption related to what I had understood it meant to be a Christian. I assumed that I was a Christian because I had been baptized. Christians get baptized, I had been baptized, therefore, I was a Christian. I also thought that heaven, if it was real, was attained by being a nice person. I reasoned that since on a moral and ethical scale which had the Pope on one end and Hitler on the other, that my live style was closer to the Pope's than Hitler's, thus making me a shoe in for heaven if God was fair.

The second assumption I had made related to education. In eighth grade my science teacher told our class that "religious people were mental cripples who needed a crutch to get through life." I was very impressed by this teacher and took to heart what he said. In the eleventh grade, my physiology teacher told our class that "educated people believed in evolution." As I grew older my education had become more important to me. As a result of several teacher's comments I assumed that it was not possible to think deeply and still be a Christian. Religion in my mind was therefore something for nice people who were not too concerned about an academic education. My first assumption was to confuse churchianity with Christianity. Churchianity represents men and women making their best efforts to reach up to God and receive His approval, based upon their individual efforts to be found worthy in His eyes. Biblical Christianity is a message explaining how God has chosen to reach down to mankind through the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ, providing salvation by His grace as a free gift to all who believe, in spite of our unworthiness. Religion is essentially a message of man reaching up to God. Christianity is a message detailing how God has reached down to man. Religion exalts man. Christianity exalts God. I had received just enough religious training to confuse religion with Christianity and had rejected an honest consideration of Christianity in the process. My second assumption was to confuse naturalism, dialectical materialism and the suppositional baggage assumed to be true by both philosophical world views, with actual empirical data and good science, which provides conclusions based upon testing, observation and repetition rather than wishful thinking and naturalist / atheistic suppositional indoctrination.

On the 17th of June, 1970 at 8:00 P.M., I listened to a gentleman clearly explain that God's plan is that I have eternal life (John 3:16, John 10:10, Romans 5:1), but that my problem with sin (to miss the mark in word, thought or deed) had separated me from Him (Romans 3:23, Romans 6:23). This sounded more like bad news to me than good news. He went on to say that God had provided a remedy for my sin by sending His only son Jesus Christ to die on a cross as a payment for my penalty (2 Corinthians 5:21, Philippians 2:4-10, 1 Timothy 2:5, Romans 5:8, John 14:6, Ephesians 2:8-9), but that it was absolutely necessary for me to respond to His remedy for the remedy to be effective (John 1:12, Romans 10:9-10, Revelation 3:20). I bowed my head in that room and quietly asked Jesus Christ to become my Savior and Lord. Jesus came into my life and has made me a new person, from the inside out (2 Corinthians 5:17). That was nearly thirty-one years ago. Knowing Jesus is more than religious activism or academic curiosity. It is a real relationship. Spiritual maturity is a process (1 John 2:12-14) that should continue to develop and grow as long as we are alive.

God used a Campus Crusade for Christ high school ministry to teach me that aggressive, reproductive Christianity (2 Timothy 2:2) should be considered normal Christianity. Sincerity is necessary for Christian living, but it is not sufficient for impacting our world for Christ (Matthew 28:18-20, 2 Corinthians 5:17-21, 2 Timothy 2:15, 1 Peter 3:15). He has used several godly men, seminary and nearly twenty-five years of serving in church ministry to teach me that making disciples means far more than leading people to Christ and asking them to pray and read their Bibles. It is impossible to give what you do not have or share what you do not know. When people tell me that their Christian faith is boring, what they are really telling me is that they do not pray, they do not study and they do not give away what they have been given. The Christian life is an adventure that is exciting to live and share. To judge Christianity by people who sit on their hands, criticize others and turn a living faith into dead religion is to misrepresent Biblical Christianity. Christianity was never meant to be lived as a passive spectator sport.

Dr. Karl Payne, at heart, is an apologist who loves to train and equip Christians for spiritual service and warfare (Eph.4:11-16). He enjoys preaching, writing and retreat / conference / seminar speaking. He derives his greatest pleasure tackling the challenge of teaching Christian workers, interns and budding preachers / teachers at both the Bible College and Seminary levels. In addition, he has co-authored two books: A just Defense and Cross Training through Multnomah Press.

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