“Praise” Coaching–Part 2: Forgiven
Our sins can prompt two opposite and equally harmful (and possibly damning) responses in our hearts. The first is not to think enough about them, and the other is to think too much of them. The first response shows we don’t know ourselves well enough, and the second that we don’t know God well enough.
Sadly, I can have both of those responses, often in the same day! My heart can fall into its judgmental bent, especially toward those who hurt or disappoint me, without my seeing the “log” in my eye over the matter–I feel justified. But then, something will remind me that being forgiven means being a forgiver, not judging, etc. And then I can spin into the despair that comes when I see how my sins often seem to be on “repeat.” God certainly must be tired of forgiving me–he probably is already shrugging and saying, “that’s just Craig.”
Of course both attitudes are wrong–the one that says my sin isn’t really a problem, and the one that says it’s too big a problem for God to still be gracious to me.
And so, the first of the benefits listed by the psalmist for us not to forget is that the Lord “forgives all our iniquities.” This word for wrongdoing is one of a number of terms the Bible uses. “Sin” is generally missing the mark of God’s standard. “Trespass” (or “transgression”) is crossing a line that God has drawn (like crossing a fence onto private property). But “iniquity” speaks to our own brokenness–it refers to what is corrupt, bent, and crooked in us.
When we have a small view of sin, it is often because we have a large (and generous) view of ourselves. We know we sin, but everyone does, and it’s not a big deal. Our brokenness doesn’t “seem” broken, it seems “normal.” But that’s the problem–it is normal, or what the Bible calls “natural” to us. If my head were stuck at a 45° angle, I might cope by holding my upper body at a ridiculous angle, but more likely, my brain would adapt and interpret things in a way that “makes sense,” even though something was very wrong with me. Our iniquity can be that way. We don’t understand our brokenness because it is so often what we have always known, or what we have become used to.
Iniquity’s brokenness isn’t physical, though. It is spiritual, and brings with it the moral corruption that is normal for the “natural” person apart from God. In 1 Corinthians 2:14, Paul says this person doesn’t perceive the things of God and in chapter 3 he says some Christians in Corinth were thinking just like unbelievers–like people of “the flesh.” When we are not very concerned about just how broken we are, we are not in a mindset that makes us long for mercy, grace, and forgiveness. We may think we deserve a break, because our sin isn’t that serious. That is a dangerous place to be.
But we can think too much of our sin as well. It’s not that we shouldn’t see it as very serious–we should. John Owen’s book “On the Mortification of Sin” encourages us from the Scriptures that reminding ourselves of just how serious and deadly our sin is serves as a tool to help us hate it and seek to kill it. But sometimes we believe our iniquities are too great and their guilt too much for God to overcome–especially if we have sought and received forgiveness in the past and then gone on to sin–perhaps even greater sins than we had before. We are certain that God, having shown mercy, will not be taken in by our cries this time. At best, he might grudgingly forgive a first or second return, but that’s it.
If we think this way, it is because we believe God is like us–a lie that is part of our inheritance from the fall of humanity into sin in the first place. Sin makes us “performers”–we must perform to receive people’s approval and we must perform to turn away God’s wrath and make him accept us–whether by sowing fig leaves to cover our nakedness, or by cleaning up our lives in order to be pleasing to him, or by trying to make up for our sin by being extra righteous before we ask him for anything. What this reveals is our incredibly mixed up view of who God is. Far from being a stern and judgmental Father whose Son is perpetually disappointed in those he died to redeem and who sends the Spirit to constantly show us just how guilty we are, the triune God goes to great lengths to show us just how much he is for us. This very psalm (103) reminds us:
“As parents feel for their children,
God feels for those who fear him.
He knows us inside and out,
keeps in mind that we’re made of mud (Ps. 103:13-14 MSG)”
Jesus tells us to come to him and we’ll find he is “gentle and humble” and gives rest, not tasks, to the weary and heavy laden (Matthew 11:29).
And the Spirit does convict, but he does so as a measure of God’s kindness that leads us to repentance (Romans 2:4), and then empowers our praying when we do repent (Romans 8:26).
Thus, when I begin my recounting of the Lord’s benefits, what better place to start than here?
My iniquities are real, they are deadly, and they will constantly lead me to wrong conclusions and deadly consequences. They have been with me in some manner since before I was born (remember Ps. 51:5). They promote rebellion in my heart, and too often I believe and act on the false narrative they tell (“it won’t hurt,” “you deserve…,” “God isn’t being good to you,” and all other such reasonings).
And yet the Lord forgives all my iniquities. He forgives the ones that have been with me seemingly since birth and still trouble me. Every iniquity, trespass, sin, has been forgiven. The ones I committed before I trusted in the mercy of God through the blood of Jesus Christ are forgiven, but so are the ones committed after.The Lord forgives, not because I deserve it, but because he has made a promise to redeem those who come to him in repentance. That promise (or covenant) led him in the Old Testament to express his anger and even chastisement on Israel, but then to offer the consolation of restoration–even calling Israel his “favored child” that he could not give up in Jeremiah 31:20–after chapters of recounting Israel’s failures and rebellions.
He forgives the iniquities that I will commit today, and those I will commit tomorrow. I hate even writing that, but I know it will be true of me, and of you as well. Isn’t it a marvel that every day, even on those days when I’m not particularly sensitive to spiritual things, the Lord still forgives?
There is no better place to start our memory restoration program than here. I should begin by remembering how lost I was, and how hopeless I would be as a bent, crooked soul before the Righteous Judge. But the Father who judges also loves his children and is a merciful God. His Son rejoiced at the thought of redeeming the sheep the Father entrusted to him and he will not lose one of us. He knows we are sinners, but he loves us enough to make the way for us to be forgiven. And whenever we come, as often as we come, we find forgiveness.
As John Newton said, “I am a great sinner, and Christ is a great Savior.” Let’s remember and rehearse the forgiveness of all our iniquities as we begin to praise the Lord.
