The Power of Forgiveness

Acts 26:17b-18 “I now send you, to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me.”

I was read this power devotion on forgiveness and it states that there is a historical point in our earthly lives at which the forgiveness of Christ was granted, even though He was “slain from the foundation of the world” and in the eternal sense we were “predestined” to be “conformed to the image of his Son”. Historical point because it changed our destiny. By Christ’s finished redemption work on the cross, he has subdued, cleansed, and forgotten our sins. Our human minds will never comprehend what it cost the triune Godhead to subdue our iniquities and metaphorically throw our sins “into the depths of the sea”. How is it possible for an omniscient (All-knowing) God to blot out and forget our sins? Yet the Scriptures clearly tell us that He does so. God’s forgiveness is an eternal act of forgetfulness as well as judicial payment and propitiation with the perfect sacrifice in Jesus Christ on our behalf. A holy God cannot fellowship with an unholy being.

Christ has replaced our sins with His holiness.  Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new. We must be made the righteousness of God in him, so that He “might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus” – Romans 3:26. Christ has given us victory over sin. Since all of the above is true and active in the life of every believer, there should be an obvious exhilaration that enables us to confidently stand against whatever “fiery darts” the Enemy – the devil- throws at us.

Sin shall not have dominion over you. Since the offense of sin was dealt with on the cross, we should “reign in life” by Jesus Christ. That is the power of forgiveness and God has made this possible.

In Christ, Brian