The Way We Were

Then the serpent said to the woman, "You will surely not die.  For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."  So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate.  She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate.  Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew tthat they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves coverings.  And they heard the sound of the LORD God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the LORD God among the trees of the garden.
Genesis 3: 4-8 NKJV

I hear alot of people talk of just how many times that they go to God in prayer for forgiveness for something they've done. Somehow, in their own minds, Jesus has somehow erased the sacrafice which He offered for them so many years ago.  Now, when I phrase it this way, people would think me deluded if I were to say that the blood sacrafice of our Lord Jesus has somehow been removed from Gods sight.  And yet this is just the thinking which we embrace when we somehow feel that we need to come to God for His forgiveness for whatever it is we have done.  In our hearts, we may feel that we are indeed sinners saved by Gods grace, but is this the truth?  I think not.  For the blood sacrafice of Christ Jesus was not a temporary solution, but a new creation.  Under the law, a priest would offer up sacrafices and prayers of forgiveness for the Jewish people each year on the Day of Atonement.  The trouble with this line of thinking is that it was only a temporary solution, which is why more supplications to God were needed each and every year.  The sacrafices offered under the law never removed the sins of the people, it only covered them.  Like sweeping dirt under a rug, the area may indeed look clean, but the real dirt remains hidden underneath.

And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us.  And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.  Having disarmed principalities and powers, He made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them in it.
Colossions 2: 13-15 NKJV

Of course, to believe in the death and resurection of Jesus is to believe that He gave Himself once and for all for the sins which once convicted us and held us hostage.  The apostle Paul even went so far as to call those who have not received the gift of Christ as being "Slaves to sin"{Romans 6:16}.  Do we believe in our hearts that Jesus truly gave Himself to death to cleanse our sins?  Yes?  Then why is it that we still seek our Lords forgiveness for our perceived iniquities?  Are there somehow some of our sins which Jesus could not nor would not give Himself for?  Not according to the apostle Paul.

Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slave sto sin.  For he who has died has been freed from sin.  Now if we died with Christ, {Galations 2:20} we believe that we shall also live with Him, Knowing that Christ, having been raised from the dead, dies no more.  Death no longer has dominion over Him.  For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all; but the life that He lives, He lives to God.  Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6: 6-11 NKJV

If we take to heart this passage from Romans 6, we see the truth that Paul is trying to reveal.  For on that cross, Jesus defeated  sin once and for all.  As Paul claims, "For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all."  It is for this very reason that there is now no sin for which we have need to seek our Lords forgiveness.  That slate has been wiped clean at the cross.  And if our "Old man" has been crucified with Christ, what sin is there that is left to be forgiven?

~Scott~