Christian Living

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Can God forgive my sins? Does God forgive all sins? I desperately need my sins to be forgiven. Can I trust in God to forgive even the most terrible sins? Yes, the Bible supplies us with the answer and does so in very strong terms. Beholding the forgiveness of God is awe-inspiring. Who forgives to the extent that God forgives? The abundance of God’s forgiveness is revealed in the way He depicts His forgiveness.

1. He will bury our sins
When we sin against God and we approach him in repentance, He promises to cast our sins into the depths of the sea. The idea here is that our sins are buried out of His sight. The prophet wrote,

You will again have compassion on us; you will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea (Micah 7:19 ).

God assures us that He does not operate in the same way that man does. When He forgives, He does not bring the sins up again. They are in the depths of the sea, never to be used against us before the heavenly court. No one, not even the devil, can successfully accuse us with them for all time and eternity. Once our sins are forgiven, they are forgiven forever.

2. He will not remember our sins again
Indeed, not only does God remove our sins from His sight, but He also goes further with His forgiveness. He will remember our sins no more. Unlike some people who will always remind us of what we did a week ago, God says that once He forgives us, He forgets. He said,

For I will forgive their wickedness and will remember their sins no more (Hebrews 8:12).

When the Bible speaks of God remembering our sins no more, it does not mean that God has amnesia. It means that the memory of our sins does not soil our relationship with Him. He will never allow our past sins to play a role in our current relationship with Him. When God forgives, He forgets.

3. He will blot out our sins
God also used the word “blot” to talk about our sins. Blot is a very strong word, and use of that word implies that when God forgives in His legal court, no residue remains. He said,

I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more (Isaiah 43:25).

The word refers to the cancellation of debt. Our sins are like debts in the eyes of the Sovereign ruler of the universe. The debt must be paid. However, once the sins are blotted out, we are acquitted.

Another beauty of God’s forgiveness here is the emphatic use of the first pronoun, I. He said He is the One who blots out our transgressions. Neither man nor angel plays a part in this process; it is by His act of will and grace alone that He blots out our sins. He acquits us. He cancels our debt. We are free to walk away from our sins, and in His eyes, they are no longer a debt. What a forgiving God!

He blots out our transgressions, which refer to the breaking of His law. Our sins reveal our imperfections, but with God, all forms of sins can be forgiven and blotted out.

4. He will purge our sins
Very closely related to the idea of blotting is that of purging. David, in his prayer of penance after he had killed an innocent man in order to marry his widow, asked the Lord to purge his sins,

Cleanse me with hyssop, and I will be clean; wash me, and I will be whiter than snow (Psalms 51:7).

He knew of God’s ability to purge his sins to the extent that they would cease to be visible before Him. This act of purging is congruent to the use of hyssop, which must be applied to someone who was previously infected lived like a leper afterwards. When the priest applies this hyssop to him, he is made clean both in the sight of God and man. No doubt David wanted people to also see that God had applied His hyssop and had welcomed him back into the fold.

Similarly, God is willing to do apply the blood of His Son as hyssop. When you come before the Lord, know that He is willing to purge and cleanse you until no residue of sin clings to you.

In conclusion, God wants to portray His willingness to forgive by using these strong terms. No offense is so great that it cannot be forgiven. No sin is so terrible that it is immune to God’s mercy of God. No transgression is so abhorrent that God cannot forgive it. He forgives us of all our sins and He will remember them no more. What a God!

How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? (Hebrews 9:14)

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