Perhaps no doctrine is more clearly and more repeatedly set forth in scripture, than that God is now forgiving sins, and that those who are forgiven are entitled to know it for present peace and comfort. When consciences are awakened, (and oh, that many more were awakened!) the certain knowledge of having sinned against God, with its indescribable sense of guilt, and the fear of death and judgment, plunges the soul into the bitterest anguish and distress. To such nothing can give peace, but the certain and unquestionable assurance not from man, but from God Himself—that all their sins have been blotted out, and this so completely, that they will never be remembered again. (Heb. 10:17.) How gracious of God to give such solid assurance!
There is, however, a vague idea in the minds of many on this vitally momentous point. They say, “It is impossible to know that our sins are forgiven till we come to die, or till the day of judgment.” But nothing can be more opposed to the truth of scripture. Did Jesus say to the helpless paralytic man, Your sins shall be forgiven you when you are on a deathbed? Certainly not. But He did say, “Son, be of good cheer, thy sins are forgiven thee.” (Luke 5:20.) Did the Savior say to the sin-convicted woman that fell at His feet in the Pharisee’s house, “You cannot know that your sins are really forgiven till you are near death, or till the day of judgment?” Most certainly not. Quite the contrary. He said to the woman, “Thy sins are forgiven. Thy faith hath saved thee. Go in peace.” (Luke 7:48-50.) Again, did the apostles preach present forgiveness and justification, or only to be known in the future? Let us hear what Paul preached at Antioch. “Be it known unto you, therefore, men and brethren, that through this man [Christ Jesus] is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins; and, by him, all that believe ARE justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses.” (Acts 13:38, 39.) No further evidence, surely, is needed to show the scripture doctrine of present forgiveness of sins. It is now, or never. Jesus said, “If ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins.” (John 8:24.) And yet, in the face of these and other scriptures, we hear many saying, “I hope I shall have my sins forgiven;” “I hope I shall have everlasting life.’ Whereas they have not the smallest ground for hope, and for this reason, because God is proclaiming present forgiveness of sins, through the blood of Jesus, to everyone that believeth. Therefore, those who believe not, instead of having the slightest ground for hope of pardon and salvation, are habitual rejecters of it. It is a very solemn thought; but thus God speaks in His word—“He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life [forgiveness of sins too, Eph. 1:7]; and he that believeth not the Son [or is not subject to the Son], shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.” (John in. 36.) Instead, then, of such having ground for saying they hope to be forgiven, and hope to have eternal life, they are, day by day, rejecters of these very blessings, and are exposing themselves to the abiding wrath of God. Nothing, then, can be more delusive, more fatal, more opposed to the infallible word of God, than the notion that men may hope for forgiveness at some future time. Were the Lord Jesus to descend from heaven with a shout this day, it would be joyfully found by many that “those who are Christ’s at his coming” are “caught up to meet the Lord in the air;” but, with intolerable misery, it would be found by others that they are left behind, and exposed to divine wrath.
“Confession” and “absolution” are words frequently heard in these days; but, alas! with what fatal error. As to confession to men, scripture says, “Confess your faults one to another”—observe, not to an official person, but “one to another, and pray one for another.” Now this certainly implies that the most gifted in the church of God may confess his faults to the feeblest in the faith, with the view of securing their prayers for his blessing; besides, the context shows that the emphasis is on prayer. Again, we say, observe, there is nothing official here. It is really unaccountable how scripture should be so frightfully perverted, that men should be sometimes found who pronounce “ absolution” of the sins of their fellow-sinners in an eternally saving sense. Confession of sins to God is an entirely different thing. We read of one who said, “I acknowledged my sins unto thee, and mine iniquity have I not hid: I said I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord; and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin.” And again, “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins.” (Psalm 32:5; 1 John 1:9.) It is God who pronounces remission of sins to everyone that believeth in Jesus. It is God that justifieth. It is God who pardons, and restores the souls of His erring children, on confession to Him.
If it be said, “The church teaches these popular doctrines of confession and absolution,” the reply is, “We read nothing in scripture of the church teaching, but the very opposite, that the church is taught, that the Lord has given teachers to teach those who form the church, the body of Christ.” (Eph. 4:11, 12.) It is quite true that an apostle, though not even his delegate; and also an assembly of two or three gathered together in the name of the Lord Jesus—a company of disciples, not of apostles, received authority from the Lord to bind or loose, to remit or retain sins, but this certainly only in an administrative character, or in the way of discipline, and never in the sense of eternal salvation. (Compare Matt. 16:19; 18:15-20: 1 Tim. 1:20; John 20:20-23 Cor. 5:4-13; 2 Cor. 2:5-8.)
Throughout the scriptures God is revealed as a sin-hating and sinner-forgiving God. All the prophets, evangelists, and apostles, in their writings, testify of this. What was in former times foreshadowed in the sacrifices of bulls and goats, has, in the end of the ages, been fully substantiated by the one offering of Christ Himself. The clothing of our first parents with “coats of skins;” Abel obtaining witness that he was righteous, by the more excellent sacrifice of the firstling of the flock; the blessings which followed Noah’s offering of the clean beasts and fowls; the sacrifice, in figure, of Abraham’s only-begotten son; the safety given by the blood of the paschal lamb; the cleansing of the leper by blood; the atonement of Israel’s sins by the blood of the sacrifice carried within the veil; and the various daily sacrifices which were continually offered, spoke loudly, yet figuratively, of Him who was in due time to shed His blood on Calvary, for many, for the remission of sins. The harmonious sound, from first to last, was “Without shedding of blood is no remission.” (Lev. 17:11; Heb. 9:22.)
Again, we may notice that all through scripture the blessing given was always on the principle of faith. Adam, in a world of death, brought in by his own sin, so believed God, that he called his wife “the mother of all living.” Eve’s faith so counted on God to fulfill His word, in providing a Redeemer through her, that when her first son was born, she said, “I have gotten a man from the Lord.יי Abel, we are told, offered his sacrifice “by faith.” Noah became heir of righteousness by faith. “Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.” The passover was kept “through faith.” The Red Sea was crossed “by faith.” David described the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works, saying, “Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.” (Rom. 4:3-8.) There are many other scriptures which show that God’s way of blessing to man as a sinner has always been on the principle of faith. Now, however, faith rests on a finished work, an accomplished redemption; we believe in God that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead, who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification. (Rom. 4:24, 25.)
In Peters memorable sermon at Caesarea, he boldly declared that the universal testimony of the prophets was to remission of sins through faith in our Lord Jesus. After having spoken of the Person, life, death, and resurrection of Christ, and of His being “ordained of God to be the Judge of quick and dead” he said, “To him give all the prophets witness, that, through his name, whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins.” (Acts 10:43.)
Surely nothing can be more unquestionably established by the truth of God, than the present certainty of remission of sins, in virtue of the blood of Jesus, to everyone that believeth in Him. God can thus act in righteousness because Christ has once suffered for sins, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God. So thoroughly has sin been atoned for, and all God’s righteous claims met, in the death of His Son, that He righteously raised Him from the dead, and highly exalted Him; and so perfect is the application of the infinite virtue of His work to us, that God can say, “Their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.” It is to this the Holy Spirit bears witness. Nay, more; sin having been righteously judged, the purposes of love are carried out, and divine grace flows forth with such unhindered blessedness, that God freely gives us life, acceptance, and blessing even now in Christ in heavenly places. “He hath made him sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made [or become] the righteousness of God in him.” (2 Cor. 5:21.) Could there possibly be anything more done to assure our hearts, and give certainty as to forgiveness of sins?
And now, dear reader, the solemn and eternally momentous question for you is this— “Are your sins forgiven?” Do not deceive yourself by saying, “I hope they will be,” for you have no authority for so hoping. Neither harbor the delusive idea that it is impossible to know that your sins are forgiven in this life, for have we not seen that God plainly declares in His word who have forgiveness of sins, and who are still in their sins. Do not say, “I will try;” for you cannot obtain remission of sins by trying; but do honestly take your place as a guilty and helpless sinner before God. And if your anxious inquiry is, What can I do to have my sins forgiven? we reply, Nothing. You can do nothing but sin, absolutely nothing; neither does God, in the gospel, demand anything from you. On the contrary; knowing, as He does, your utterly unclean condition, and that you are “without strength” He preaches forgiveness of sins to you, on the principle of faith, entirely on the ground of peace having been made by the death and blood-shedding of His own Son. Do seriously ponder this. Do consider that “without shedding of blood there is no remission,” and that God could not in righteousness forgive you on any other foundation than that Christ hath suffered for your sins in His own body on the tree. What a soul-comforting truth, and what an abiding ground of confidence!
Before you lay this paper down, we beseech you to turn to Jesus, the sinner’s Savior, believe on Him, and have present remission of sins.