Forgive and Forget (10-2-10)

Isaiah 43:25 - "I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, And I will not remember your sins."
 

Jeremiah 31:34 - "for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more."

Ezekiel 33:16 - "None of his sins that he has committed will be remembered against him. He has practiced justice and righteousness; he shall surely live."

Hebrews 8:12 - "For I will be merciful to their iniquities, And I will remember their sins no more."

Hebrews 10:17 - "And their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more."

Not only does God forgive our sins, and not only did He do all the work in order to be able to forgive our sins, but something that stuck out to me recently is that He forgets our sins. All of the verses I quoted state that God will not remember our sins. It's great to know that I'm forgiven, but the fact that God not only forgives but also forgets our sins is very comforting. The only thing God can see when He looks at us is the blood of Christ. He cannot see our sins. This does not mean that He doesn't know about them, He's God, He knows everything. But He chooses to put them behind Him, if you will, and not bring them up anymore. Once He has forgiven your sins He will never bring them up again. Satan may bring them to our remembrance and try and convince us that we are beyond forgiveness, but that is simply not true. When our sins are covered with the blood of Christ, God will not bring them up again. I find it interesting that there are a lot of Old Testament saints who sinned against the Lord, and yet in the New Testament their sins are not mentioned, only their righteousness. In Hebrews 11, for example, one of the most striking examples of faith mentioned is Sampson. You would have to search the account of Sampsons life very carefully to find out how exactly he demonstrated a life of faith, and yet in the New Testament he is mentioned as a man of faith. It's as if the Lord forgot about his sins. Another striking example is in 2 Peter 2 when God refers to Abrahams nephew Lot as "Righteous Lot." If all that we knew about Lot was recorded in the Old Testament we could very easily come to the conclusion that Lot was not saved. But this verse in Second Peter informs us otherwise. The Lord views Lot as "Righteous Lot."

Praise God that He chooses to remember our sins and our lawless deeds no no more! We need to strive to imitate our Heavenly Father in this way. If He chooses to forget our sins, who are we to remember or bring up the sins of another? If our Heavenly Father could forgive and forget, how can we do less than the same?

Colossians 3:12-13 - "So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you."