The Apostle’s Creed: The Forgiveness of Sins

The Apostle’s Creed -The Forgiveness of Sins

“God exalted this Man to His right hand to be a Ruler and a Savior, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins.” Act 5:31 

“Therefore, brothers, let it be known to you that through this Man forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you” Act 13:38

“… to open their eyes, and 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.”  Act 26:18

“In Him we have redemption through His blood and the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace,” Eph 1:7

“… in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.”  Col 1:14

Can there be any better words to hear from Jesus than these, “Your sins are forgiven.” Luk 7:48

And why are these words so wonderful?  Because we are sinners; we have broken God’s law repeatedly, and with impunity; we love to sin!  And so to have our sins forgiven is wonderful!

We Christians too continue sin.  We do not like to sin as we once did, we do not sin as often as we did, nor with such high-handedness, but we still sin.  Paul relates his own experience in Rom 7.

So these words “forgiveness of sins” are very dear to we Christians.  Our sins are covered by the blood of Christ, blotted out, washed away, forgotten, cast into the sea:  forgiven.

We ourselves could do nothing to get rid of our sins; someone else had to get rid of them for us.  When Jesus died on the cross, he satisfied/appeased (the Bible word is “propitiated”) the wrath of God, and his blood washed away, covered our sins. 

We are talking about the forgiveness of specific sins, individual acts of sin; each one of which deserved to be punished.  Even though people like to think their good deeds will outweigh their sins, think of this hypothetical statement by a murder to a Judge in a Court of Law, “Your Honor, yes I did commit this murder, but I give to the United Way, and do many other good deeds, so you cannot punish me for this murder; I only killed once, but I do many good things”; no Judge would accept that plea, and if any Judge ever did, there would be a huge public uproar, and rightfully so.

Our Court system functions that way, because God functions that way; that is one way in which we are image bearers of God:  in our sense of justice.

We innately know our good deeds cannot offset our sins.

We are supposed to do good, we are supposed to obey the law; we are we are not rewarded for obeying, that is what we are supposed to do.  We are punished for disobeying; we are not supposed to disobey.  Your boss does not reward you for being on time to work, you are supposed to be on time, every day, never late; but he docks you when you are late, because you did not do what you are supposed to do.

The good news of the Gospel is that “there is forgiveness of sins”!  Jesus died in our place, appeased (propitiated) the wrath of God, and his blood washed away, covered our sins.  He took our place; he died for us!   That is the Gospel!  So simple, so clear!

The 1st Century Greek and Roman had no concept of a God who ruled in heaven, who had a law, which all men are required to obey, and so they did not have a concept of sin against God, and hence they did not think they needed forgiveness.

The 1st century Christian was acknowledging they were sinners, people who had broken God’s law, but they were also proclaiming forgiveness of sins!

What about you?  Do you understand that there is a God in heaven, who has a law, which you are required to obey, but which you have broken, and that for those individual sins, crimes against God, you deserve to be punished?

I am telling you there are two (2) roads: one of life and one of death; choose life!  Humble yourself before God, admit you have sinned, admit that you will never be able to pay the debt for your sins, and ask to be forgiven.

I, Ray, believe in the forgiveness of sins; I have experienced the forgiveness of my sins!