Encouragements for our troubled times No. 37
COVID-19 Series | Date: 03 December 2020
The Elders and Deacons want to encourage the members and those who regularly meet with us through this weekly letter. If you have news which you would be happy to share with the fellowship or request for prayer, then please let us know.
A message from our Pastor
** 1 John 1:9**
“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."
Whether we are in lockdown or out of it; or whether we are living with COVID or are free of the virus; one thing is for certain, we all sin and have need of our God’s forgiveness. It doesn’t matter how long we have been a Christian or how mature and godly we are, we all sin. In fact, the longer we are Christians the more we realise how prone to sin we are, and how deep our sins go. We, like the Apostle Paul, can say “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?” One day we will be fully delivered and we can also say with Paul “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” For He will complete that which He has begun in us. But until that time, while we are still in the flesh, we are prone to sin and need our Lord’s forgiveness. So, how comforting to read this promise of God’s Word.
“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins.” What a God we have, ever faithful. His Son has suffered and died for all our sins. He has paid the full price and taken all our sins away. They are all dealt with, therefore if we confess our sins, He will not withhold His forgiveness. Nor does He want to, that’s why He chastens us. He wants us to turn away from sin and walk with Him in righteousness so He corrects us and forgives us. But He could not do this without His Son’s sacrifice for us. Our God is also ever just. Our God will never require a second payment for those sins that Jesus has paid the price for. Jesus has paid for them all; past, present and future. Therefore, because He is just, He will not withhold His forgiveness.
When we confess our sins, He not only forgives us but He will also “cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” When we are forgiven by a fellow human being, we may feel forgiven and in the eyes of the law we may be guiltless but the act and its guilt never really leaves us. We have committed a sin; the act has been done and it cannot be undone by our confession or by another’s forgiveness. But as far as our God is concerned, all of the sin is gone, Jesus has become sin for us. He has taken the deed, with all its guilt and shame, and removed it from us, as far as the east is from the west. It is no longer ours. Therefore, when we confess our sins our Heavenly Father is able to cleanse us from all the unrighteousness.
So, when we, as His blood-bought children, confess our sins and He forgives, we stand before Him forgiven and cleansed; His righteous children, for “the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all our sin.” Verse 7.