Thoughts on God's Forgiveness and Mercy throughout the Scriptures
Thursday April 11, 2013 12:29am
God's forgiveness, where do we even start to describe the mercy God has for us as sinners. i guess the best place to start would be in Genesis. We can all recount the story of the fall of human kind, but can we see God's forgiveness in it? The first thing that we learn in our Bible classes is that God's redemption plan was started the moment of the fall. As we see God does not leave His creation alone, He seeks out Adam and Eve, He doesn't abandon them despite having the knowledge of what they had done. When God finds them He has to punish them by removing them from His presence, but He doesn't just leave them to fend for themselves He gives them clothes made from animal skin, what a lot of people would consider the first sacrifice for sins, and He puts angels to guard the way to Garden. That verse in itself is interesting. I have been told by people a lot smarter than me that the phrase literally means to keep the way to the Garden. Possibly it was their way of going to perform sacrifices. Overall though we see God acting on the humans' behalf.
Something i found really interesting that God never has to develop the idea of forgiveness. i guess for us we are taught to forgive others for wrong doings, but God never had to do that. As soon as the people messed up, God not only forgave but took actions to help them and to benefit them. He wanted to maintain the relationship, not to separate it. The only time we ever see God come to a point where He is tired of the way things are is the flood narrative. The Bible says God regretted making human kind. However there is still hope, God finds Noah. Noah is a man who walks blamelessly before the Lord. A truly righteous man in a cruel world. God is willing to take action to preserve His creation through Noah. Even though God does punish, He still longs for the relationship to be reinstated. He longs for the recreation.
Just to look at some of the examples of forgiveness in the Bible i'll list off a few names. Moses, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Samson, David, Jehoshaphat, Jonah, Peter, the crippled man (Mark 2:5), Paul, and so many more. Our God is a forgiving God and a just God. There are consequences to our actions, but God's love and mercy have overcome the actions themselves. If we want to be forgiven, God will forgive. If we want to be forgiven, we will forgive. Jesus tells us that if a man will not forgive his brother, God will not forgive him. God expects us to be involved in the restoring of the relationship with Him. So often we speak about Heaven and how wonderful it will be, and by golly it's going to be great. But this should not be our main focus right now. We are called by God to restore His people unto Him, and to pursue the Kingdom of God. Jesus preached that the Kingdom of God is near and when we realize it's about loving others as ourselves we are getting ever so close to the Kingdom. It's God plan to not only restore our relationship, but to also restore His creation. Let's not get to wrapped up in the glory of things to come, let's focus on introducing others to God's mercy. Let's hold on to the hope of the glory of God, and let's share that hope with others along the way.
God's forgiveness, where do we even start to describe the mercy God has for us as sinners. i guess the best place to start would be in Genesis. We can all recount the story of the fall of human kind, but can we see God's forgiveness in it? The first thing that we learn in our Bible classes is that God's redemption plan was started the moment of the fall. As we see God does not leave His creation alone, He seeks out Adam and Eve, He doesn't abandon them despite having the knowledge of what they had done. When God finds them He has to punish them by removing them from His presence, but He doesn't just leave them to fend for themselves He gives them clothes made from animal skin, what a lot of people would consider the first sacrifice for sins, and He puts angels to guard the way to Garden. That verse in itself is interesting. I have been told by people a lot smarter than me that the phrase literally means to keep the way to the Garden. Possibly it was their way of going to perform sacrifices. Overall though we see God acting on the humans' behalf.
Something i found really interesting that God never has to develop the idea of forgiveness. i guess for us we are taught to forgive others for wrong doings, but God never had to do that. As soon as the people messed up, God not only forgave but took actions to help them and to benefit them. He wanted to maintain the relationship, not to separate it. The only time we ever see God come to a point where He is tired of the way things are is the flood narrative. The Bible says God regretted making human kind. However there is still hope, God finds Noah. Noah is a man who walks blamelessly before the Lord. A truly righteous man in a cruel world. God is willing to take action to preserve His creation through Noah. Even though God does punish, He still longs for the relationship to be reinstated. He longs for the recreation.
Just to look at some of the examples of forgiveness in the Bible i'll list off a few names. Moses, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Samson, David, Jehoshaphat, Jonah, Peter, the crippled man (Mark 2:5), Paul, and so many more. Our God is a forgiving God and a just God. There are consequences to our actions, but God's love and mercy have overcome the actions themselves. If we want to be forgiven, God will forgive. If we want to be forgiven, we will forgive. Jesus tells us that if a man will not forgive his brother, God will not forgive him. God expects us to be involved in the restoring of the relationship with Him. So often we speak about Heaven and how wonderful it will be, and by golly it's going to be great. But this should not be our main focus right now. We are called by God to restore His people unto Him, and to pursue the Kingdom of God. Jesus preached that the Kingdom of God is near and when we realize it's about loving others as ourselves we are getting ever so close to the Kingdom. It's God plan to not only restore our relationship, but to also restore His creation. Let's not get to wrapped up in the glory of things to come, let's focus on introducing others to God's mercy. Let's hold on to the hope of the glory of God, and let's share that hope with others along the way.
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