A Prayer for Forgiveness

 

 

Compassionate, consoling, gentle, gracious and merciful God when Your Son taught us to pray, He not only taught us that You are the source of  the basic needs of life, but He quickly reminded us that You are the source of  the basic needs of the soul.   He taught us to pray: “Forgive us of our sins.”  Father God, the pain and misery caused by our failures and foolishness; our bad choices and our wrong decisions; our self centeredness and our selfishness would all be unbearable save that You forgive us of our sins.  In Your Word You have said to us: “Blessed are they whose transgressions are forgiven, whose sin is covered…I have swept away Your offenses like a cloud, Your sins like the morning  sun…I will trample Your sins underfoot; I will hurl all Your iniquities into the depth of the sea…Their sins and loveless acts I will remember no more.”   You have thrown a blanket over our sins, You have swept them away as far as the clouds are from the earth; You have hurled them into the bottom of the sea.  You will remember them no more.   All of this is possible because You have made us holy through the sacrifice of Your Son, Jesus.  “He, who knew no sin, became sin for us that we might be made right in Your eyes.”  He made it possible for us to stand blameless, sinless, holy and righteous before You.  He who knows our condition has changed our position.  We now stand in Your presence, forgiven and pardoned, sinless and holy.  You paid the debt You did not owe.

 

Lord Jesus, we confess that we too often dwell on our condition, both past and present, but You call us to think of our position   Keep us from confusing our condition with our position.  We are sinners, the battle between our old nature and our new nature, the old man and the new man, continues throughout life’s journey.  But our position in Christ calls us to live a life of peace, joy and righteousness.  Our forgiveness results in the deep abiding assurance that one day our condition will be as our position.  We may still feel guilty, but we know that forgiveness is not based on our feelings but on the fact that Your Son, our Savior, died for our sins.  

 

All this we accept as true, O Lord God, but we are left with our memories.  Time itself has not delivered us of them.  Oh that You had included our memories in our salvation.    But is it possible that they have been included?  You did not totally remove them but You did change them.   You changed them from a curse to a cross.   Prior to our knowing Your Son Jesus, our memories were a curse, hanging over our heads, condemning us, but now they are a cross.  The memories of our past are the cross we bear; the cross which reminds us in our time of temptation of the grace that has redeemed and delivered  us from our sin.    Sometimes I wonder if this was not what our Savior was thinking when he said, “Come unto me all you who are heavy burdened (because of past sins) and I will give rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am gentle in heart and you will find rest for your souls.”

 

Father God, thank You for providing that which our souls need most - forgiveness.  Yes, “Forgive us of our sin.”       Amen