Lay it Down by Bill Tell

Helping you find freedom by laying down performance-driven Christianity. There is a place for you here. Welcome.

Archives for June 2010

Effect Number Three – Unbelievable Good News!

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Okay – lets press on to the third effect of God imputing His righteousness to us because it is so closely tied to the last effect that God no longer condemns us even though we still sin and still experience guilt when we do sin.

This third result is such unbelievably good news that most believers do not believe it! The good news is this – that God will NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER punish you for your sins again! NEVER! If God still punishes us for our sins, then Jesus did not absorb all the punishment for our sins on the cross…and Calvary did not work. A lot of believers seem to approach this like insurance, that Jesus absorbed 80% of our punishment, but there is a 20% copay that we need to absorb…and that others need to experience when they sin!

The ripple effects in our lives of this good news are incredible and far reaching and so for the next few blogs we will take a brief look at some of them. Then at some point in the future I will unpack this more fully because there is a lot here. The first thing we will need to unpack is the difference between God’s punishment and God’s discipline. That’s next.

Effect Number Two – Romans 8:1

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Sorry for the two week delay – but that is an unintended effect of a kidney stone!! Ouch!

Remember – we are looking at the effects of God imputing His righteousness to us…the effects of our relationship being based on the life and death of Christ and not on our performance. The first effect was that our sin never separates us from God again as it is no longer the basis of our relationship.

Now the second effect is this – because God sees Christ’s punishment on the cross as our punishment, we are free from condemnation. Romans 8:1, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

Will you and I still sin? Absolutely, we still have our flesh. Do we feel guilty when we sin? You bet! Does our guilt condemn us? NO! Never again do we need to feel condemned when we sin. If we still feel condemned because of our sin and guilt, we are imagining something that is not true. If in reality we are still condemned then the sacrifice of Christ on cross did not work…but it did work and so there is not even a grain of condemnation left for us. What incredible freedom this gives us in the presence of God.

So What About I John 1:9?

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So – if my sin doesn’t come between me and God any more – what about I 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.” Doesn’t confession get the sins our from between us so we can be close again? This is what I believed for years. But once I began to grasp the truth of the previous blog, I found I had to rethink this verse.

What if when I sin, God doesn’t move away. And what if I can’t move away because he has me in His grasp? What if nothing in all of creation can separate me from the love of God…not even my sin? But what if in that grasp I feel uncomfortable and dirty and it makes me squirm in His grasp of me? That’s where I John 1:9 comes in – when I confess He is faithful to cleanse me and I can stop squirming and enjoy this beautiful relationship of grace that I have with Him.