Is forgiveness a small thing?
Today in chapel, we continued on our way through Mark, focusing on the story of the paralytic forgiven and healed in Mark 2. Chaplain Messner focused on two questions:
- What is my biggest problem? or, what is the greatest threat to my welfare?
- Who is able to deal with that problem?
As we looked at the paralytic and his friends, the scribes, and Jesus, we saw that jesus saw past the paralytic’s physical need to his greatest need, to be cleansed from his sin. We tend to see our greatest problem or threat as something that comes from outside us: spiritual, material, or relational evil. But jesus makes it clear that the greatest problem we have is our own sinful hearts, and our greatest need is to be forgiven. Regardless of all other problems in our lives, this one remains the greatest, and only God can deal with it. Jesus was able to forgive the paralytic’s sin because He was God and would later pay the full price of that forgiveness on the cross.
But, day to day, do we really see forgiveness as a small thing? Is it something that we take for granted?
The other, and very real, problems and evils we face in our lives are “light and momentary” when we really understand our sin and God’s holiness. Personally, this truth has hit me from all sides. My pastor, Rev. Eddie Jacks, who is preaching this Friday in Chapel, drove a similar point home during our Sunday service yesterday as he was preaching from Christ’s letter to the church at Sardis in Revelation. Then, yesterday afternoon, I picked up “at random” Ed Welch’s book When People are Big and God is Small, a chapter of which provided a similar helpful way of seeing our fears in light of the truth of the gospel. So, the questions I am asking myself this afternoon:
Do I see my sin as my worst problem? Or am I convinced that there are bigger, more important problems I need God to deal with? Do I truly want to run from my sin and to the forgiveness of Christ found at the cross?
Published on 10 Nov 2008 by Christiana Fitzpatrick at 1:20 pm.
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