Will God Forgive Me?

By Neil Earle

At the end of the day most Christians thinking quietly in their beds at nights aren’t bothered by big questions of theology. It’s more like a simple but important series of worrisome queries:

He Was The Worst…

Of all the bad kings in Israel and Judah’s history King Manasseh was the worst. And he was the son of a righteous king, Hezekiah!

Well, sometimes young people like to stiff their parents as many can testify. Here’s the file on Manasseh:

“He did evil in the sight of the Lord, following the detestable practices of the nations the Lord had driven out…He bowed down to all the starry hosts and worshipped them…he sacrificed his sons in the fire in the Valley of Hinnom, practices sorcery, divination and witchcraft, and consulted mediums and spiritists.The Lord spoke to Manasseh and his people but they paid no attention” (2 Chronicles 33:2-6, 10).

Jewish tradition says it was Manasseh who had the prophet Isaiah sawn asunder (Hebrews 11:37). He was the worst!

Assyrians putting hooks in prisoner's lips as with King Manasseh. Click photo to enlarge.

But then…something no one expected. Manasseh foolishly rebelled against the all-conquering Assyrians and promptly got himself carried off to captivity with a hook in his nose and bound with bronze shekels. And then something unexpected happened:

“In his distress he sought the favor of the Lord his god and humbled himself greatly before the God of his fathers. And when he prayed to him the Lord was moved by his entreaty listened to his plea; so he brought him back to Jerusalem and to his kingdom. Then Manasseh knew that the Lord is God” (2 Chronicles 33:12-13).

Would even Ripley believe it?

Manasseh after repentance and faith was not only pardoned and absolved of is. He was restored back to his throne. He becomes an ancestor to Jesus the Christ (Matthew 1:10).

What a turnaround. It is perhaps the ultimate Old Testament example of God’s unbridled mercy and forgiveness. Surely the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting. All made possible by what the book of Hebrews has taken delight in showing – “we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who believe and are saved” (Hebrews 10:39).

Christ’s sacrifice was retrospective, covering the sins o Manasseh and it as prospective covering your and mine. Thank God for his loving kindness.

There is relief in real repentance.

Am I right with God?

Will God forgive me?

And finally, the climax: “Have I committed the Unpardonable Sin?”

The answer to that last one is a robust and resounding “NO!”

The peculiarity of the question about the unpardonable sin is that if you worry about it, it means you haven’t committed it.

Gary Cockerill in a recent commentary on Hebrews 10:26 writes about willful sin and the prospect of no forgiveness: “Let all who are aroused to concern by the force of his warning take heed, yet let them also take comfort. Those whom the pastors’ words evoke concern have not come to such a destiny, for the ears of those who have arrogantly insulted the Spirit of grace are deaf to his pleas.”

In other words, if you think you have committed the unpardonable, that’s proof you haven’t.

Sin’s Broad Sway

Ministers get to know a lot of people and like the great Victorian preacher Charles Spurgeon said years ago, I have not personally met anyone who has ‘trampled the Son of God underfoot” or “insulted the Spirit of grace” (Hebrews 10:29).

Yes, like lawyers and doctors we ministers get to see people at their worst. We can list many rangy, obstreperous, obnoxious and even dangerous people over the decades but none of those I can recollect are in this condition of total rejection of God’s work in Christ. Perhaps there were/are, but not to my remembrance.

Of course we should all be worried about sin and that is a big theme in Hebrews 10:26-39. Remarks about “judgment and raging fire,” “a dreadful thing to fall intro the hands of the living God” and warnings not to “shrink back” are rounded out by Hebrews 10:39, “But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who believe and are saved.”

Mercy always follows judgment, as sinners such as King David and Simon Peter experienced. To be close to God as a Christian is indeed to be close to the possibility of fiery judgment, but that fire is refining as numerous Scriptures attest (Malachi 3:2-3).

Sin is bigger and broader than any of us can even be aware of let along manage and control all the days of our lives. The definition expands out even away from the “lawbreaking” issue. It gets into the heart. Thus, “the thought of foolishness is sin” and whatever falls short of full faithful responses is sin in Romans.

Sinner and Righteous?

That tormented sinner, Martin Luther, won his way through to the peace of God when he realized that the key to the issue was faith. That faith God gave him through the Spirit. He coined a very powerful phrase – “simul justus et peccator” which can mean “I’m justified yet still a sinner.” Christ lived a perfect life and through the Spirit Jesus lived in Luther as he does in all Christians.

Not all churches and ministries have held such a balanced view of grace working through faith for indeed it is hard to hold on to this healthy concept across our own lives. Like quicksilver.

Another aspect of sin and the Christian life is the question, Will I run out of time? How much time will God give me? And that one I usually answer, “As much time as it takes.”

This mercy of God towards the truly repentant is best explained in a life story. Let me introduce you to Andreas, a man I knew from Eastern Europe. Andreas had been sexually abused by his grandfather and his parents were not close. They sent him to an orphanage, a “step up” Andreas told me with a smile on his face.

Never Forsaken!

In 1963 the family moved to Canada and Andreas earned a reputation as a tough guy in school but always sticking up for the underdog. He was sent to Catholic school where he excelled in soccer but that couldn’t stop him from succumbing to those radical torrents of guilt and abuse coursing through his mind and spirit. By age 16 he had stolen 100 cars. At age 8 he faced 75 criminal charges for theft and armed robbery. The only good thing was meeting his wife, Theresa, who somehow believed in him. One day watching a religious movie he felt the character playing Jesus was looking right at him and that scared him into reading a Bible for the first time in his life.

Now he knew there was a God and he needed this early seed sowing for he was out of jail on $100,000 bail and a court case coming up. Losing a bet on a football game he threw a beer bottle through the TV and his wife finally walked out. That really crushed him. He prayed as never before. Slowly he began to hear the voice of the Holy Spirit showing him God had indeed been with him. He was living in peaceful Canada, he had learned from his years at the orphanage, while involved in a car accident while DUI he crashed into a lady's car but her little baby in the back was unscratched. “It was a miracle. The police were dumbfounded that nobody was killed,”

Peter could preach repentance and forgiveness for he had experienced it himself after denying his Lord.

These acts of grace subdued his tempestuous spirit and Theresa returned to him. She knew there was another Andreas inside. About to face court, he fired his lawyer and decided to defend himself with God’s help. The judge was pondering the sentence. Armed robbery, a serious charge but during the crime Andreas had helped a lady with a baby who testified on his behalf.

“The judge hands the sheet to the bailiff. Then he pulls it back,” Andreas told me,”He tears up the paper. For a long time the judge stares out the windows. He shakes his head. He rewrites the sentence. The bailiff reads it. I was so scared all I heard was twelve. I thought, oh, no twelve years. But the prisoner next to me is pumping my hand and congratulates me, all excited. Twelve months, it was twelve months.”

Andreas was praying for “a deuce and a day” – two years! Twelve months was a great break. God was still with him.

He went back to the cell hoping to get a Bible to read and lo and behold there was one already on his bed. He turns to Luke 15 – the prodigal Son. “Thank you, God.”

The inmates hear of his story. One prisoner asks if it will work for him. “Of course God will help you,” Andreas replies. The prisoner fires his lawyer, prays to God and gets his sentence cut in half.

Soon Andreas is leading forty or so inmates to pray with him some nights before shut-down. The guards are suspicious. “Don’t worry this is a good things,” says Andreas. “Ill explain it in the morning.”

Andreas is assigned to work in the kitchen where his natural enthusiasm convinces dozens of inmates to watch religious television. He asks for church literature and is baptized upon his release in May, 1984.

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The Body Reaches Out

End of story?

No. Not quite. “Even after all that the drugs in my body still had such a strong hold. It was very strange. God had given me so many victories yet some of the addictions still stayed. Later on I felt God explained that to me as, When you fall you will know that I am there for you. Always remember the righteous man falls seven times but gets up again.”

Now begins his real long-term Christian struggle. At its best the church is the ultimate support group. “I was up and down. It was very frustrating to me and my ministers trying to deal with this. No one seemed to know what to do. Then came 1987 and the local churches started a support group for people like me called the Invitational Bible Study.” (See Chapter 7 in the book “Mending Broken Relationships” at atimetoreconcile.org.)

Andreas had a tough discouraging battle but “what impressed me about my ministers was that here were well-educated people who, as far as I know, came from good homes, and never experienced some of these things, yet here they were meeting with us, counseling us, telling us God was on our side, and actually going to the AA and narcotics Anonymous meetings with us. It was the blend of Bible encouragement with community counseling that made the difference.”

Finally, in 1989, after attending a detoxifying clinic in New Orleans, Andreas began to get the last convulsions off his back. He was 18 years clean and sober when I last met him in 2007. Truly, it is no secret what God can do.

Andreas shows God will give us the time we need and the help we need and that he will never give up on us. Most of Andreas' sins were on the outside, external. And pastors sometimes feel it is easier for such people to see themselves and to seek God’s help as St. Paul himself alluded to in 1 Timothy 5:24. Sins of the spirit – self-righteousness, chicanery, deceit – these are more serious ultimately because harder to spot. Either away, even these are not unpardonable to those who seek God’s loving-kindness. Andreas’ life proves it.