Good evening. Quick comment before
I start. To give myself a little leeway
here. If you ever sit down to write a sermon and you got that
thing wrote out a masterpiece, you can follow it right along
good spacing and it's it's pretty good. And then you sit down and
review the last couple of times and you start scribbling a bunch
of comments and stuff you'd like to add in there before long.
It's a mess. And if I pause tonight, I'm not
pausing for effect. I'm dazed and confused and trying
to find where I'm at. So I just got to get that out
there. If you do it at last minute and you got all this, there's
no time to rewrite it and make it all nice. So I'm kind of bothered. Hope it comes out. So I got that. All right, our text is going
to be what Mitch just read out of Jeremiah chapter 31. Let's
turn to Jeremiah 31. Isaiah and Jeremiah. Text is going to be the last
part of verse 34. But I'm going to read again,
starting at verse 33. And this is the new covenant
that God makes with his people, the covenant of grace. But this
shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel.
After those days, saith the Lord, I will put my law on their inward
parts and write it in their hearts and will be their God and they
shall be my people. And they shall teach no more
every man his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, Know
the Lord. For they shall all know me from the least of them
and to the greatest of them, saith the Lord. And here's my
text, for I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember
their sin no more. I've entitled this message, Remember
to Forget. Yeah, it's a little it confused
me even saying it now, but by the end of it, I hope we'll understand
what I mean by that. I want to look at. Four questions
and one comment out of this text. First, whose sins are these that
are forgiven? Second, who then took ownership
of these sins? Third, who put away these sins?
Fourth, now who cannot remember these sins and iniquities? And
last, fifth, there's just going to be a statement. Even though
we forgive him, he'll never forget us. And I want to look at some
of the things of grace that we forget. And the one thing that
we should forget, we seem to always remember. And that's the
one thing we need to remember to forget. So I want to quickly
just look at the first four questions and spend more time on the last
comment. So the first question was, whose sins are these that
are forgiven? It says, I will forgive their
iniquity and I will remember their sin no more. There is a
possessive pronoun. It means it indicates ownership
or possession of something. So a believer is someone that
owns up by the grace of God. They own up to their sin. They
don't try to hide it or dodge it or cover it up. A believer
is a confessor. They own up to their sin. It's
theirs, and it's their fault. Let's look at James chapter 1. James chapter 1. Read a few verses. Right after Hebrews. Talking about a believer taking
ownership. Of their sin, and it's their
fault. James 1 starting verse 13. Let no man say when he is tempted,
I am tempted of God. For God cannot be tempted with
evil, neither tempteth he any man. But every man is tempted
when he is drawn away of his own lust. There is another possessive
pronoun, own. You own it, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived,
it bringeth forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, bringeth
forth death. Do not air my beloved brother. It's his own lust. He owns it. He possesses it.
He committed it. It's all. It's all my fault. Sin is all my fault. It's not
Adam's fault. It's not my parents fault. It's
not my coworkers fault. It's not my kids fault. The devil
didn't make me do it. I made me do it. It's my fault. And verse 16 said, Do not err
concerning this. Don't mistake that. If you make
a mistake there, you're going to make mistakes everywhere else.
So a believer owns up to their sin and they confess their sin.
Turn over a couple books to 1 John, chapter 1. 1 John, chapter 1,
verse 8. This speaks of someone that does
not own up to their sin. Verse eight, if we say that we
have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. We
deceive ourselves and Christ is not in us. Verse nine, if
we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins
and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. There is a believer confessing
their sin. In verse ten, someone doesn't confess. If we say that
we have not sinned, we make him a liar And his word is not in
us, or Christ is not in us. So a believer, only a man with
Christ in them, a believer with a new man, confesses. And he'll
own up and he'll confess his sin to God. So whose sins are
these that are forgiven? It's all who own up to their
own sin. It's their fault. And they confess
that to God. Second question. Who then took
ownership of these sins in this new covenant of grace? Let's
turn to Lamentations right after Jeremiah. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations
chapter one. We'll start reading in verse
18. Lamentations one verse 18. The Lord is righteous, for I
have rebelled against his commandment. Here I pray you, all people,
and behold my sorrow. My virgins and my young men are
going into captivity. I called for my lovers, but they
deceived me. My priests and my elders gave up the ghosts in
the city while they sought their meat to relieve their souls.
Now, these next few verses are words of Christ from the cross.
We know that the Old Testament speaks of Christ. He tells us
that. So let's read these next few verses as Christ from the
cross. Verse 20. Behold, O Lord, for I am in distress. My bowels are troubled. Mine
heart is turned within me. For I have grievously rebelled.
Abroad the sword bereaveth. At home there is death. They
have heard that I sigh. There is none to comfort me.
All mine enemies have heard of my trouble. They are glad that
thou hast done it. Thou wilt bring the day that
thou hast called, and they shall be like unto me. Let all their
wickedness come before thee, and do unto them as thou hast
done unto me for all my transgressions. For my sighs are many, and my
heart is faint." So look at that. Verse 22. Do unto them as thou hast done
unto me for all my transgressions. Christ takes ownership of the
sins of his people and calls them mine. It doesn't say, do
unto them for all of Brian's transgressions or Mitch's or
Mark's or any, it's my transgressions. Christ takes possession, ownership
of all these sins of his people. And although he never committed
one sin, yet on the cross, he claims him as his very own, my
transgressions. He took ownership of all the
blame, all the shame, all the guilt of all our sins. and suffered eternal hell when
he was forsaken of his father for our sins that he took ownership
of. And he took them. We didn't give
them to him, we didn't offer them to him, and we didn't decide
to let him take and promise and all that mushy mush. He took
them. Leviticus 16 verse 22 says, and
the goat, and this is talking about Christ our scapegoat, shall
bear upon him all their iniquities into a land not inhabited, and
he shall let go the goat in the wilderness. The word bear there
means to lift, to take up, to take away. He took my sin, he
took your sin, believer's sins, only himself, and he took ownership
of it. So who took ownership of these
sins in this new covenant? Christ, our scapegoat did. The
third question I wanted to look at was, well, then who put away
these sins? They were taken from us. They
still exist. They didn't disappear yet. We own them. They're our
fault. We confess them to God. Christ
took them. He takes ownership of them. And
then who puts them away? Let's turn to Hebrews chapter
one. I think Todd was here Sunday
reading these first few verses, and we'll read them again, the
first three verses. Hebrews chapter one. Starting verse one, God, who at sundry times and
in diverse manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the
prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son,
whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made
the worlds, who, being the brightness of his glory and the express
image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his
power, When he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on
the right hand of the majesty on high. So here we have in verse
three, Christ himself purged our sins. Purge means a washing
off or a cleansing. And I guess I can relate to it
somehow back in 1985. I was in Groton, Connecticut
at Naval Nuclear Power Welding School. And so we welded all
day long on these pipes. And you put these two pipes together
and you would put this filler metal in between and you'd weld
them together. Well, before you made that weld,
you had to plug one end of the pipe and bring in 100% pure argon
and purge the pipe of air. Take away all the air and replace
it completely with argon. And you had to have 100% pure
argon in that pipe before you did your weld or you had bad
welds. That's called purging the pipe,
purging it with argon. So you got 100% argon, zero air
left when you're done with your purge. Now in the same manner,
the blood of Christ purged away my sin, completely washed it
away, 100% his blood washed it away. So now where God looks
on me, he sees 100% righteousness, 0% sin, because Christ's blood
purged it away. And just like when they x-rayed
them whales completely through with an x-ray machine to make
sure I didn't try to cover something up, because you could, after
a while, you could learn You could do a couple bad whales,
but if you put a cover weld over top of it, you could take your
TIG torch and make it look nice and pretty and smooth, and you'd
think you'd be hiding something from it. Well, they pulled that
x-ray machine out, and sure enough, it would show a pit here, or
inclusion here, or a defect there, and no good. Well, in the same
way, God can look at every believer, and he looks us through and through. And with his x-ray machine, there's
no faults. We're completely perfect and
pure, and it's all done by the blood of Christ, completely purging
us of our sin. A fourth question then is, who
cannot remember these sins? They've been purged away, they're
disappeared, they're gone. Who cannot remember them? Well,
we know it's not me or you. They're always fresh on our mind,
it seems, and we spend too much time remembering them, which
is going to be a point here a little bit later on. So we'll get back
to that. But who can't remember these sins? The only being with
a perfect memory, God himself, all powerful, all everywhere,
all knowing, cannot remember these sins. I will forgive their
sins and I will not. And I will remember their iniquities
no more. He cannot remember him. He has
no recollection of them. because Christ took them and
put them away. Now, I would say Christ isn't
better at hide and seek than God because, you know, in this
case, though, he may be because he did. He did a little more
than hide. He didn't take him in a far corner
of the universe and just put him away to try and hide him
to where God couldn't find him. He made him disappear. They're
gone from existence. And God can't find something
or remember something that doesn't exist. So that's how far gone
they are. And we're told that too. Let's
turn back to Jeremiah chapter 50. Jeremiah chapter 50 talks about these sins gone,
not existing anymore. Jeremiah 50 verse 20. In those days and in that time,
saith the Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for,
and there shall be none. And the sins of Judah, and they
shall not be found, for I will pardon them whom I reserve. You
can't put any more plainer. The iniquity of Israel shall
be sought for, and there's none. Zero. Sought here comes from
the word to search out. or to strive after something.
It's not just giving a cursory glance at, I don't see it. Like
when you tell your kid to go look for something, they just,
ah, nothing. This searching here is just getting,
tearing everything up, pulling the carpet up, making sure. God
searches in that manner, strives after it, and it's, can't find
it. It's non-existent, it's gone.
And in those days and time, which the verse starts with, that could
be speaking of Judgment Day, because on Judgment Day, when
we stand there as a believer. He'll look us over and we're
going to be perfect and holy and acceptable, so Judgment Day
will have no sin. It could be the time of love
spoken of in Ezekiel or the time that God comes to a sinner in
mercy and gives him life. That's called the time of love.
And then the second that happens, a new man is created, and that
new man has no sin. But this could be any day and
any time from when eternity began, which it never really did. It's always existed. And until
the end of eternity, which it never will, because it never
ends, you pick any day or any time during that time in all
eternity, and you try to find one sin on one believer And there's
none. There never has been. Because
every believer has always been united to Christ. From eternity past till now,
to eternity future. And united to Him, we have no
sin. God couldn't say in Jeremiah
that I've loved you with an everlasting love. He can't love somebody
that has sin on them. If I've been eternally loved
of God, then I've been eternally holy in Christ. as every believer
has. So we've never had sin on the
new man in Christ in God's eyes. He couldn't love us if we had.
So he's eternally loved us. And so who cannot remember these
sins? God himself. Cannot remember these sins because
Christ put them away. And it's kind of hard to, even
when I read that, he says, I will remember their sins and iniquities
no more. It's kind of, well, I believe it because I see it,
but you can't remember something that doesn't exist. They've been
put away by Christ. So there's our four questions.
And now we're going to come to the last statement that I want
to talk about. Which was, even though we forget him and all
his promises, he'll never forget us. He always remembers us. He keeps us, he forgives us,
and he loves us for Christ's sake. Now, but unfortunately,
even though he won't forget us, we seem to be good at forgetting
our God and his promises. Matter of fact, we can sit here
and listen to sermon by our pastor, and by the time we're out that
door, where's it going? It's pretty much out of memory,
it seems like, because as soon as you get out that door, there's
a kid, there's a car, there's a job, there's a phone, there's
a Something and. You just forget, we forget that
we're in Christ and we're I believe sometimes instead of being called
believers, we should just be called forgetters. It seems like
we spend more time doing that than believe it. And, you know, we can forget
material things. I understand that the older you get, the keys
just disappear easily. The wallet's gone. Where's the
kids? I don't know. I thought you had
him. You had him. You forget material things, but to forget
spiritual things, that's what bothers me the most. How can
I forget my Savior? How can I forget Him? I don't
know how I can, but I do. I don't want to, but it happens. We still have this flesh and
we still have an old man and we forget. And I just want to
look at some verses in scripture that talk about our forgetting
and that we should try to remember these things instead of forgetting
them. Let's start in Deuteronomy chapter 8. Deuteronomy chapter 8, starting verse 11. Beware that thou forget not the
Lord thy God, in not keeping his commandments and his judgments
and his statutes which I command thee this day. Lest when thou
hast eaten an ark full, and hast built goodly houses, and dwelt
therein, and when thy herds and thy flocks multiply, and thy
silver and thy gold is multiplied, and all that thou hast is multiplied.
Then thine heart be lifted up, and thou forget the Lord thy
God, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from
the house of bondage, who led thee through that great and terrible
wilderness, where there were fiery serpents and scorpions
and drought, where there was no water, who brought thee forth
water out of the rock of Flint, who fed thee in the wilderness
with manna, which thy fathers knew not that he might humble
thee. and that he might prove thee to do thee good at thy latter
end. And thou say in thine heart, My power and the might of mine
hand hath gotten me this wealth." So as soon as things start going
good, looking good, you're feeling good, you take comfort in those
and you forget God. Anytime we look on how far we've
advanced in faith or look on any of the works of our hands
or our strength or anything like that, the quality of our prayers,
we become full of self. We become lifted up in pride.
And so in love with self that we forget the Lord, our God,
and we forget what he's done for us, we become so enamored
with self. We forget that he brought us
out of Egypt, he brought us out of the slavery of works religion,
and he's given us grace and faith to rest in the work of another,
our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. You would think we can never
forget someone living and dying for us, giving his life for us,
but we do. I just, I wish we didn't. I mean,
it's hard to remember Christ when you've got to remember a
different password a hundred times a day. I mean, there's
so many things. Technology is good, and I'm glad
we got it God purposed it. We always find a way to ruin
a good thing, it seems. And we forget Christ, we forget
grace, and we remember the good old days of our fleshly religion.
And just as Israel begged to return to Egypt where there was
bread and water, we yearned to return to that feeling I had
or that experience or that emotion, just some tangible proof that
my present salvation is real if I could just relive how I
felt that day. And that's nothing more than
looking to self and not at Christ for salvation. And Isaiah 45,
22. Whenever Turner does not say.
Look into your feelings and be saved, look into your emotions,
look into your prayers, look into whatever it says, look unto
me and be saved. My salvation is a person. Christ
did it all, and you should always remember that. Don't forget it.
Always remember that Christ did it all. Let's turn over Deuteronomy
chapter 32. Seems like there's a lot of forgetful
verses in Deuteronomy. Maybe they had a bunch of passwords
they had to remember back then, too. OK, Deuteronomy 32, verse 18. Of the rock that begat thee,
thou art unmindful and has forgotten God that formed thee. Christ
begat us, he birthed us, he formed us, and he gave us life, creating
a new man. But here it says we're unmindful
of that. To be mindful of something is
when you keep something in your memory, you recollect it, recollect
that it's easily brought to your mind. You're mindful of it. But
it seems like sometimes we don't keep Christ in our memory. We
don't recollect Christ as our all. And we're unmindful of him
because our mind is so full. We're unmindful because our mind
is full of self in this world and there's no room left, it
seems. But a believer, thank goodness, has a new mind. We have the mind of Christ. It
says that in 1 Corinthians 2, verse 16. And in this mind, Christ
is all, and there's room for nothing else. He's everything
in our salvation, and we need to remember that. Don't forget
that He birthed us and He gave us life, and there's a new man
in you, and it's all to the glory of God. Don't forget that. Remember,
He did it all, and He's our all. Turn over to the middle of Psalms
there, chapter 88, verse 12. Here's another forgetful verse.
Not that we should forget it, but it's speaking of how forgetful
we are. Psalm 88, verse 12. Shall thy wonders be known in
the dark? And our righteousness in the
land of forgetfulness. This land of forgetfulness, that
word forgetfulness. Comes from the word oblivion.
And I thought that was just. Some some kind of way, really
putting it are our natural heart, our fleshly heart that we're
born with, and we still have. Is oblivious. To God, it's oblivious
to grace, it could care less. And. And it's oblivious to righteousness
to the only true righteousness, that's righteousness of Christ
and the Apostle Paul put it another way in Romans 10, verse three,
for they speaking of the Jews, but also speaking of every man
being ignorant of God's righteousness. For they being ignorant of God's
righteousness, going about to establish their own righteousness,
have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. I looked up the word ignorant
again. It sounds like a good description of me. And I figured,
well, here, let's see what this says. And sure enough, to not
know something due to lack of information or lack of intelligence. And I was like, oh, yeah. So. We're ignorant, naturally stupid,
spiritually stupid. We're just we don't have a clue. We're oblivious when we walk
around this world in our flesh until God strikes us down. Directs
Providence to make us sit in one of these pews or of any church
where the gospel is preached and gives us life and gives us
a new mind and a new heart that's not oblivious and it's not forgetful. So. If we could just remember
His righteousness is our righteousness, then we wouldn't spend so much
time trying to work up our own righteousness. So don't forget
that. He is our righteousness. What He did, His obedience, is
our obedience before God. Don't forget it. Although we
do, let's try not to. Psalms 103. Turn over a couple
pages. Psalms 103. We'll read the first five verses. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and
all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord,
O my soul, and forget not. If we're told not to forget,
that means we do forget. Forget not all his benefits,
who forgiveth all thine iniquities who healeth all thy diseases,
who redeemeth thy life from destruction, who crowneth thee with love and
kindness and tender mercies, who satisfieth thy mouth with
good things, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagles. These benefits, you know, Pretty
much everybody in here that's got a job or a steady job, you
can sit here and you can name all of your work benefits just
like that. You can pull out that 401k and know the percentage
and your health benefits and dental and you can sit there
and rattle off all your benefits because they're important to
you and you've kind of got them down pat. But if somebody came
up and said, can you give me those five benefits in Psalm
103, You know, I don't know if we
could name one, two, any. These are the benefits I want
to have right here. I'm glad, I'm happy that the
Lord's given me some good work benefits and we're all happy
for that. I wish I wouldn't complain so
much about my job. It's not right. And to complain
is just not the right way to be about our jobs. We should
be thankful for having the jobs and able to support the gospel.
But the benefits I want to have are these benefits here. First
one, in verse three, who forgiveth all thine iniquities. I'm trying to see if I've got
enough time to go through all these. All right. Jeremiah 33. We're going to turn to some verses
here, because with each benefit, I want to show a verse. I don't
want you to take what I say. I want you to see what God says. Jeremiah 33, verse 8. We're just going to read the
verse and make a short comment on it. Verse 8, And I will cleanse
them from all their iniquity, whereby they have sinned against
me, and I will pardon all their iniquities, all, whereby they
have sinned and whereby they have transgressed against me.
So that's a benefit. That's quite a benefit. We've
had all of our sins and all of our iniquities cleansed. and
washed away by the blood of Christ. And don't forget that. And when you have all your sins
and iniquities washed away and you're in Christ and you're united
to him, you have a new name right over there in verse 16. In those
days shall Judah be saved and Jerusalem shall dwell safely.
And this is the name wherewith she shall be called. She, the
church, every believer. The Lord, our righteousness.
You've got a new name, now don't forget it. That's quite a benefit
to have that name. The second benefit was who healeth
all thy diseases. Let's turn to Luke 17. Luke 17.
Starting verse 11. And it came to pass, as he went
to Jerusalem, that he passed through the midst of Samaria
and Galilee. And as he entered into a certain village, there
met him ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off. And they
lifted up their voices and said, Jesus, Master, have mercy on
us. And when he saw them, he said
unto them, Go show yourselves unto the priests. And it came
to pass that, as they went, they were cleansed, and one of them
When he saw that he was healed, turned back and with a loud voice
glorified God and fell down on his face at his feet, giving
him thanks. And he was a Samaritan. What
a benefit. We're lepers. We're full of the
leprosy of sin. And God has cleansed us by His
grace. That's a benefit. That's a big
benefit. And don't forget it. You've been
healed. You've had this leprosy, this sin healed by God. What a benefit. Now, the third
benefit he talked about was who redeemeth thy life from destruction. Isaiah chapter 51. Isaiah 51. Verse 9 and 10. Awake, awake, put on strength,
O arm of the Lord, awake as in the ancient days in the generations
of old. Art thou not it that hath cut
Rahab and wounded the dragon? Art thou not it which hath dried
the sea, the waters of the great deep, that hath made the depths
of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass over? That word ransomed
Right there is the same word, redeemeth, that we had back in
Psalm 103. And how are we ransomed? Well,
the last part of verse 10, in the depths of the sea, when Israel
was trapped between the Egyptian army and the sea, they were going
to be destroyed. They were going to be destroyed.
And so are we. There's a way that hath made
the depths of the sea a way. Well, Christ is the way, the
truth, and the life for the ransom to pass over.
Christ is our Passover. So that's a benefit that not
many people can claim. And I lay claim to it because
I trust Christ and I know he is my way and he's the truth
and he's my life. And what a benefit that is. The fourth benefit, who crowneth
thee with loving kindness and tender mercies. 2 Timothy chapter
4. To crown the word crown is in
that verse means to encircle for protection to gather around
to encircle someone for protection. And the grace and mercy of our
father encircles us, surrounds us, protects us and preserves
us until that day that the Apostle Paul mentions in this verse.
Second, Timothy four, verse eight, henceforth, there is laid up
for me. a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous
judge, shall give me at that day, and not to me only, but
unto all them also that love his appearing." There's a crown
waiting for every believer. Revelations chapter 1, verse
6 says that we are all made kings and priests unto God. Kings wear crowns, and this is
not a crown to show off, it's the righteousness of Christ.
It's the crown that we're all received, and that's quite a
benefit, to have His righteousness as our crown. And the fifth benefit
was, "...who satisfieth thy mouth with good things, so that thy
youth is renewed like the eagles." I know we're flopping back and
forth here, but Psalms chapter 34. Psalm 34. Verse eight. We're talking about
our mouth being satisfied with good things. Old taste and see
that the Lord is good. Blessed is the man that trusted
in him to taste and see means to perceive, to see, to understand,
and that the Lord is good and he's only good to believers.
He saved our soul. And he's made his whole and.
It's all good. That's the. Struggle with that a lot, I'm
always. But it's all good. Anything that
happens to a believer. It's good because it's from God.
It's for your good. It's for His glory. And maybe
He'll give us grace to taste that and to understand that,
and to rejoice in Him no matter what He brings, because it's
all good. It's all good. So those are some good benefits.
I'm glad I went over those. Conclusion. It's a little long,
so don't get too excited. So remember, my title was Remember
to Forget. I've just listed a few of the
verses in the Bible that talks about how we forget, how forgetful
we are. So we really don't have a problem
remembering to forget. We just forget the wrong things.
We forget how God has delivered us from the bondage of the law
to liberty in Christ and how Christ is all my salvation and
I need nothing else. That I'm to look to Christ as
my salvation and not my feelings and experiences and emotions.
And that eternally united to Christ, I'm eternally loved by
God. And there's never been a time
that he's never loved me or any believer. He's loved us eternally.
And that Christ took personal possession of my sin and he bore
the wrath of God in my place and made my sin disappear. from
existence so that God has no memory of it because he said
their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. So we
forget the things we should remember and the one thing we should forget. We remember if God can't remember
my sin. Why do I spend hours and hours?
Laying on that pillow. Remembering my sin. Yeah, it's
good. We never rise above a sinner
saved by grace. I know we're supposed to always.
We know that we're we're sinners in the flesh and we'll never
rise above that. And we come to God for mercy every day. But
to sit there and rehash like a broken record, that same sin
or that same action or that same attitude you carried over and
over in our head. Is not a good not a good thing
to do. Let's look at one verse that
talks about this. Philippians chapter 3. Philippians 3 verse
13. Philippians 3 verse 13 and 14. I count not myself to have apprehended,
but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind,
and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press
toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in
Christ Jesus. Forgetting those things which
are behind, the good, supposed good, and bad. Forget, forget
it. and pressed towards the mark
of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. By faith, look
to Christ. And if God has no memory, Christ
took that sin away and purged it completely and put it out
of existence, and God has no memory of it, neither should
I. Although I feel like a hypocrite
saying that because we all spend too much time dwelling on it. But believer, you have no sin,
no sin. You're clean, you're holy, you're
righteous right now. So remember that instead of remembering
all the things of the past, of the day, of the year, of your
life. You know, 1st John chapter 3,
1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John
chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John
chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John
chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter
3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John
chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John
chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3, 1st John
chapter 3, 1st John chapter 3 That same whosoever that calls on
his name and says, God be merciful to me, the sinner, that same
whosoever is born of God, does not commit sin, has no sin in
the new man. And so when that hits the pillow
tonight, there's a holy head and a holy mind, a new mind that
hits that pillow. And faith believes that. If I
spend my time moping over my sin, what I'm saying is that
Christ did not completely put my sin away and that he failed.
Because I still think it's there. It's not there. We like to excuse
this time of moping as a conviction of sin. And the guiltier and
more convicted I feel, the more saved I feel. Say what? You know, a God saved person
has no sin. Now act like it. It's OK to smile
about being a believer. You know, I'm the worst person
to be saying that because I'm kind of glum a lot. I realize
that. And we're sitting in pews and
Todd tells us good news every time we come in here. And if
we heard good news outside of here, boy, you could see us just
hopping up and down and high fiving and yada yada. He gives
us the good news that we're sinners saved by grace and we're headed
to heaven to be with our Savior whenever He comes back to get
us and we just sit there. And, you know, it's okay to rejoice
in the Lord. It's fine to smile. I wish I
could more. I wish we all could more. He's
made us perfect. So instead of time spent in guilt
over your sin, spend that time in thanks to our Savior for putting
away our sin. He put it away to the extent
that God says I can remember their sins and their iniquities
no more. So tonight, remember to forget.
Forget your sin. Remember your Savior. May his
completed work and his love to us always be on our minds. Amen.