“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Rom 3:23)

Today I heard a sermon called *Guilty, But Forgiven.*

And I think I am going to sit with this one for a while. Because there are some truths you hear and agree with, and then there are truths that expose something inside you. Truths that follow you home. Truths that make you realise you may have understood grace with your head, but perhaps you have not been living as though you truly believe it.

Here is one of those truths: I am guilty. And yet… I am forgiven.

Both are true.

I desperately want to remove guilt. I rename things. Explain things. Justify things. Compare ourselves to somebody who did something worse.

But the Bible does not seem nearly as frightened of the word sin as we are. *Sin is anything contrary to the will and character of God.* (let that sync in) 

Romans 3:23 says that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. The original idea behind sin carries the picture of missing the mark. God established the mark. And every single one of us has missed it.

Sometimes spectacularly. Sometimes secretly. Sometimes in ways nobody else will ever know. And sometimes in ways we have managed to make look perfectly respectable.

Jesus took it even further.

In Matthew 5:28, He teaches that a person can commit adultery in the heart through lust.

That is uncomfortable.

Because Jesus was showing us that sin is not merely about the things our hands have done. It reaches into our motives. Our thoughts. Our desires. Our hearts. James 4:17 says:

“If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.”

So sin is not only doing what I know I should not do. Sometimes sin is knowing what I should do and refusing to do it.

And suddenly there is nowhere to hide. We are guilty. All of us.

But here is where the Gospel becomes breathtaking. Guilty does not mean condemned.

Romans 6:1 asks a fascinating question: “Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase?”

And Paul’s answer is immediate:“By no means!”

In other words, grace is not God’s way of pretending sin does not matter.

Grace is not permission to continue living however we please. Grace is what makes it possible for guilty people to become free people.

And I think sometimes we confuse those things. We either make sin so small that we no longer need grace…

Or we make our guilt so enormous that we believe grace could never possibly cover us. Both misunderstand the Cross.

The Cross tells me my sin was serious enough that Jesus had to die for it. But it also tells me His blood was powerful enough to forgive it.

I was guilty.

He knew it.

He paid for it.

And He forgave me.

That changes everything. But we love adding a “but.” This really challenged me today.

We confess our sin and then quietly add a but. “Yes, Lord, I know I was wrong, but you know what they did to me.”

“I shouldn’t have said that, but I was hurt.”

“I know this isn’t right, but you understand my circumstances.”

“I know I am guilty, but…”

And suddenly our confession becomes an explanation. An explanation becomes a justification. And before long, we are asking God to forgive something we are still defending (ouch).

There is something incredibly freeing about standing before God without a but. No defence. No comparison. No explanation.

Just: Father, I sinned. And then trusting what He says next.

Because 1 John 1:9 gives us one of the most beautiful promises in Scripture:

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.”

Read that again.

He is faithful. He is just. He will forgive. He will cleanse. That means confession is not the doorway into condemnation.

Confession is the doorway out of hiding. So why are we still living like slaves?

Love – V.L