Guilt vs. Grace
The attitude of guilt is a mental attitude sin that destroys capacity for life and causes the believer to become weary, stifling the ability to think clearly. Guilt, like all mental attitude sins manufactures its own misery. All believers have failed. No one is immune to failure. All believers possess a sin nature and we are all guilty before God. However, we are talking about the feeling, not the fact of guilt. We all have something of which we are ashamed, yet our lives are to be free from shame and guilt. (Hebrews 12:1-3) For this reason we must constantly examine our spiritual lives.
These are exactly the instructions we find in Hebrews 12:15. “See to it” means constantly check yourself. “That no one comes of the grace of God” is experiential grace, this is failure to execute God’s plan for your life by missing the principle of grace. Your good works DO NOT make you spiritual, they are a result of being spiritual. “That no root of bitterness springing up” uses the Greek word “pikria” for bitterness and it means bitter fruit. In other words, failure to appropriate the grace of God experientially produces bitter fruit in the life. The context of this passage tells us how to appropriate this grace… by staying focused on (having the mind of) Jesus Christ. It also outlines the discipline that results when we fail to do so. When we fail through the sin of human works (bitter fruit), we have failed or set aside the grace of God. We must be careful not to allow our failure to produce an attitude of bitterness in us towards ourselves, towards others or especially towards God. “Trouble you” is an obvious reference to a guilt complex. When the believer allows any failure to produce a bitter attitude, they are going to feel guilty. “And thereby many be defiled” uses the Greek word “miaino” for defiled and it means to pollute or to contaminate. When we are out of fellowship with God through guilt, not only do we defile ourselves, we contaminate everyone around us.
Graceis thecure for the problem of guilt through naming your sins to God and resuming your spiritual life. Both of these are grace functions. (I John 1:9)
Naming your sins does not mean feeling sorrow, promising to reform or any other type of penance. The Greek word for confess in I John 1:9 is “homologeo” and it means to name, acknowledge, admit or cite. Sorrow, a promise of reformation or any penance can only lead to feelings of guilt. If any of these are what is meant by “confession of sin” (and they’re not), confession would be leading us right back into sin, since guilt is itself a sin.
Confession has nothing to do with how we feel about our sins, it has to do with what God has done about them. God’s righteousness and justice have been completely satisfied (propitiation) by Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross. The whole idea of confession is to adjust to what divine justice has already accomplished through grace. Grace means that we can do nothing to deserve or earn forgiveness of sin before or after salvation. This includes but is not limited to, sorrow, reformation and penance.
Now, having said that, there may be genuine sorrow for a particular sin and we should want to eliminate it from our lives. This, however, can only be accomplished after confession, under the filling (control) of the Holy Spirit. This is a part of resuming our spiritual lives. After we confess (name) our sin to God, we need to do three other things: isolate that sin, forget it and move on. If not, you will be carrying a weight of guilt until you do.
God does not want us to live with the millstone of guilt around our neck. Self-recrimination is a waste of time and energy… time and energy we could be putting to better use. This is why He has provided us with the solution to sin after salvation. So why get upset and guilty, just follow God’s instructions. We need to stop “buying into” the way the world system thinks about sin (this includes religion), which is that a person must make up for the wrong they have done by some system of human works. What we need to do is to start thinking the way God wants us to think about sin, which is to name it, forget it and move on. If we fail to follow God’s instructions, we remain in our sin, and God as a good and loving father has no other choice than to discipline us. This doctrinal concept is also found in Hebrews 12:5-11.
Graceis thecure for the problem of guilt. We have seen this as a grace function in forgiveness and restoration to fellowship from I John 1:9. Let’s see why God is able to forgive and restore us, thereby eliminating the need to feel guilty. Romans 3:19-24 is where we learn why God is free to forgive and to restore.
Romans 3:19-20
“Now we know that”- we have previous knowledge. “whatever the Law says”- a reference to the Mosaic Law (over 600). “it speaks to those who are under the Law”- the Mosaic Law was given to the Jewish nation of Israel (Exodus 19:3; Romans 9:4) The fact that Israel failed under the Law is God’s demonstration that the entire human race is sinful and guilty before Him. “That every mouth may be stopped”- this is a purpose clause. The purpose for the Law is to stop every mouth, both Jew and Gentile, from proclaiming their innocence before God. “And all the world may become accountable”- Greek “hupodikos”- a judicial term for being brought to trial and judged guilty. “To God”- under judgment from God. “Because”- because of this. “By the works of the Law”- good deeds, keeping the Law. “no flesh will be justified”- no one is declared righteous due to his own righteous acts. “In His sight”- before God. “For through the Law”- by means of the giving of the Law. “Comes the knowledge of sin”- the Law is like a mirror that shows us our sin and need for a Savior. If we look in a mirror and see dirt on our face, we don’t use the mirror to clean our face. In like manner we don’t use the Mosaic Law to cleanse us from our sin. The Mosaic Law was given to Israel so they would see their guilt and their need for God’s solution. This was demonstrated to them continually through the rituals of sacrifice.
Romans 3:21-22
“But now”- conjunction of contrast which joins two opposing thoughts. “The righteous of God”- the righteous which belongs to God. “Apart from the Law”- apart from the Mosaic Law. “Has been manifested”- is clearly revealed. “Being witnessed” – to testify, to be called as a witness of something of which you have knowledge. “By the Law and the prophets”- a reference to the Old Testament (law- first part; prophets- second part). “Even the righteous of God”- the righteous which belongs to God. “Through faith”- righteousness is appropriated by faith. “In Jesus Christ”- in Jesus Christ. “For all those who believe”- upon faith in Christ God imputes (charges to the account of) His righteousness to the believer. “For there is no distinction”- between Jew and Gentile.
Romans 3:23-24
“For all have sinned”- this is a reference to the imputation of Adam’s sin to the sin nature we are born with (condemnation must precede salvation) I Corinthians 15:22. “Fall short of the glory of God”- this is a reference to personal sin which originates from the sin nature inherent in all of us from birth. Falling short of God’s glory (righteousness) is what reveals to us that we cannot resolve the guilt problem by our own efforts. We are not condemned because of our personal sins (Christ paid that penalty on the Cross). We are condemned because we are born with a sin nature. “Being justified”- being declared righteous. “As a gift”- justification is a free gift from God to us upon our faith in Jesus Christ. We cannot earn, nor do we deserve this justification. “By His grace”- this declaration by God is a grace function. “Through the redemption”- redemption means that we have been redeemed from the “Slave Market of Sin.” A reference to the fact that sin condemns us (Romans 6:23), but Jesus buys us from the “Slave Market of Sin” by His death on the Cross. “That is in Christ Jesus”- redemption is one of the 40 assets that come to us a result of our position in Christ. The reason God can forgive our guilt and declare us righteous is by His grace in sending His Son to pay the penalty (ransom) for our sin.
So, what does God think about our guilt? He no longer holds us accountable. Jesus Christ took our guilt on the Cross and has taken care of the problem once and for all. Now when God looks at us He sees the righteousness of Christ within us, not our sin. For this reason alone we need to stop feeling guilty about our failures and realize that God is not concerned about where we’ve been, only where we’re going!
Psalms 103:12, “As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us.”