Forgiveness is at the heart of the gospel. If we don’t understand God’s forgiveness in Christ, we don’t understand Christianity. We won’t have joy, peace, and comfort without comprehending this crucial Christian teaching. Moreover, if we don’t grasp divine forgiveness, we will struggle to apply forgiveness in our relationships with other people.
One of the questions people struggle with in relation to forgiveness is this: if our sins are already forgiven in Christ, then why do we still have to pray for the forgiveness of our sins regularly? For example, each Sunday we have a prayer of confession where we ask for forgiveness. Many Christians make it their practice to confess their sins daily and seek God’s forgiveness. But why? Some even go beyond questioning it and confidently assert that regularly asking God for forgiveness is unnecessary, that it undermines Christ’s work for us, and that it confuses Christians into thinking that they are sinners.
Let’s first review what forgiveness involves. Forgiveness is release from an obligation. It’s best illustrated in the parable Jesus told in Matthew 18 about the unforgiving servant. The story begins with a servant who owed the king an astronomical debt. The servant begged for more time to pay. But instead of giving him more time to pay, the king had pity on his servant and he released him entirely from the debt. He forgave him all of the enormous debt. The servant was let go from his obligation to pay it back. This is what we have in the forgiveness of our sins. Think of the worst financial crisis you’ve ever had. You had a huge debt and you thought you might never be able to pay it back. Well, it pales in comparison to the astronomical debt we owe to God. This is because we have sinned against infinite majesty. Sin against infinite majesty incurs infinite debt. But in Christ God has pitied us and he has released us from our obligation to pay it back. We are forgiven. The gospel promises us this. When we place our trust in Christ, we are freed from the burden of the debt.
Now it’s important to realize that the Bible describes two kinds of forgiveness. The first is judicial (or forensic) forgiveness. We find a good example of that in Romans 4:7-8. There Paul quotes from Psalm 32, “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven…” Judicial forgiveness is about forgiveness from God as judge. This takes place in the context of our justification – justification is when God declares us right with him because of what Christ has done. Justification includes the forgiveness of all our sins, past, present, and future. They’re all swept away and we’re released from the debt we’ve incurred because of them. As a result, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Rom. 8:1).
The other kind of forgiveness is what we call parental (or relational) forgiveness. Having been justified by faith, we’re adopted into God’s family. He is our Father and we’re his beloved children. Nothing can ever change that. No one gets kicked out of God’s family. But within this family context, we still do sin against our Father. Within this family context, we create a disruption in our relationship with him. We now go to him in prayer as our Father and ask for his parental forgiveness of our sins. This is the forgiveness mentioned in the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.” It’s the forgiveness of someone who is already God’s justified child.
This distinction is implicit in the Heidelberg Catechism. It speaks of judicial forgiveness when expositing “the forgiveness of sins” from the Apostles’ Creed (Lord’s Day 21), and it speaks of parental forgiveness when it exposits, “Forgive us our debts” from the Lord’s Prayer (Lord’s Day 51). One exposition occurs in the context of our redemption and justification, and the other in the context of our sanctification and the life of a redeemed child of God. However, one of the best expressions of this distinction is in the Westminster Confession:
God doth continue to forgive the sins of those that are justified: and, although they can never fall from the state of justification; yet they may, by their sins, fall under God’s fatherly displeasure, and not have the light of His countenance restored unto them, until they humble themselves, confess their sins, beg pardon, and renew their faith and repentance.
You could say it this way: judicial forgiveness establishes our status with God; parental forgiveness sustains our fellowship with God.
Let me share two practical points in conclusion. First, relish the judicial forgiveness you already have as a believer in Christ. Praise God and love him for it. Second, pursue God’s parental forgiveness for as long as you’re still a sinner. As long as you’re on this earth, keep on going to God as your Father to seek his forgiveness through Christ. Your Father loves his children and he will always graciously forgive.
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