Guilt

Now I want to talk to you about provision for three, what we could call emotional needs—guilt, shame and rejection. Now God through the sacrifice of Jesus has provided for complete deliverance from each of those things—guilt, shame and rejection. But my experience is that many, many Christians—born again Christians—are not fully free from guilt or shame or rejection. So I want to talk to you tonight about deliverance from each of those three things. And I would estimate at least twenty-five percent of the people here this evening need some kind of deliverance from one or other of those three things.

Now let’s start with guilt. And you know what people say—conscience makes cowards of us all. If you have a sense of guilt you can never be a fully liberated, victorious, effective Christian. And God doesn’t want you to have any lingering sense of guilt whatever. Isaiah 53 verse 6 which is the prophetic description given seven hundred years before the event through the Prophet Isaiah of the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross, and it says,

“All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way;”

You see that’s the problem of all humanity. We have not all necessarily committed some specific sin such as murder or adultery. But we’ve all done one thing. We’ve turned to our own way and our own way was not God’s way. And God calls that iniquity or rebellion. And it goes on to say,

“And the Lord has laid on Him [Jesus] the iniquity of us all.”

All our rebellion was visited upon Jesus on the cross that we might be free. In John 1 verse 29, John the Baptist introduces Jesus and he says,

“...Behold! The Lamb of God who carries away the sin of the world.”

Jesus was the Lamb upon whom God laid every sin of every human being of every time and every place. And He carried it away that it might never again trouble us or cause us to feel guilty.

How do we avail ourselves of that? I’m speaking very simply tonight. Nothing complicated. You know my conclusion—this is only for myself—but it concerns me us if I can’t explain something simply it is because I haven’t understood it clearly. And I work at it until I can.

I think of my precious first wife who used to sit in the front row and pray for me. And I mean she prayed earnestly. But when she bowed her head and clasped her hands I thought to myself, “Now what have I done?” But God answered her prayers. You see she was much older than I was. An experienced missionary. She could have lorded it over me. She could have dominated me and she didn’t. She backed off, took the position of a wife and let me be the head of the family. And in the long run, and it was a long run, it paid off. I could have easily been submerged beneath my much more experienced and gifted wife. And some of you wives maybe you’re making that mistake. You’re much sharper, you’re much quicker, you’re much cleverer than your husband, but don’t take his place because the result is confusion.

Now how do you avail yourself of this provision? It’s all very simple. Proverbs 28 and verse 13.

“He who covers his sins will not prosper, But whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy.”

So what do you have to do? You have to confess your sin. In 1 John chapter 1 verse 9 it says,

“If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

So if we confess our sins, God will forgive us. But if we refuse to confess, God will not forgive. God has committed Himself to forgive every sin concerning which we repent and confess it to Him. But if we refuse to confess we receive no forgiveness. You see there’s a tremendous tension and tendency not to bring sin out into the open.

When Lydia and I were first married she had a dream one night and through that dream God spoke to her and He said this, “Time does not cover sin.” And I’ve carried that with me ever since. “Time does not cover sin.” You may have sinned fifty years ago, but if you’ve not repented and confessed and forsaken, you’re still accountable for that sin. I think one of the things that God is doing in my life is from time to time reminding me of sins I have not confessed. Now I don’t believe in making a search for sin. I don’t think that way. But from time to time God shows me a sin that I committed and never confessed and never repented. And all I have to do is say, “God I’m sorry. I repent. I acknowledge.” And it’s gone. But until I confess it hasn’t gone.

You see we feel bad about bringing our sins out into the light of God’s countenance. But that’s the only place where they are forgiven. If you withhold confession you will not receive forgiveness. Let me read that again, Proverbs 28:13.

“He who covers his sins will not prosper, But whoever confesses and forsakes them will have mercy.”

It’s not enough to confess. You have to forsake. That’s repent. You have to turn away from it. When you confess and forsake you are guaranteed God’s mercy.

And now when God saves you it’s a perfect work, and I want to confront you with just one beautiful and glorious and holy and wonderful effect of confessing our sins. It’s in Isaiah chapter 61 and verse 10. Isaiah 61:10

“I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, My soul shall be joyful in my God;”

That’s pretty exciting isn’t it? That’s not just religion. That’s salvation. You know as a boy growing up in the Anglican Church I listened to all those beautiful prayers and things, and I loved them. They’re so beautiful. And all the confessions that people said. But I said to myself afterwards, “If they’ve really confessed all those things why do they walk out looking just the same as they walked in? It doesn’t seem to have changed them at all.” So I concluded it didn’t work. I was wrong and later I discovered it does work. But anyhow,

“I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, My soul shall be joyful in my God; [Listen. What’s the reason?] For He has clothed me with the garments of salvation, He has covered me with the robe of righteousness,”

Now there’s two things there—the garment of salvation, the robe of righteousness. Many, many Christians and some of you here tonight have received the garments of salvation but you don’t realize you’ve been covered with the robe of righteousness. Not your righteousness, but Christ’s righteousness. A righteousness which has never known sin, which has no guilty past, which has no nothing to be ashamed of. And bless God, God didn’t just drape it on you, He covered you with it. There’s no area of your personality that is any longer exposed to the accusations of Satan, because He’s covered you with a robe of His righteousness. And when you realize that you’ve confessed, forsaken, and received salvation, all you need to do is let God put on you the robe of righteousness. When you wearing that robe of righteousness there’s no room for a guilty conscience. There’s no room for remorse, there’s no room for doubting and questioning. It’s all taken care of at the cross. So that’s God’s remedy for guilt. Let me say it very simply, it’s the garment of salvation and then the robe of righteousness.

Now many people have received the garment of salvation but they’ve never understood that there’s also that goes with it a robe of righteousness. Not your righteousness. God’s righteousness imputed to you through Jesus Christ. And when you put that on it covers you. The devil can look at you from any angle, but he’s got nothing of which he can accuse you because you’re covered with the robe of the righteousness of Jesus Christ. That’s God’s remedy for guilt. There are many of you here tonight that have never fully availed yourself of that remedy. I’ll give you an opportunity to do it.