Recently I read someone explaining how
he was no longer a Christian because he did not believe that it was
just of God punish even a willing victim to pay for our sin. At the
first glance it seems like this man is correct. How could a good God
punish one person for another's sin? It seems so unfair. But taking
a closer look at a few key things from Scripture reveals how wrong
this is.
First, understanding who God is. God
is triune. He is three persons yet one God. The
three persons of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, are
one such that seeing one of them act is the same as seeing the others
act, thus Jesus says to His disciples that by seeing Him they had
seen the Father. (John
14:9) The Trinity is pictured in multiple places, the best of
which is when Jesus is baptized. At that time the Father proclaimed
that Jesus is His Son and at the same time the Holy Spirit descends
in the form of a dove. (Luke
3:21-22) The Trinity is like a marriage – the relationship
between a man and his wife is one of selfless love, and so is God's
relationship to Himself. So Jesus when He is faced with the cross
goes willingly as He seeks to do His Father's will. (Luke
22:39-46 and Hebrews
12:2)
Second, the definition of sin. Sin is
not just bad or wrong things that a person does, but offenses he
commits against God. My sins (i.e., lying, lust, hatred, or pride)
are all ultimately crimes against the Holy God who made me, and not
crimes against my neighbor, even when they are also offenses against
my neighbor. (Psalm
51:4)
Third, what forgiveness is.
Forgiveness is best illustrated in the parable that Jesus told about
the man who owed his king ten thousand talents. (Matthew
18:23-35) In that parable, Jesus says the king is settling all
his accounts, and he calls in a servant who owes him the tremendous
sum of ten thousand talents. A talent is a weight of gold that was
worth approximately twenty years of a laborer's wages. (Ibid.)
This is 200,000 years of wages, or about 9 trillion dollars today in
2012. Clearly this man is going to have a hard time paying this
debt. Actually I think that Jesus point here is that the man is not
going to be able to pay it back. The man however pleads with the
king asking for mercy because he says he will pay it back. However
the king gives him more than he asks for and tells him that he will
forgive the debt. The king gives up whatever he could have done with
that money by forgiving the debt. He says in essence, “Whatever
project I am working on that needs that money, it is not as important
to me as you are.” Forgiveness is saying to someone, “I will
cancel the debt that you owe to me.”
But the debt still has to be paid by
someone. In the parable the king pays it. Jesus says that the
kingdom of Heaven, God's kingdom, is like that parable.
The Father has given all authority to the Son, Jesus. (Matthew
28:18 Jesus has been exalted by being given the seat at
the Father's right hand. He has been made king over all creation and
will come again to judge the world. (Acts
2:33-36 and Matthew
25:31-46) When He returns again He will be the one who publicly
pardons the sins of His people. Jesus
paid the debts of those who trust in Him, though ultimately the debts
are to Himself. (Galations
3:13)
This is not the same as me forcing my
child to pay debts owed to me by our neighbor, it is more like my
child inheriting my estate after I am gone (remember that Jesus, the
Son, is the King now) and in his good will forgiving a debtor who had
owed me money. There is nothing unjust about that at all.
