Daily Devotions
Psalm 103:11-12 – For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is His steadfast love towards those who fear Him. As far as the east is from the west so far does He remove our transgressions from us.
This devotion pairs with this weekend’s Lutheran Hour sermon, which can be found at www.lhm.org.
Remember the times you’ve moved. You packed up everything, using every stray box you could find. You stacked boxes to the ceiling. And then one hard-working day, you loaded the truck. When it was all loaded, you took one more walk through the house. It was finally all empty. It was time to go. Leave the old house and maybe you’ll be leaving behind the old problems. The troubles stay behind while you go on to someplace new. Travel far enough, and maybe the past won’t find you. That’s a nice hope, but we all know it won’t work out. Go as far as you can, but you can’t outrun your past. It always has a way of coming with you.
So, wouldn’t it be wonderful if you could actually be far enough away from your past mistakes they could never find you? Here’s the good news. We don’t have to sneak away in the night to be that far away. God makes that distance the heart of our forgiveness. When God forgives us, He moves our sins as far away from us as possible. God has taken our sins away across the world and over 2,000 years ago. He moves our sins so that we don’t have to try to run away ourselves. Instead, God has moved our sins while we stay right where we are. God has put the sins of the entire world onto His Son. Imagine the weight and size of that move. Think about the load He’s taken onto Himself as He goes to the cross. All the world’s sins, all the evil and anger is compressed onto Him.
No box, no vault, no moving truck could contain all this, but the Son of God picks up that load and puts it onto His shoulders and carries it onto the cross. Having moved the sins of the world onto the cross, God ensures that those sins won’t come back. It’s again a bit like our moving. When you move, you move. You don’t leave a box or two with the new owners and tell them you’ll be back someday to get it. You move, and that’s the end of it. When God moves our sins onto the cross, they are done. We don’t have to worry that He’s kept back a box or two of our worst sins, threatening to unpack them onto us at the worst moment. Psalm 103 tells us He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. God has locked our sins away onto the death of Jesus.
They’re as far from us now as east is from the west. At the cross, there’s no warehouse of sins neatly tagged waiting to be returned to us. No, the sins have no return address label. The charges against us are nailed to the cross with no chance of being moved. So we don’t have to be on an endless race to outrun our past, moving with no forwarding address. No, the moving has all been done by God. He’s come to us Himself in Christ and has picked up all the sins of the world, moving them to the end of the earth from us. Now we live in forgiveness—that wonderful gift that’s come to us from far away. Our home with God now is one of peace. The boxes we unpack now are those God has prepared for us. The gifts of peace, hope, and love. Those gifts remain with us while our sins are moved far away, fixed on the cross.
WE PRAY: Heavenly Father, thank You that You have moved our sins as far as east is from the west. Our running away is done, and we can remain safe with You, forgiven through the cross. We pray in Jesus’ Name. Amen.
This Daily Devotion was written by Rev. Daniel Paavola.
Reflection Questions:
1. Have you ever moved and left some boxes behind? If so, were you able to get them back?
2. How good is it to know that God will not dredge up our sins and shame us with them in the future? How do we know He won’t do that?
3. What would you say to someone who thinks that God cannot forgive them?