Too Late to be Forgiven?
It has been said that all our lives, like pencils, need erasers. And who of us doesn’t want some discrediting episode in the past erased from the record?
Whenever memory recalls what happen, we want to put it on fast forward, and leave what occurred in the long-ago past. Louise Fletcher Tarkington, lamenting her own sinful past, wrote:
I wish there was some wonderful place
Called the Land of Beginning Again
Where all our mistakes and all our heartaches,
And all our poor selfish grief,
Could be dropped like a shabby coat at the door
And never put on again.
That would be alright, wouldn’t it? — the ugly deed gone, a new record begun? But magical thinking like this, charming though it is, doesn’t work in real life.
Antonio Rotta has painted a picture called “Nothing to be Done.” We see on the canvas where she painted a shoe cobbler shop from a long time ago. In that shop, we see a young girl from the village who has brought an old pair of shoes to see if they could be repaired.
Even to the eyes of one inexperienced, it is obvious that these shoes are too worn out. Nevertheless, the old shoe cobbler holds one shoe in his hand, examining it closely to see what he could do. Then, shrugging his shoulders hopelessly, he seems to say, “I’m sorry, little lass, there’s nothing that can be done.”
Nothing that can be done? These words may be spoken about a pair of worn-out shoes, but they should never be spoken of a human life! Especially when God is brought into the picture! No matter how shattered the life, no matter how wrecked and ruined it is by sins of the past, Jesus can do something!
Referring to the Messiah, the prophet Isaiah declared, “He will not break a bruised reed nor quench a smoldering wick.”
The reed referenced by Isaiah was a little musical instrument that was used by shepherds as they led their flocks over hill and dale. But because this reed was made of thin bamboo, it was easily breakable. So, whenever that happened, the shepherd would snap the reed in two before throwing it away to be trodden under foot by men and beast.
By doing this, he made it obvious to anyone else who later found the reed that it was useless; there’s no need to pick it up.
However, no matter how broken and bruised that thrown-away life, Jesus came to reclaim it, to fix it, to give it purpose.
And as for the smoldering wick, Jesus came to minister to that burned-out life, too, and to give it a glow it never had before!
How willing is our God! And patient is our God!
Remember Methuselah? His name actually means “when he is gone, it will come.” According to this symbolic prophecy, that name depicted a growing number of people waiting for terminal judgment.
But wait — and that’s exactly what our God did —the Lord delayed, desiring a different outcome. For how long did he wait? Well, Methuselah lived longer than any man in history — for 969 years!
All this is to say, “There is time for you! There is hope for you! Your life doesn’t have to end this way! Though battered, bruised, and burned out — though discredited, discounted, and discarded— the message “nothing to be done” need not be true of you, because there is a wonderful place called “The Land of Beginning Again.” Peter actually went there!
After Peter’s great failure in Jerusalem where he cursed Christ three times, Peter announced, with a mixture of deep hurt and final resignation, “I go a fishing” — which meant a lot more than let’s go down to the lake and catch a few.
Peter was really saying, “I’m going back to the old boat, back to the old life, back to the way it was before I met Jesus. Yes, the life of a Christian may be a great life to live, especially now after Jesus rose from the grave!” But, with his voice trailing and his shoulders dropping, Peter then sighed when he said, “It’s not for me — not after what I did.”
So out there in that boat with the wind and the waves and the salty night air, Peter found himself drifting in more ways than one when suddenly — Jesus appeared!
Oh, my! The Lord came back for him! This caused that flawed and shameful apostle to leap out of the boat and swim to shore with sprinter’s speed!
The restoring that day never would have happened had not Jesus made the first move and sought Peter out. Moreover, the gracious way the Lord forgave Peter, and restored Peter, was something Peter never forgot.
According to one of the Church Fathers, Clement of Alexandria, every time Peter heard the cock crow, he wept. Not because of guilt, not because of unrelenting remorse, but because of his unspeakable gratitude. So great was God’s gracious forgiveness!
One way to know if forgiveness has taken effect is this: Can we take the Lord’s side in calling for obedience, not just generally but in that specific area where we had failed—miserably failed, and everyone knows it? The tendency would be to avoid the subject, or if not that to confess our sin all over again before we address it.
Yet, in less than two months after Peter’s colossal failure, he boldly stands before thousands of people, in Acts chapter 2, publicly testifying for Jesus, the man he had publicly rejected! And in Acts chapter 3 he twice says (verse 13, verse 14), you denied Jesus. But that’s what Peter did
You would think he would have choked on those words, or at least dialed it down and softened the point. But he does not. And the reason he does not is because for him that terrible sin of his had been thoroughly cleansed, and permanently expunged from the record.
Therefore, Peter was no longer in shame, no longer in anguish, no longer in conflict of soul. It was over! Why? Because Jesus ended it!
You may be thinking there’s nothing to be done, and that your guilt is never going away. But it can go away! And just like Peter, it can happen quickly … decisively … permanently, so that not even your reputation is tarnished.
