Acts 13:26-41
The Freedom of Forgiveness
September 8, 2002
The movie Les Misérables, based on the novel by Victor Hugo, opens with a vagabond, Jean Valjean, curled up on a stone bench on a desolate French street corner. His bedraggled appearance makes him seem dangerous and causes the townspeople, from whom he sought food and shelter, to snub him. Finally he slumps over in dejection—until a passerby points to a place where he can find refuge.
He goes to the door and knocks. The homeowner, the town's bishop, is startled by the late-night visitation but attentively listens to his story. Valjean reveals that he is a recently released convict. Even so, the bishop welcomes him into his home and serves him dinner.
Later, in the middle of the night, Valjean remembers the sparkling silver spoon he used to eat his soup at dinner and sneaks to the dining room to steal the bishop's valuable silverware. The clanking of metal arouses the bishop, who rises to inspect the clattering below. When they meet face to face, Valjean strikes the bishop, leaving him unconscious, and escapes with a heavy knapsack of silver.
The following morning the bishop's wife laments the loss of her silver, but the bishop is unperturbed, telling his wife, "So we'll use wooden spoons. I don't want to hear anything more about it." Moments later, authorities appear at the bishop's manor with the stolen silver and Valjean handcuffed. Looking deeply into the thief's eyes, the bishop says, "I'm very angry with you, Jean Valjean." Turning toward the authorities, he asks, "Didn't he tell you he was our guest?" "Oh, yes," replies the chief authority, "after we searched his knapsack and found all this silver. He claimed that you gave it to him."
Stooping in shame, Valjean expects the bishop to indict him. A new prison sentence awaits him. But the bishop says, "Yes. Of course I gave him the silverware." Then, looking intently at Valjean he asks, "But why didn't you take the candlesticks? That was very foolish. They're worth at least 2,000 francs. Why did you leave them? Did you forget to take them?" The bishop orders his wife to hurry and fetch the candlesticks, while the authorities stand dumbfounded. They ask, "Are you saying he told us the truth?"
The authorities immediately release Valjean, who is shocked by the turn of events, and the bishop thrusts the retrieved candlesticks into Valjean's knapsack.
Once the authorities leave, the bishop drops the heavy bag of silver at Valjean's feet. After peeling away Valjean's hood, which was cloaking his guilty face, the bishop sternly looks him in the eyes and orders Valjean, "Don't forget…don't ever forget you've promised to become a new man."
Valjean, trembling, makes the promise and with utter humility asks, "Why are you doing this?"
The bishop places his hands on Valjean's shoulders, as an act of blessing, and declares, "Jean Valjean, my brother, you no longer belong to evil. With this silver, I've bought your soul. I've ransomed you from fear and hatred. Now I give you back to God." (Les Misérables, 1998, R. Yglesias)
Victor Hugo’s story of the freedom that comes when forgiveness is extended illustrates what our passage this morning declares is a reality. The very heart of the message of the gospel, the good news secured for us by Christ is summed up in Acts 13:38-39. But while we may be able to articulate the truth of the declaration of our forgiveness by God, we must grapple with what that means and have that truth so transform our lives that we may recognize and other see God’s work of forgiveness in us.
Last week we began to examine Paul’s sermon at the synagogue in Pisidian Antioch. In the first section of this sermon Paul reiterates how the grace of God repeatedly was shown to a rebellious people. Now this morning we come to the bulk of that message and see how the grace comes to full fruition as Paul declares the freedom of forgiveness. READ Acts 13:26-41
Paul tells the Jews and God-fearers gathered that day in the synagogue that they have the message of salvation (v26), that they bring the good news which the Father promised to the fathers (32). That message is then clarified in v38. What does that forgiveness mean? Verse 39 spells it our clearly. The benefit of the gospel is freedom. Let us look at what this freedom means.
Forgiveness comes at a cost v26-31
The cost of forgiveness comes because of our sin
Having already reminded them of their own family history, how that time and again God was gracious as he initiated their relationship with him and provided protection for them time and again, even in spite of their own rebellion against him. Now in v26 he brings them into the present. Paul reviews the events that surrounded the death of Jesus.
Luke’s record of Paul’s sermon is no doubt a brief summation, most likely highlighting details which would have been expounded in more detail in the actual message. But what is here gives us a good sense of the key components of the message of salvation.
Those in Jerusalem continued to oppose God’s grace. Even though they had the advantage of hearing the prophets read each week, they did not recognize that Jesus of Nazareth was indeed the Messiah.
Paul rehearses the events from a dozen years before. Jesus, having no sin, was condemned as a sinner and executed as a lowly criminal. Although Paul does not make a direct reference to any specific biblical passage that foretold this event, the early church often turned to Isaiah 53. This familiar passage, written 600 years before Jesus birth, describes the extent to which God secured our forgiveness.
The cost of forgiveness comes is the exchange of Jesus’ life for us
Jesus’ death on Calvary was not just an unfortunate turn of events, but an exchange. He was wounded for our transgressions, he took on our iniquity (Isa 53:5-6). Paul refers to the cross as a tree, calling to mind the phrasing found in Acts 5:30 and Galatians 3:13 which recall the law in Deuteronomy 21:22-23 which says “…a hanged man is cursed by God.”
But critical to an understanding of the forgiveness secured for us by God is what Paul makes clear and expands upon in v30. Despite the fact that Jesus took on the costly, the deadly work of bearing our sin, God raised him from the dead.
There is one eternal principle that will be valid as long as the world lasts. The principle is--Forgiveness is a costly thing.
- Human forgiveness is costly. A son or a daughter may go wrong; a father or a mother may forgive; but forgiveness has brought tears. ... There was the price of a broken heart to pay.
- Divine forgiveness is costly. God is love, but God is holiness. God, least of all, can break the great moral laws on which the universe is built. Sin must have its punishment or the very structure of life disintegrates. And God alone can pay the terrible price that is necessary before men can be forgiven. Forgiveness is never a case of saying: "It's all right; it doesn't matter." Forgiveness is the most costly thing in the world. (W. Barclay in The Letter to Hebrews. CT 36.11)
Forgiveness comes because of a promise v32-37
The promise of forgiveness is ours because the Son now reigns
Paul not only rehearses ancient and recent history, he next grounds his argument in God’s Word. The forgiveness he proclaims comes because God had promised to secure this for us. The promise made secure by Jesus’ resurrection, means that Jesus is now reigning. The curse that Jesus took on for us has been removed as a guarantee that the curse has been removed for us, too.
Paul, in v33, cites Psalm 2:7, a passage we’ve examined in the past. The context describes the opposition of the nations to God’s rightful sovereignty exercised in his Son’s rule.
Paul, by working his way through these three passages establishes the fact that forgiveness is guaranteed. The One who hung on the tree, the one punished for crimes he did not commit, has satisfied the demands of the Law and is no longer guilty. With guilt removed, he now has authority. With that authority he gives us the tremendous promises given to David.
The promise of forgiveness is ours because of the promise to David
From Ps 2 Paul then turns to Isaiah 55 where the prophet promises God’s needy people that he will make an eternal covenant. In that covenant we receive the holy and sure blessings of David.
While we do not have the time to extract what all this means this morning, all these passages are linked to 2 Samuel 7 where Nathan relates to David the promise God has made to David to establish through him, all God’s promises. So that, in Isaiah 55, these blessings are once again, the permanence of Christ’s reign and the certainty of his securing for us eternal life.
The promise of forgiveness is ours because Christ is now raised
Then Paul turns to his third and final OT quote, Psa 16. The messianic prophecy states that David’s son will not remain in the grave, but that God will raise him from the dead. With this proof Paul shows that the promise, originally given to David can not be applied to him. For when David died, he was not raised from the dead. But, David’s heir, Jesus, was raised.
With the certainty and importance of the resurrection now stated, Paul moves then to his conclusion. What does Jesus death, burial and resurrection mean for us, today?
Forgiveness comes as freedom v38-39
The freedom of forgiveness brings a new status
This is the great summation of what we have in Christ. All other benefits flow from this, but if we miss the centrality of sins forgiven as the chief benefit of Christ’s work on our behalf, we will never grasp the life-changing message of the gospel.
To ignore the central truth that our sins are forgiven, to allow them to continue to taunt us with past failures can be deadly. Dr. Paul Brand, a Christian physician, illustrates this when writing of how some amputees experience the sensation of a phantom limb. Somewhere, locked in their brains, a memory lingers of the nonexistent hand or leg. Invisible toes curl, imaginary hands grasp things, a "leg" feels so sturdy a patient may try to stand on it. For a few, the experience includes pain. One such patient was his medical school administrator, Mr. Barwick, who had a serious and painful circulation problem in his leg but refused to allow the recommended amputation. As the pain grew worse, Barwick grew bitter. "I hate it! I hate It!" he would mutter about the leg. At last he relented and told the doctor, "I can't stand it anymore. I'm through with that leg. Take it off." Surgery was scheduled immediately.
Before the operation, however, Barwick asked the doctor, "What do you do with legs after they're removed?" "We may take a biopsy or explore them a bit, but afterwards we incinerate them," the doctor replied.
Barwick proceeded with a bizarre request: "I would like you to preserve my leg. I will install it on my mantle shelf. Then, I will taunt that leg, 'Hah! You can't hurt me anymore!'"
He got his wish. But the despised leg had the last laugh. Barwick suffered phantom limb pain of the worst degree. The wound healed, but he could feel the torturous pressure of the swelling as the muscles cramped, and he had no prospect of relief. He had hated the leg with such intensity that the pain had unaccountably lodged permanently in his brain.
Christians can be obsessed by the memory of some sin committed years ago. It never leaves them, crippling their ministry, their devotional life, and their relationships with others. They live in fear that someone will discover their past. They work overtime trying to prove to God they're truly repentant. They erect barriers against the enveloping, loving grace of God. Unless they experience the truth in (1 John 3:19-20) that "God is greater than our conscience," they become a pitiful as poor Mr. Barwick, shaking a fist in fury at the pickled leg on the mantle.
(P. Brand, P. Yancey, Leadership, 5.3)
The freedom of forgiveness is declared to be our by God’s grace
This new status as now forgiven is further described as freedom in the ESV, justified in the NIV. The connection of these two terms is critical in understanding what it means for us to be forgiven. Paul uses the familiar term justified or dikaio?. This word, taken from the courtroom means to declare someone right, to put a person in a right relationship with another. It necessitates that past offenses be forgiven. In that sense it means to be freed from the claims that once where there.
For this to happen we must be given another’s righteousness. John Calvin was fond of an illustration used a millennium before by Ambrose. A wonderful picture of this righteousness is seen in the blessing of Jacob. You recall how Jacob sought to steal his brother’s blessing in Genesis by putting on his clothes and passing himself off as his brother Esau. Of this Calvin writes:
Wherefore Ambrose appears to me to have very beautifully exemplified this righteousness in the benediction of Jacob; that as he, who had on his own account no claim to the privileges of primogeniture, being concealed in his brother's habit and invested in his garment, which diffused a most excellent odor, insinuated himself into the favour of his father, that he might receive the blessing to his own advantage, under the character of another; so we shelter ourselves under the precious purity of Christ our elder brother that we may obtain the testimony of righteousness in the sight of God. (Institutes lll.XI.23).
What Jacob did that was by treachery we are granted by God’s grace. Our Elder Brother, Jesus Christ willingly gave us his habit, his clothing, and we are now fully accepted by the Father. We are freed from the condemnation of the Law, freed from going to God the Judge with filthy hands trying vainly to plead our case. Another pleads our case in our behalf, Jesus who is fully accepted by the Father.
It is important to understand that the freedom we have, that justification means we are forgiven, but that it is more than forgiveness; it is to be cleared of all blame and to be free from every charge.
In an earthly court, the judge cannot forgive and justify a man at the same time. If the judge forgives him, then the man must be guilty, and therefore cannot be justified. If the judge justifies him, then he doesn't need forgiveness, because he isn't guilty. God, however, undertakes to both forgive the sinner, and then put him in a new position where there is no charge against him at all. God makes it as though he had never sinned. This is what the Shorter Catechism means when it answers the question, "What is justification?" with: "An act of God's free grace, wherein He pardons all our sins, and accepts us as righteous in His sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith"
For God to forgive, he will not lower his standard or disregards the penalty of the law. Rather God, through his Son delivers the believer from the penalty of His law through its execution (Rom. 8.3-4). The law of God thus satisfied on our behalf, God declares us to be what we truly are in His sight: not guilty. God must act according to justice. Unless God's justice is satisfied, there is no justification. If, therefore, justification only consisted in the forgiveness of the sinner, then we do not need a Savior, or atonement.
Mercy without proper grounds has a horrible habit of making the conscience uneasy. Forgiveness without satisfaction is fickle forgiveness. A god of mere forgiveness is a god of mere condemnation. A god of mere condemnation is a god who provides no grounds of trust in him as one who will go on being merciful to us. But our God is not like that. We can be certain that our sins, 2000 years ago were nailed to that tree, laid in the tomb, so that, on that resurrection Sunday, as Christ came out of the tomb, our sins no longer had any claim upon us.
Therefore the result of justification is full acceptance. So many times we struggle with this truth on a daily basis. We question and doubt that God’s unqualified love has been poured out on us, that our heavenly Father can never reject us.
I come across people constantly that are incredulous of this truth. They shake their heads and say, "That can't be, I've got to do something. The only way God can find me acceptable is that I must make myself acceptable." But it will never be that way. No one can ever make oneself acceptable to God by trying to live a good life.
What will you do with God’s forgiveness? v40-41
God’s forgiveness may be scoffed at
Paul closes with a warning, again quoting from the Scriptures. This verse, from Habakkuk speaks of the danger of failing to recognize what is happening is truly from God. Don’t scoff at his forgiveness. There are two types of scoffers
There are the cynics, whose ridicule is easy to spot. With dripping sarcasm they dismiss as fantasy that which God has declared to be true. In a church such types are infrequent.
But there is another form of scoffing which I believe is far more prevalent in a church and far more dangerous. It is the dispassionate professing believer.
They know it is not socially acceptable to scoff at God’s mercy, but they receive the news of his grace with wary acceptance, with a yawn, or a response of “ya, but…” Why do we call grace amazing? Grace is amazing because it works against the grain of common sense.
It is so easy for people to revisit the grave of forgiven sins and mourn over them. Our sins do not reside at the memorial markers we create. God has already dealt with our sin. That debt was paid on the cross of Jesus Christ, as He became our sin so that we might become His righteousness. We struggle to fully accept this by faith. We keep tabs and each time we sin, we are afraid to come before God because we might have used up our chances.
God’s forgiveness must be received
It is important to note that the gospel is clearly defined here. It is not “what Jesus can do for you.” Still less is it to be psychologized and subjectivized into “feeling like a new person.” The gospel is not to be confused with its application. It is what Jesus did in his death, burial and resurrection. The point of the gospel is that people believe it. The salvation won by Christ must be appropriated personally by faith in him.
If our greatest need had been information, God would have sent us an educator.
If our greatest need had been technology, God would have sent us a scientist.
If our greatest need had been money, God would have sent us an economist.
If our greatest need had been pleasure, God would have sent us an entertainer.
But our greatest need was forgiveness, so God sent us a Savior.
(Unfinished Business, C. Sell, Multnomah, 1989, pp. 121ff)
What the Bishop in Hugo’s novel could only imitate, we who are in Christ posses. Our freedom was purchased not with a pair silver candlesticks and some spoons. We are freed from the penalty of our own sin by the one who died in our place. With confidence we can proclaim the truth of our final hymn, proclaiming in the resurrection our new life. The glory belongs to Christ. The benefit is now ours.
