Obstacles to Receiving God's Forgiveness

When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralyzed man, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”

- Mark 2:5

We all have obstacles that try to keep us from receiving God’s forgiveness.

Some of us think: “Forgiveness? Why do I need forgiveness?” We don’t see any sin in our lives. This is denial, friends, and most of us participate in it at some point in our lives. We all fall short of God’s standards, either by what we’ve done or by what we’ve left undone. Refusing to acknowledge reality doesn’t make reality go away.

Others of us are buried beneath mountains of guilt and shame. We feel bad about what we’ve done or what we’ve failed to do. And we’ve grown used to feeling bad. We’d feel bad if we didn’t feel bad! We can’t receive God’s forgiveness because we aren’t willing – or able – to forgive ourselves.

Still others of us get trapped in unhealthy cycles of behavior. We repent and receive God’s forgiveness, but then go and do it again and again and again. After a while, we feel we used up our allotment of grace. We stop receiving forgiveness or even asking for it.

Others of us have taken the route Bonhoeffer called “cheap grace.” We say “It’s God’s job to forgive.” Forgiveness becomes automatic. Repentance never happens. Forgiveness becomes a trinket that we store in a back corner of our memory. The cheap substitute prevents us from enjoying the real thing.

And, lastly, some of us just don’t believe that God forgives at all. Either we don’t believe he exists or we believe that he’s always angry. Forgiveness is not received because forgiveness is never offered … at least, in our view. We are alone with our sin.

Do you see yourself in any of these portraits? Which of these obstacles are at work in you? Where have you had experience with obstacles keeping you from receiving forgiveness? What obstacles would you add to the list?

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