Imagine a town way back when they used stocks as punishment. As people live in this town they see the stocks in the town square and sometimes they see people being punished in them. Now imagine someone commits a crime so she put herself into the stock because she knows that's what she deserves.
The Judge comes by and says "What have you done?" The person then confesses the crime. The Judge says "You are forgiven" and walks away. The person stays in the stocks though. She feels that her crime was severe and deserving of more time. The person sits in the stocks for days and notices there are other people walking around the town that the person KNOWS have committed the same crime she has. So the person gets mad. "Why aren't they being punished like I am?" The person starts to get angry at the Judge because she is in the stocks while other guilty people are walking around free.
One day the Judge walks by and sees the person in the stocks and says "Why are you still in the stocks?" The person says "Because I committed a crime." The Judge says "But I forgave you. The stocks aren't locked, you can leave them whenever you want." But the person doesn't leave. Instead she gets mad because the Judge isn't making other people sit in the stocks too. The person becomes resentful of other people who have committed crimes and aren't sitting in the stocks all day.
So how is this like God?
I have a friend who is struggling to forgive herself for a mistake she made years ago. She's feels like she destroyed her life with this mistake and is struggling to forgive herself. The mistake she made is a very common mistake people in our culture make. My friend gets very frustrated because she sees other people make the same mistake and yet their lives aren't destroyed. She feels like God isn't punishing other people who made this mistake and she can't understand why she is still being punished. She feels like, because her life pre-mistake hasn't been restored, she is still being punished.
I asked her if she has forgiven herself for this mistake. She admits she hasn't. I asked if she's asked God for forgiveness and she says she has. Now, knowing God I'm pretty sure she's been forgiven by Him. But she can't seem to forgive herself. She seems to feel as though she is being punished more than other people who have committed the same mistake because she sees them seemingly enjoying life without recrimination.
This reminds me of my old town story above. God forgives us through Jesus. No sin is greater than another so its not like there these BIG sins that He holds over our heads and lets the little ones slide. Yet, we pick certain sins that we think are unforgivable and we put ourselves or others in the stocks. I'll say that again WE PUT ourselves (and others) in the stocks. (This sounds very much like knowing between good and evil, Hmm... like The Fall) God has every right to put us all in stocks on a daily basis. We deserve to spend eternity in the stocks but that's the beauty of Jesus. Jesus came and suffered way more than the stocks for us so that we don't have to spend eternity sandwiched between wooden boards, having tomatoes thrown at us.
Now, some sins have natural consequences and God isn't going to miraculously take those away from us. For example, if you drink and dive you could get into a wreck and seriously injure yourself or others. Yet there are people who drink and drive on a regular basis and they never get a ticket or into a wreck. Life and consequences aren't fair. God isn't fair but He's good.
Sometimes, we've been in the stocks so long our arms are numb and we need help getting out of them. We are so used to the stocks and are so atrophied from being in there that when we are freed we are too week to extricate ourselves. This is when we need God and our community around us to take us out of the stocks, to clean the dried up tomato seeds out of our hair, to show us how to live a normal life, to forget why we were in the stocks and just love us.
God wants us walking in freedom. He doesn't want us sitting in the heat, getting splinters in our neck and wrists. Jesus took the splinters for us. He forgives us so who are we to not forgive ourselves? Do we know more than God? Are we better judges than He is? Isn't this what He was protecting us from when He told us not to eat from the Tree of The Knowledge of Good and Evil?
God wants us walking in freedom. He doesn't want us sitting in the heat, getting splinters in our neck and wrists. Jesus took the splinters for us. He forgives us so who are we to not forgive ourselves? Do we know more than God? Are we better judges than He is? Isn't this what He was protecting us from when He told us not to eat from the Tree of The Knowledge of Good and Evil?
