Amelia Church of Christ - Christian Church in Amelia, OH near Cincinnati in Clermont County

“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.” (John 10:10, NIV) Those words came straight from the mouth of Jesus Christ. You’ve probably heard of him. Jesus told us that he came to give us life. Life to its fullest.

But he also tells us about somebody else…a thief. A thief who comes to steal, kill, and destroy. That thief’s name is Satan. You’ve probably heard of him, too. The Bible tells us very explicitly that Satan isn’t some mythological creature. He’s not some abstract idea in modern art. He’s not some party animal who’s rocking out to AC/DC and hanging out in the hot tub with Playboy bunnies. And he’s not some cartoon character with red skin, horns, and a pitch fork.

The Bible tells us that Satan is real. He’s just as real as Jesus. And, just like Jesus, Satan has a real mission. Jesus’ mission is to give you life. Satan’s mission is to rob you of the life that God wants for you.

Check out this Scripture from the book of Galatians. “For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:26, NLT)

This one little verse IS the life that God wants for you. This verse gives us our true identity. If we give our lives to Christ, we are children of God. That is who you are. When you look in the mirror, you should see the face of a prince or a princess. That’s a fitting title for you since you’re a child of the King.

But for most of us, that’s not what we see when we look in the mirror. You don’t see a prince. You don’t see a princess. You look in the mirror and you see something far, far less. Why? What happened? Someone stole your identity.

We’re kicking off a brand new series of messages today called Identity Theft. The Bible tells us that our true identity is found in God. We are his children. But we’ve also seen that Satan is a master thief. He is out to steal your identity. He wants you to see yourself as something less than a child of the King. He wants to rob you of the life that God wants for you. And he’s got some very powerful tools to do that. In this series, we’re talking about four of Satan’s most effective weapons that he uses to rob us of our true identity.

Today, we’re talking about one of the most deadly weapons in the devil’s arsenal…guilt.

If you are in Christ, then when you walk up to a mirror, you should see a perfect and pure child of God looking back at you. But for a lot of us, guilt has robbed us of our identity. The perfect reflection we should see has been destroyed by the guilt that is constantly hanging over us.

Guilt is an incredibly powerful emotion. Guilt has the power to ruin your life. It can completely rob you of your true identity. It can turn you into someone that God never intended for you to be.

For some of us, the guilt of our past haunts us every single day of our lives. Maybe it’s the culmination of a lifetime of bad, sinful decisions. Or maybe it is just one huge, horrendous decision that haunts us. We’d do anything to turn back the clock. We’d give anything to be able to go back and do things differently. But time keeps marching on. And try as we might, we can never get over the guilt of our past.

Now, the Bible is clear. We all have a screwed up past. In Romans 3, the Bible says, “There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God…” (Romans 3:22b-23, NIV)

Be sure to notice that little three-letter word…all. All have sinned. All fall short of the glory of God, which means that we all fall short of the standard that God has set for our lives. Everyone in this room is a messed up, screwed up, jacked up sinner. It doesn’t matter what they’re wearing…a suit or jeans. It doesn’t matter if they’re a man or a woman. It doesn’t matter if they’re old or young. They’re a sinner. You’re a sinner. I’m a sinner.

I definitely have a checkered past. I look back at my past and I see things that I can’t even believe I did…but I definitely did them. I’ve got more than a few skeletons in my closet. If this is your first time here at Amelia and you’re looking for a church with a perfect pastor, I’m really glad you came…but you need to look somewhere else. My past is filled with incredibly stupid and sinful decisions. I’d love to be able to jump in a DeLorean, hit 88 mph, go back in time and undo it all…but I can’t.

And if you’re honest, you’re right there with me. The regrets of your past are too many to name. But here is God’s truth about the past.

If you don’t let it die then it won’t let you live. If you don’t let the guilt of your past die, then that guilt will always rob you of your identity. That guilt will always bring you down. It will never let you live the life that God desires for you. If you don’t let it die, then it won’t let you live.

Listen to what God said through the Old Testament prophet, Isaiah. “Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! I, even I, am he who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake and remembers your sins no more.” (Isaiah 43:18-19a, 25, NIV)

If you really understand the truth of this Scripture, it will change your life. This is straight from the mouth of God. God himself tells us not to dwell on the past. He says to forget it. And you know why God tells us to forget about our past? Because he has forgotten about it. God tells us that he is the one who blots out our screw ups. He forgets about our sins. If God has forgotten about your past, why in the world would you dwell on it?

But now, for some of us, the guilt we experience doesn’t just emanate from our past…it comes from our present. You’re not feeling guilty over a decision you made ten years ago…you’re feeling guilty over a decision you made last night.

Here’s the dirty little secret that a lot of Christians don’t want to admit. The secret is not that we have sinned. The secret is that we do sin. Do a scan of this room again. Everyone you see has a sinful past. Everyone you see also has a sinful present. No one has achieved perfection. And as long as we live in this world, the Bible says that we never will.

The Bible says, “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.” (1 John 1:8, NIV)

Here’s what this means…anyone who claims that they never sin is a prideful liar. Pride is a sin. Lying is a sin. Game. Set. Match.

But most of us don’t fall into that category. Most of us fully recognize that we keep on sinning…and we feel incredibly guilty about that.

You’re not alone. In fact, the Apostle Paul was right there with you. This is the Apostle Paul. The greatest missionary in history. The man who wrote most of the New Testament. Even he knew what it was like to deal with sin, not only in his past, but also in his present.

Listen to what he said in Romans 7. “I don’t really understand myself, for I want to do what is right, but I don’t do it. Instead, I do what I hate. And I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature. I want to do what is right, but I can’t. I want to do what is good, but I don’t.

I don’t want to do what is wrong, but I do it anyway. I have discovered this principle of life—that when I want to do what is right, I inevitably do what is wrong.” (Romans 7:15, 18-19, 21, NLT)

Can I get an “amen?” Every single person here knows what this feels like. You know what it feels like to see the right thing and still do the wrong thing. You know what it’s like to hate the wrong thing, and then turn around and do it anyway.

And you know what that produces? Guilt. Life destroying, identity robbing guilt. That’s exactly what it produced in Paul’s life.

Listen to what he said right after he told us how sinful he was. Paul said, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:24, NIV)

You ever felt like that? You look in the mirror and you don’t see a child of God. That reflection has been destroyed. That identity has been stolen by the guilt of your past and the guilt of your present. The only thing you see in the mirror is a wretch. You see someone who can never amount to anything. You see someone that God couldn’t possibly love. Someone that he couldn’t possibly forgive.

You need to understand where this is coming from. It isn’t coming from God. This is guilt talking. This is Satan whispering in your ear. This is the thief that Jesus warned us about. He’s out to destroy you…and he’ll do it by reminding you of your guilt over and over again. Every time you seem to make any progress, he’ll just push down harder, until the weight of that guilt makes any forward progress impossible.

Several years ago, I weighed about 50 lbs more than I do today. I was…well, I was a fat slob. No other way to say it. One day, a friend of mine asked me to help him carry a new bathtub up the stairs in his house. He was building a brand new house and his huge new garden tub had just arrived.

I said, “Sure, I’ll help you move it,” and away we went. This tub was big. And I was a tub of lard at the time. And I quickly figured out that this tub was not going to move that tub.

His bathtub was way bigger than I had imagined…and it was stinkin’ heavy. We only made it up a few steps and I just couldn’t go any further. I gave it everything I had, but I wasn’t going to be able to move that tub any further.

I saw my friend a few days later and said, “So what did you do about your tub?”

He told me, “It’s cool. Later that day, my dad came over and we moved it up the stairs.”

Now wait a minute. I was in my early 20s. His dad was in his middle 50s. And yet this guy, who was more than twice my age, was able to do what I couldn’t do. That is what you call a humbling experience.

The problem was the fact that I was horribly out of shape. Not only was the tub heavy, but I was heavy. All of that combined weight made it impossible for me to make any forward progress.

Some of you know what that feels like, because the weight of your guilt is so heavy that you can’t move any further. You can’t push that tub any further up the stairs. You’re stuck right where you are.

You agree with Paul. You look at yourself and you say, “What a wretched man I am! What a wretched woman I am! Who will save me from this guilt? Who will rescue you from this junk that’s weighing me down?”

Paul answers that question. Listen to this. Paul said, “What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:24, NIV)

He answers the question in the very next verse. “Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:25, NIV)

The answer to our guilt is Jesus! You don’t have to dwell on your past. You don’t have to see yourself as a miserable loser. Yes, you have a sinful past….yes, you have a sinful present…and you can still see yourself as a pure and perfect child of God. How does that happen? Jesus. That’s how it happens.

We’re going to read the very next verse that Paul wrote in the book of Romans. The verse that’s right after this one that’s on the screen right now. But before we do, I want to be sure I have everybody’s attention. The words we’re getting ready to read are the most important words I’m going to say all morning. This one verse of Scripture can change your life. I’m not blowing smoke. I’m not being melodramatic. The truth of God in this verse can change your life forever. So are you ready? I said, are you ready? Are you ready to hear a life-giving, identity-restoring truth from the Lord? Are you ready, church?

Here we go. Romans 8:1 - “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus…” (Romans 8:1, NIV)

If you get nothing else out of your time here today, you’ve got to get this. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ.

The word “condemnation” is a judicial term. It refers to a judge who passes sentence on a guilty person. But it goes even deeper than that. This word not only refers to the guilty sentence, but it refers to the penalty that follows. This Bible word, “condemnation,” literally refers to the judge, jury, and executioner. The judge hears the case. The jury finds you guilty. The executioner carries out the punishment.

But look at the word that comes before “condemnation.” Paul said that if we are a Christian, there is “no condemnation.” Literally, this word in the Bible that is translated as “no” means “not a single one of any kind.”

So here it is…if you give your life to Christ, there is not a single shred of guilt left to condemn you. You are pure. You are clean. You are holy. You are a saint. Your past sins…forgotten. Your present sins…forgiven. You don’t have to live under the weight of your guilt anymore because, through Jesus Christ, God has removed everything and anything that could ever condemn you.

And later on in Romans 8, Paul tells us exactly why that is true. How does God remove all our guilt? How does Jesus offer us this forgiveness?

Pick it up in verse 31. Paul writes, “What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (Romans 8:31-32, NIV)

This is how we can be set free from guilt. This is why there is not a single thing that will ever condemn us. It is all because God “did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all.”

It happened when Jesus died on the cross. Maybe you’ve never heard that Jesus was hung on a cross with spikes through his wrists and ankles, and that he hung there, suspended in the air, in excruciating pain, until he died. Maybe today is the first day that you’ve ever heard that. Or maybe you did hear somewhere along the way that Jesus died on a cross, but you’re really not sure why.

Here it is. Jesus was the Son of God. He was God in human flesh. And God willingly gave up his Son for you and for me.

Remember earlier when we read the verse that says “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God?” Well, now we need to read the rest of it.

Check this out. From Romans 3 – “There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.” (Romans 3:22b-25a, NIV)

Now, that might sound a little confusing at first. There are some “churchy” sounding words that we need to define. The Bible says that God presented Jesus as a sacrifice of atonement. When Jesus died on the cross, his sacrifice was the atonement for our sin. In other words, Jesus paid the price to forgive our sin.

The Bible teaches that God is a just God, which means that sin has to be punished. But the Bible also tells us that God is a God of grace, which means he desires to forgive sin. That sounds contradictory, until you see the cross.

God’s justice and grace come together in perfect harmony at the cross of Jesus Christ. Jesus died for our sin. He never sinned himself. He was perfect, absolutely sinless. But he died to atone for our sin, to pay the price for our sin so we wouldn’t have to. God’s justice was satisfied because the price of sin had been paid. God’s grace was satisfied because, even though we are guilty, we don’t have to pay the price for our sin. It has already been paid in full.

And here’s the result…Romans 3:24 says that we “are justified freely by his grace.” What does it mean to be justified? It means that when God looks at me, it is “just as if I’d” never sinned. God looks at me and doesn’t even see my sin anymore. My sin has been forgiven. My sin has been forgotten. It’s like I never sinned in the first place. And God gives me that gift freely through his grace. There is nothing I can do to earn it. Nothing I can do to deserve it. It is a free gift of God.

But this isn’t just theology. This isn’t just stuff to talk about in a church service. This has practical, life-changing application.

Let’s go back to Romans 8. Paul has just told us that God loved us enough to give up his own Son to pay the price for our sin. Now, listen to what he says next.

Pick it up in verse 33. “Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.” (Romans 8:34-34, NIV)

If you are a Christian, who is going to bring a charge against you? People may accuse you. Your own guilty conscience may accuse you. Satan may accuse you. But God has justified you, which means all those accusations result in one, big, fat nothing. The sins of your past, even the sins of your present, are gone.

Who is going to condemn you? We read earlier that there is no condemnation for us if we are in Christ. And here’s why. “Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us.”

You will be condemned by Satan, by other people, and at times, even by your own guilt that you feel. But Jesus is at the right hand of God, interceding for you.

The message of Easter is that Jesus died for our sins. But death couldn’t hold him. Three days later, He rose to life again. We don’t worship some religious teacher and philosopher who lived a good life, but is now dead and buried.

Our God, our Savior, our Jesus is alive! And right now, at this very second, he is interceding before God on our behalf.

That means that even when I screw things up, Jesus is at God’s right hand, and he’s telling the Father, “Yeah, he messed up. But I died for that sin. I paid the price for it. Mike is still mine. He’s still my child.”

And, if you are in Christ, Jesus is doing the same for you. Every time you mess things up, every time you sin, Jesus is telling the Father, “This one’s on me. I got this one. I paid the price for it. He’s still mine. She’s still mine.”

That’s why this verse is who we are. This is our true identity. “For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus.” (Galatians 3:26, NLT) Through faith in Jesus, through his death and resurrection for our sin, we can be God’s children. No more sin. No more condemnation. No more guilt.

For some of you, getting rid of your guilt sounds like a pipe dream. Right now, you’re thinking, “Yeah, that sounds good. But you don’t know what I’ve done. You don’t understand what a screw up I am. You just don’t know…”

You’re right…I don’t know. But God does. And he still said there is no condemnation if you give your life to Christ. He still said that you are justified freely by his grace. He still said that you are his child.

Some of you have given your life to Christ, but you’ve never let go of your guilt. God has forgiven you, but you’ve never forgiven yourself. You drag your guilt around everywhere you go. You drug it in here with you today. But you can leave without it. God’s grace is so huge, the power of the cross is so amazing…it can release you from all of your guilt. All of it. Today, you can fully and finally lay it ALL down at the cross. For the first time, you can walk out of this place today as a person who is truly free.

There are others of us here today who have never given your life to Christ. Maybe you’ve never heard about Jesus before. Maybe you’ve heard about Jesus plenty, but you’ve still never done anything about it.

Here’s all you need to know…God loves you like crazy. So much that he gave His Son to pay the price for your sin. Right now, you are under the guilt of your sin because you’ve never accepted Christ as your Savior and Lord. But it doesn’t have to stay that way. You can be forgiven. You can be released from the shackles of your guilt.

But it’s not going to happen because of anything you do. It’s not about what you can do for God. It’s about what God has done for you. All you have to do is accept the free gift. Believe in Jesus. Trust that his death and resurrection are enough to forgive you. Come to be baptized, which is where you die with Christ and rise to a brand new life. No condemnation. Not even a hint of guilt. Pure. Perfect. Forgiven. Free.

Mike Edmisten

Tags: forgiveness, grace, guilt, Identity Theft, past, Romans 8