Not Condemned

Jesus told a story in Luke Chapter 15 about a son who took his inheritance and wasted it in a far away land. When the prodigal son decided to come back to the Father, He found his father waiting for Him with open arms. He did not make the son feel condemned. He made him feel forgiven and accepted (Luke 15).

And that is a picture of our God, a picture of a good, good Father. It’s not our ‘good’ deeds or our good behaviour that makes Him good. It’s who He is. When we have messed things up, He is still a good Father. When we have rebelled, He remains a good Father. When we are like the prodigal son, He is still a good Father. There is nothing we can do to make Him stop being a good Father and, as a good Father, He corrects us in perfect love. It’s perfect love that casts out our fear, not bringing us condemnation.

When God came in the cool of the evening to chill with Adam and Eve, they were hiding from Him. God desires us to hide in Him, not from Him (Genesis 3). When Adam and Eve came to God, they had made themselves a covering from fig leaves. But as a good Father, God knew they needed a better covering, one that was able to last. God made them garments from animal’s skin and covered them from their shame. Because of their shame and their failure, God killed an animal, in order to cloth them.

In Nehemiah Chapter 9, we read an account of the children of Israel and how stubborn they were. Yet God remained a good Father to them. He provided manna for them, made their clothes able to last, made sure their feet didn’t swell. God was there looking after them as a good Father without condemning them.

Even in Matthew 26:40, when Jesus found His three inner circle disciples asleep for the third time, He did not condemn them. He didn’t make them feel like the worst, weak Christians ever. He understood where they were at, and instead of condemning them, He allowed them to go ahead and have a nap.

Jesus told the woman caught in adultery, “Neither do I condemn you, go and sin no more.” And those are still His words to us today. If God is not the one condemning us, then where is the condemnation coming from? Yes! It is coming from the enemy. And we should silence the voice of the enemy and remind him that, in our Father, there is now no condemnation, but forgiveness and acceptance.

If He was a condemning God, many people in the bible would have fallen under the weight of His condemnation and would not have fulfilled their God-created purpose.

God, in His love, did not send His son Jesus Christ to condemn us, but to redeem us and to reconcile us with the Father. Let’s come as we are, whether we feel terrible, troubled, bitter, confused, messed up, lost, let down, ashamed or under a burden of false guilt. He will receive us with open hands and not with words of condemnation. He will clothe us and transform us with His love.

He says, “But forget all that - it is nothing compared to what I am going to do. For I am about to do something new” (Isaiah 43:18-19, NLT). He knows us, yet He stands at our door and knocks, wanting to be with us. What love!