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“I will be propitious to their unrighteousnesses, and their sins I shall by no means remember anymore”—v. 12; Jer. 31:34b:
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Christ made propitiation for our sins to appease God’s righteousness, to reconcile us by satisfying the demands of God’s righteousness—Heb. 2:17.
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The precious and all-efficacious blood of Christ resolves all our problems so that we can remain constantly in fellowship with God to continually enjoy His organic salvation—1 John 1:7-9; 2:1-2:
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Before God, the redeeming blood of the Lord has cleansed us once for all eternally (Heb. 9:12, 14), and the efficacy of that cleansing need not be repeated.
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However, in our conscience we need the instant application of the constant cleansing of the Lord’s precious blood again and again whenever our conscience is enlightened by the divine light in our fellowship with God.
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Once God forgives us, He erases our sins from His memory and remembers them no longer; forgiveness of sins means the removal of the charges of sin against us before God that we may be delivered from the penalty of God’s righteousness—John 5:24:
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When God forgives us of our sins, He causes the sins that we have committed to depart from us—Psa. 103:12; Lev. 16:7-10, 15-22.
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God’s forgiveness of our sins results in our fearing Him and loving Him in our restored fellowship with Him—Psa. 130:4; Luke 7:47.
Morning Nourishment
Heb. 8:12 For I will be propitious to their unrighteousnesses, and their sins I shall by no means remember anymore.Psa. 130:4 But with You there is forgiveness, that You would be feared.
To “be propitious” [in Hebrews 8:12] is to make propitiation for our sins. Christ made propitiation for our sins to appease God’s righteousness, to reconcile us by satisfying the demand of God’s righteousness (2:17)….Based upon this propitiation, God forgives our sins. In 8:12 we are told by the Lord that “their sins I shall by no means remember anymore.” Here we see that God will forget our sins. To forgive means to forget….Without forgetting, forgiveness is not real. God not only forgives us our sins but also forgets our sins.
In the new covenant the primary blessing is the imparting of the divine life which brings in the inner law of life, the blessing of having God and of being His people, and the inward ability of knowing the Lord. For God to do this, He had to be propitious to our unrighteousnesses and forget our sins. The propitiation for our unrighteousnesses and the forgiveness of our sins give Him the ground to impart His life into us. (Life-study of Hebrews, pp. 413-414)
Today’s Reading
Forgiveness of sins means the removal of the charges of sin against us before God that we may be delivered from the penalty of God’s righteousness (John 3:18; 5:24). Because a charge had been made against us before God so that we were condemned by God, it was necessary for us to suffer God’s righteous punishment. But when God forgave us, He delivered us from the penalty of His righteousness and condemned us no longer. This is because the Lord Jesus shed His blood and died on the cross according to God’s righteousness to suffer God’s righteous punishment in our place (Heb. 9:22), thus satisfying God’s righteous requirement. Hence, according to His righteousness, God can, and will, forgive the sins of those who believe in Christ, canceling the charges of sin against them and delivering them from the penalty.In the New Testament the Greek word for forgiveness means “causing (it) to leave” and “sending away” (Matt. 12:31; Rom. 4:7; Acts 5:31; 13:38). When God forgives us of our sins, He…also causes the sins which we have committed to depart from us. This is because when He made the Lord Jesus an offering for sin on the cross, He laid all our sins on Him that He might carry them up in His body for us (John 1:29; Isa. 53:6; 1 Pet. 2:24). Furthermore,…He also caused all our sins to be laid on Satan that he should bear them forever. This is revealed in type in the atonement recorded in Leviticus 16. When the high priest made atonement for the children of Israel, he took two goats and presented them before God. One was for God and was to be killed to make atonement for the children of Israel; whereas the other was “for Azazel,” that is, for Satan, to bear the sins of the children of Israel (Lev. 16:7-10, 15-22)…[since] sin came from Satan.
When God forgives us, He not only exempts us from suffering the penalty of sin and causes our sins to depart from us, but He also forgets our sins. Once He forgives us, He erases our sins from His memory and remembers them no longer.
People think that God’s forgiveness will cause man to become audacious and reckless. Little do they know that the grace of God’s forgiveness is to bring man into the fear of God (Psa. 130:4). Our experience tells us that the more we are forgiven by God, the more we fear Him; the more we have received the grace of God’s forgiveness, the more we have the fear toward God….The grace of God’s forgiveness causes us not only to fear God but also to love God [Luke 7:47]. (Truth Lessons—Level One, vol. 3, pp. 118-120, 122-123)
Further Reading: Life-study of Hebrews, msg. 36; Truth Lessons—Level One, vol. 3, lsn. 36; CWWL, 1932-1949, vol. 3, “Crucial Truths in the Holy Scriptures,” vol. 1, ch. 6