No Sin Left Unpaid

There are those "kinder, gentler" kind of folk who like to think that God is a nice God and forgiveness is free, that He can just wave His magic wand and make it all go away. The cross of Christ is an offense in this kind of thinking because it makes God seem so mean and narrow-minded. We're told to forgive; why can't God? So they assume He can and glower at those who argue otherwise.

Part of the problem here is the problem of magnitude. In terms of crime and punishment, we understand that the punishment must fit the crime. No one, in our legal system, should go to prison for life for stealing a piece of candy from a Walmart, right? That's not justice. On the other hand, there have been stories of people convicted of crimes like rape who are let off with a wrist slap. That's not justice. We apply this kind of thinking to sin, but we typically have a problem when we do. We have a faulty valuation of the sin we commit. We classify idolatry and treason against the Most High as "misdemeanors" and figure God can just let us off with a warning. That's not justice.

The truth is God is Just. That means that no sin can go unpaid. That means that, in the final judgment, there can be no leniency. Every sin must be accounted for and paid up. Mercy is nice, but mercy is defined as "not getting what you deserve", and that's not justice. It is the opposite of justice.

When Jesus was dying on the cross, His last words were, "It is finished." Linguists will tell you that the word could be literally translated "paid in full". It was an accounting term, apparently. And Jesus claimed to have paid the price. Does this mean that all sin is paid for? Universalists argue it does. Scripture argues it doesn't. It was no less than Jesus who said, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven." (Matt 7:21-23) It was Jesus who warned, "Unless you repent, you will all likewise perish." (Luke 13:3,5) It was Jesus who said that "the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many." (Matt 7:13) Paul says that everyone will have their work tested (1 Cor 3:12-15). "Each of us will give an account of himself to God." (Rom 14:12) No, Jesus's "It is finished" did not mean "All sin for all people for all time is paid for." Jesus meant that all the sin He intended to pay for was actually paid for.

So there are, ultimately, only two kinds of sin: the paid for and the unpaid for. All sin will be paid for in the end. No sin will be left unpaid. The question, then, becomes, are you going to pay? I, for one, am delighted and grateful and humbled and blessed that Christ "has now reconciled you in His fleshly body through death, in order to present you before Him holy and blameless and beyond reproach." (Col 1:22) I'll take that payment, thank you very much.