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Litany of Forgiveness

As the disciples sat down with Jesus for the Passover on the night he was betrayed, he predicted that they would all run away when things got tough. Naturally, they all denied it. After all, they had already put up with some opposition. They knew that the religious leaders didn't like Jesus, and were prepared (or so they thought) for whatever was going to come. 

They weren't. Before the night was over, they had all deserted him and fled into the darkness. 

But that same night, at that same table, even before any one of them had run away, Jesus promised that they would see him again. He wasn't just promising his resurrection. He was promising a renewed relationship after they had denied him. 

Jesus promised that he wouldn't let them go, even though they would deny him. 

If we trust in Jesus, we are given the same promise. This means that we don't have to be anxious about whether the next bad thing we do is going to cause God to finally reject us. 

We don't have to worry about whether then things we have already done have made us unlovable. 

We can let it go, and know we are forgiven. 

On Sunday we went through a litany where we stood and declared together that we are forgiven. If you struggle with this, I'd encourage you to go through this, and declare out loud that you are forgiven. 

 

 Through Jesus, we are assured of our acceptance and we can say with certainty:

I am forgiven.

When we wake every morning, no matter what we will face, we can say:

I am forgiven.

When we go to bed every evening, no matter what happened during that day, we can say:

I am forgiven.

When we are embarrassed to come before God because of something we have done, we can say:

I am forgiven.

When we prefer the ways of this world to God’s ways, we can say:

I am forgiven.

When we have rebelled against God’s wisdom and gotten into trouble, we can say:

I am forgiven.

When we have rejected God’s guidance and have mired in a mess of our own making, we can say:

I am forgiven.

When we realise that we have wasted God’s gifts instead of using them well, we can say:

I am forgiven.

When we struggle under the burden of a past we cannot change, we can say:

I am forgiven.

When we doubt whether God truly loves us, may we cling to this promise and say:

I am forgiven.