It was John the Baptist, who came to announce the plan of God that, He was about to introduce remission of sin to deal with the sin problem of mankind once and for all. John taught Israel about the soon-coming and brand-new salvation of God, (only available in Christ Jesus), that could only be accessed through remission of sin. (Luke 1: 77, KJV).
John the Baptist revealed to Israel that, Jesus had come as the Lamb of God to take away their sin (and that of the world). Jesus had come to set those held captive by the devil, free; and to set at liberty, them that are bruised. It was the sacrifice of Jesus’ Life that brought the power which could save Israel (and in fact mankind) from a state they hitherto, were helpless and incapable of freeing themselves from.
John the Baptist went about in the wilderness of the river Jordan, crying out to Israel, about how the Lamb of God was soon to be slaughtered to make remission of sin available so that sin and its nature could be taken out of the spirit and body of every man, who desired deliverance from the power, and dominion of the devil, and from the consequences of sin.
To bring remission of sin to sinful-mankind is the reason for Jesus’ coming to earth. It is the very reason for the horrible manner in which he died on The Cross. He announced to his friends at the Last Supper that he was going to die for the remission of all the sins of mankind. (Matthew 26: 28, KJV).
After his resurrection from the dead, Jesus commissioned his disciples to be witnesses of the fact that, remission of sin was then forever available to sinful-mankind. (Luke 24: 46-47, KJV). The disciples lived all their lives after Jesus’ Ascension, toiling to bring the knowledge of remission of sin to everybody. They all died in this cause, while leading all men to genuinely receive remission of sin.
All the people in the Bible, who were directly involved in the work of God, to bring His salvation in Christ to sinful-mankind, died in the cause of remission of sin. John the Baptist was beheaded while he championed the cause of remission of sin. Jesus Christ was crucified in the cause of remission of sin. And so did all the apostles of Jesus Christ, die either the death of martyrdom, or of exhaustion from their toils, while propagating the blessings of remission of sin to mankind.
It is saddening that, close to two thousand years after remission of sin was made available to the world, most of us are still ignorant of how to obtain it for keeps – this great blessing of God. Why then did Jesus die, if the blessings of his sacrificial death cannot be accessed by sinful-mankind, because of ignorance of how to do so?
Oh Ignorance, you have killed many simple-minded folks of mankind from generation to generation. And yet you are so easily overcome by the Blood of the Lamb, and by the Word of the Saviour, and of the testimony of his redeemed.
Remission of sin comes to the salvation-seeker only once in one’s life-time. It brings about a single-transaction payment for all sins previously committed by the salvation-seeker. (Romans 3: 25, KJV). It wipes thoroughly snow-white clean, the crimson-coloured slate of sin: natural man’s heart, inherited from the first Adam.
Remission of sin breaks the yoke of bondage of Satan over sinful-mankind. Remission of sin establishes the repentant sinner as a branch in the True Vine; it infuses the divine nature of God with the spirit of man. (John 15: 5, Second Peter 1: 4, KJV). Remission of sin therefore, delivers natural man from the power and dominion of the kingdom of darkness, translating him into the Kingdom of Light of God’s dear Son. (Colossians 1: 13, KJV).
Remission of sin makes one the child of God – born of the holy incorruptible seed of God. In fact, the blessings of remission of sin are endless and are of such great value that, it is only God who can grant it to any seekers of it, who deserve to receive it because they do as He has instructed them to.
The simple-minded person, with a rather limited knowledge of the New Testament teachings on God’s salvation in Christ, who is reading this article, may be asking in his mind what we have done wrongly, incompatible with the New Testament revelation, and the apostolic teachings, which have denied us the salvation of God in Christ Jesus.
The answer is simple: all what we have done, not knowing or discerning remission of sin, what it entails and brings to the salvation-seeker, and how one can access it. This ignorance has taken us away from the salvation of God in Christ Jesus.
In particular, our error in equating remission (of sin) to forgiveness (of sin) has taken us far away from the salvation of God in Christ Jesus. This is the greatest error to the Christian faith – an error resulting from the wiles and machinations of the devil, all aimed at denying us the salvation of God in Christ Jesus.
Even though sinful-mankind can obtain forgiveness of sin from God in as many as “seventy times seven” times in even one given day, all that large number in forgiveness cannot equate to or bring about one single blessing of remission of sin. This is because, for the sinner to obtain forgiveness of sin, it does not (necessarily have to) involve the death of Jesus Christ.
No amount or number, of forgiveness of sins, can bring to the repentant salvation-seeker, the salvation of God in Christ Jesus. And to be told by a so-called Man of God to make one single request for forgiveness of sin from God, in one ‘Crusade’ event, to gain God’s salvation, is a ridiculous deception.
You can gain forgiveness of sin through repentance and confession of the sin to God, and or to the person you have wronged, without recourse to the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. That makes forgiveness to be obviously cheaper than remission, which (remission) must involve the precious blood and sinless life of the Messiah, Jesus Christ, to come about.
I do hope we remember that, Jesus Christ could grant forgiveness of sin to paralytics, impotent-halts, and even those who nailed him to The Cross, without them obtaining remission of sin. This was because, it was after they had been forgiven of their sins that Jesus then shed his blood on The Cross, for the remission of sin (for all mankind). This is the great contrast between forgiveness and remission (of sins) that is obviously revealed to us from the spirit (and maybe not the letter) of God’s infallible Word.
You can also gain forgiveness of sin from a fellow man, but you can never obtain remission of sin from your fellow man – not even from your closest kinsman, (except of course, from our one and only Kinsman-Redeemer, Jesus Christ). Again, as said earlier, remission of sin is obtainable from God only once in a life-time; forgiveness of sin however, can come to the sinner every day of the week, month, and or year.
Forgiveness of sin exonerates sinful-mankind from the consequences of sin: which are guilt-consciousness, sickness and disease, confusion, misery and poverty. (Deuteronomy 28: 15-68). The wrath of God, which must come upon all who sin, is stayed for those people, who are wise to seek forgiveness for their sins from Him, after repenting of them.
A man called Cornelius, of Acts chapter ten fame, enjoyed life in the blessed state of being in God’s forgiveness, and yet was neither in God’s salvation nor in His Kingdom. In that state of being in God’s forgiveness, enjoying in all, whatever the blessings of God are in that state, he did not have the remission of his sins.
It was much later on, when he was baptized in the ministry of Peter, an apostle, that he gained the remission of his sins, qualifying him to receive the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit of God in his heart and as a seal of ownership by God. That baptism also earned him the adoption and son-ship by God, for his addition into His family.
You see, forgiveness (of sin), deals with the issues of mankind’s sin, before and after Calvary. Remission (of sin) however, deals with issues of sin in man at Calvary. Both deals have their unique blessings and ways of being accessed. [—the concluding part of this article is in Part Four].
Chris Bapuohyele is an evangelist to the Body of Christ, and the author of the book entitled: “BEWARE OF THIS FALSE DOCTRINE of reciting the Sinners’ Prayer for salvation”. His email address is: [email protected].
