Remember that scene of him hanging on the cross before he
died. One of his last words was: “Forgive them, Father, for they know
not what they do.” (Lk 23,34) Not only did he offer forgiveness to
those who crucified him, who at the end of the day are actually all of
us because we all sin and sin is the cause of his crucifixion. He also
made the effort to find an excuse for his killers, for all of us.
That’s what real love is, which is what God is.
Would he still forgive us if our sins are really that big
and ugly? Again, let’s remember that the greatest evil, the biggest
sin committed not only by some men but by all of us, has already been
done. And that is none other than the killing of God in Christ on the
cross.
Whatever sin we commit, no matter how big and ugly, is
nothing compared to that most horrible sin. So, let’s not exaggerate
our sinfulness. Our sins may be very horrible, but God’s grace, his
mercy, can always handle them. (cfr. Rom 5,20)
And why is God so merciful? The only reason we can find is
that at bottom, regardless of how we may have been behaving in our
earthly life, we are all children of God, the object of his
predilection among his creatures, since we have been created in his
image and likeness. He cannot but love us, yes, even to a fault.
God in Christ will do everything to save us. That is why
St. Paul said in his Letter to the Romans: “Since He did not spare
even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us
everything else?” (8,32)
It’s good that we remember these words always so that we
avoid overreacting to our sinfulness and to our not-so-well-formed
conscience that may relay to us a devil-inspired thought that we are
already irredeemable. God is willing to go all the way to the gates of
hell if only to save us.
God knows from all eternity that we would have weaknesses,
that we would fall into sin, that we have the capacity to go against
him, and yet all these do not deter him from creating us and helping
us all the time so we can be what he wants us to be.
We cannot consider God the way we, especially in our
wounded condition, consider ourselves. God’s ways are way above our
ways. His standards, so to speak, are infinitely higher than our
standards. Though we are his image and likeness and should therefore
reflect him in our lives, we would always find ourselves short of what
he wants us to be. To counter this lifelong predicament of ours, we
should just act out of sheer faith.
Anyway, we are told by St. Paul himself that he who
started everything with us will also be the one to complete and
perfect everything is us. (cfr. Phil 1,6) Ours is simply to go along
with God’s will and ways as best that we can.
Hopefully, once we are convinced of God’s love and mercy,
we can unburden ourselves of unnecessary feelings of guilt and
sadness, and just focus and rally all our powers and resources in
doing what is truly good, which is none other than to do the will of
God, loving him and loving everybody else.
That is when we can truly say we have passed the test of
our life which is about whether we want to be with God or against him!
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