East and West

"As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us." (Psalm 20:12)

Ever wonder how far the east is from the west? They never meet. (Remember the old adage "East is east and west is west and never the twain shall meet?")

If I walk out the door and head north, eventually I'll reach the North Pole. If I keep on walking I'll then be going south.

But if I start walking east I could walk forever, and never end up going west. North and south meet at the poles but east and west never, ever meet.

That's how far God has removed our sins from us. They will never be connected to us again. The blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sin. His blood doesn't just cover our sins, only to need covering again the next year as in the Old Testament; the blood of Jesus washes our sin away.

Can God forget anything? How could the all-wise and all-knowing God ever forget anything? But He can and He does: "I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember their sin no more." (Jer 31:34).

Paul directs the book of Ephesians to the "saints" that are in Ephesus. Are we afraid to call ourselves saints? Yes, we are. We're like Paul when he said he was the chiefest of sinners; it's not bad to see ourselves that way - certainly, the longer I walk with the Lord the more I see my own depravity - but we need to see things from God's viewpoint, too. He doesn't see our sin. He doesn't remember our sin. He has forgotten them. He doesn't have a book with all our sins recorded by our names - the blood of Jesus has washed them all away.

Paul, who killed Christians prior to his conversion, said he served God with a clean conscience. We can have the same clean conscience before God, knowing that God not only forgives, but He forgets.