AP

By Rory O’Shea

Imagine if we could be completely free of that sin. Maybe we know someone who is free from it – and we yearn to be free, gloriously free. But we are captive. We fail at that sin day after day. We wish, oh, we wish we were better than we are! Most of the time we are busy, not giving ourselves time to realise the impact of our sin, but in our honest moments, we are swept with rainclouds of guilt, soaking us with self-loathing and a feeling of being a counterfeit “good Christian”. Do we need counselling? We are tempted to think that our church and friends can’t help; they would look down on us and would distance themselves from us. This is an unpleasant train of thought, so we prefer to distract ourselves with work or entertainment. We prefer to avoid dealing with the issues.

How many of us Christians live like this? How many of us feel powerless to a few sins we just cannot get rid of? I hope by the end of this article the resurrection of Christ will have changed things.

1. We are all guilty of something on a regular basis.

Perhaps we are the young person sadly addicted to our phone, endlessly scrolling. Perhaps we are men addicted to sexual pleasure. Perhaps we are in the snare of continued bitterness and conflict in our marriage. Perhaps we are addicted to chasing the next show/trend/job/purchase. If we use scripture to examine ourselves honestly, we must admit that we all have sins we just can’t get rid of. We prefer not to admit this even to ourselves because these sins cause rainclouds of guilt.

2. We ignore this guilt on a regular basis.

Guilt and shame are like rain and most of us feel like we can’t change the weather. It is so much easier to just fill our mind with something else and move on. Watch something else. Fill our time up until we are continually sleep-deprived and exhausted. Distraction is a survival strategy because if we are honest about our sin, if we turn our attention inward, we will spiral into depression and self-loathing.

Satan loves the false solution of distraction. He has filled the world with distractions. We are so busy these days, with so many voices, that some days I find myself without a moment just to have my thoughts uninterrupted. For young people this may look like spending every spare minute on our phone. For older people it may look like TV, or work or household chores. Constantly our minds are occupied. No wonder we fail to be honest with ourselves about our struggles with that sin.

The power to free us is Christ. We must turn our gaze onto him.

3. A new life in Christ’s resurrection.

Often, the resurrection is spoken of as just a feel-good ending tagged on after the crucifixion. Most Christians can explain the crucifixion well, but how many Christians can explain the benefit of the resurrection for them today?  Let me illustrate the issue.

Imagine our sins are written down in a large, thick book as pictured in Revelation 20 or Daniel 7. If we have committed the same sin repeatedly, it is written repeatedly. Beside the book stands a Roman legionary. He holds a whip, braided with metal and bone. Forward walks Christ and is fastened in front of the legionary. The soldier raises the whip and lashes into Christ’ back. The legionary takes a quill, dips it in Jesus’ blood and crosses the first sin off the board. He then proceeds to the next, and the next.

At the end of that day, Christ lies in the tomb. You feel crushed by the weight of what you have witnessed. Your guilt and self-loathing are drowning you as you contemplate the innocence of Christ and his death for you.

This is where most Christians stop. Yes, we know the rest of the story, but we stop here; we live here at this moment. We live under a guilt that weighs on us. We are responsible for Jesus’ torture and death. This is no freedom. This is no new life. This is no joy. And this moment has no power to rid us of that sin.

We must not stay in this moment; we must immerse ourselves in the resurrection. And the best way to do that is read these divinely-inspired words slowly, transporting ourselves into the scene:

“¹¹ But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb, and as she wept she stooped to look into the tomb. ¹² And she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had lain, one at the head and one at the feet. ¹³ They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” ¹⁴ Having said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing, but she did not know that it was Jesus. ¹⁵ Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” ¹⁶ Jesus said to her, “Mary.” She turned and said to him in Aramaic, “Rabboni!” (which means Teacher). ¹⁷ Jesus said to her, “Do not cling to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father; but go to my brothers and say to them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” ¹⁸ Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”—and that he had said these things to her.”

(John 20:11-18 ESV)

Can you feel the tears of joy in Mary’s eyes? Can you feel the tightness of her throat as she cries “Rabboni”? Do you see her cling to Jesus, joyful in the warm embrace of our dear Saviour who lives again?

This moment has the power to unbind us from that sin.

This moment is the alternative to our inward-looking depression and guilt. Swing your gaze. Swing it from your self-absorbed guilt. Swing your gaze around to fill your mind with the wonders of our resurrected Christ.

Feast your eyes, like Mary on the beloved Lord Jesus alive again! Feel the cheering as he casts off the garments of the grave and walks free into the dawn light of a new day, of a new age.

If you struggle to move on from your guilt, then this point is for you. If you or I were in the garden, in this moment, memories of that sin are scattered, catapulted out of our minds. And they are replaced! Replaced by a vision of Jesus’ blessed new life. It is too bright for any shadow of self-loathing to survive.

This is right there is the text.

Notice that Mary is weeping greatly! She is clinging to him. Her Lord has just atoned for her sins. The agony he went through was for her sin. But he doesn’t dwell on it, not even with a single word. He does not hold a counselling session for Mary’s sadness and guilt that he suffered so much on her behalf. Some might say Jesus is being insensitive for pressing forwards but it’s actually exactly what Mary needed, and what we need.

Jesus tells her not to cling to him. He starts talking immediately about the next item on the agenda, his ascension, and he tells Mary to go get the other disciples onto this agenda, too. No longer are they to mope in the black sadness of the previous days, they are to swing their gaze from the rearview mirror and focus on the bright road ahead.

Mary goes to the disciples and tells them. Then, in the next passage of John’s gospel, Jesus appears to them. Again, he does not dwell on the past, on their sin, sorrow, guilt or shame:

“Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you” (John 20:21 ESV)

Jesus is looking forward, not back.

Then again, a third time, this is reinforced in Jesus’ treatment of Peter. He doesn’t dwell on Peter’s threefold betrayal with sadness, hurt and shame. No, our Lord deals with Peter’s past sin by swinging his vision forwards, with a threefold commission of Peter to “tend my sheep”! Jesus is the steam engine driving on solid rails of joy and kingdom purpose, and Mary and the disciples hitch their carriages on him. They are guided along the same rails, pulled by Christ who goes before them.

He gives them the Great Commission, and they single-mindedly go forth to spread this new life to everyone. This new work, this new life, is too bright to leave any space for that sin to have our attention.

This concept is called resurrection. But it is foreign to many churches. They teach that the resurrection is only a future event; we will have new life in Heaven, but that doesn’t impact today. Paul would disagree:

“Do you not know that all of us who have been baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into his death? ⁴ We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life…¹⁰ For the death he died he died to sin, once for all, but the life he lives he lives to God. ¹¹ So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.”

(Romans 6:3-4, 10-11 ESV)

The old life, where that sin reigned, ended at the crucifixion. As Christ walked out of the tomb that morning, so too are we pulled upwards in spiritual resurrection. As Mary comes and discovers the blessed truth that her Lord is alive, she is spiritually raised in newness of life. She considers herself dead to sin and newly alive to God in Christ Jesus. Mary’s resurrected life is to be lived looking forward, straining for the glorious goals ahead, forgetting what lies behind.

As Robert Murray McCheyne said:

“For every look at yourself, take ten looks at Christ.”

Yes, maybe we will commit that sin in the future, but that is not to be our focus. In this new life, we are to be like Mary in the garden. We are to stop our mourning. The shadows flee when the dazzling, white radiance of the living Lord Jesus fills our vision.