Although you wash yourself with soda and use an abundance of soap, the stain of your guilt is still before me," declares the Sovereign Lord. –Jeremiah 2:22
In fact, the law requires that nearly everything be cleansed with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness. –Hebrews 9:22
Of all the colorful characters of my youth, one stands out in my memory. Bobby was a head taller than all the boys in my 8th grade class. In fact, by the time we got to High School, Bobby was as large in stature as any male teacher at the school. Bobby came from a troubled home life and as far as I could tell he pretty much raised himself. He rarely got into fights because no one in his right mind would have challenged him. By the time we were in the 10th grade, Bobby had begun to drink, use drugs, and have run-ins with the law. However, my memories of Bobby are that he had a gentle side to his personality. He could by funny, likeable, and he was always nice to me, and for that I was certainly grateful.
On one occasion Bobby showed up at school with a homemade tattoo on his forearm. Back in the mid-seventies this was popular for a time, and some of the students who had the nerve to do so, had these horribly amateur tattoos done with sewing needles and Indian ink. Bobby’s tattoo was of a cross accentuated with three lines flowing upward from the top. A couple of months later Bobby came to school with a painful looking scar where his homemade tattoo had once been. I asked him what had happened. He explained that he had grown tired of the tattoo and had applied sandpaper to his arm until the tattoo was gone. It was gone all right, but the memory of that painful looking scar remains in my thoughts even today.
Countless people have long been trying to come up with a way to remove the stain of sin from their lives. That stain reminds them of bad decisions, poor judgment, broken relationships, and ruined lives. Like applying sandpaper to their own skin, they come up with all sorts of attempts to remove the stain: drugs, alcohol, sex, and money. However, all of those only fuel the feelings of regret and futility. Only through faith in Jesus Christ can the stain of sin be completely removed. Because of His redemptive work of grace, Christ can wash us clean of the sin that so haunts us.
Look to the Lord today. Jesus can take the deepest, darkest stains, and make them white as snow.
Trust in Him without delay.
