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God has found out the iniquity of your servants.
Genesis 44:16
How many times have we thought we have “gotten away” with sin?
Judah and his brothers fall before Joseph and beg for the life of Benjamin.Judahproclaims that God has found out their iniquity. The guilt over what they had done to Joseph and what they had done to their father had never left them. They know now beyond the shadow of a doubt that God knows about their sin.
We may be successful in hiding our sin from others, but we cannot hide it from God. Numbers 32:23 says “And be sure your sin will find you out.” In Matthew 9:4 we learn that Jesus knows our thoughts, and in John 2:25 we learn that He knows what is inside of us. Nothing is hidden from the sight of our all-knowing God.
We cannot hide even what we think we have done in secret, for “God will judge the secrets of men through Jesus Christ” (Romans 2:16). Sin will be dealt with; it will be judged. Sin cannot hide in the dark forever because the light will shine into all darkness and one day expose what it is trying to hide (John 3:20). In Psalm 51:3, David cried out, “For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.”
Oh yes, God will find out the iniquity of all. He sees it before Him. He has every right to bring immediate judgment, but instead He offers opportunity to confess and be cleansed. “For He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust” (Psalm 103:14). He knows our sin, and yet He loves us. He loves us so much that He makes the way for us to confess. He makes the way for us to be cleansed. He makes the way for us to be reunited into fellowship with Him. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).
He has been making the way from the beginning, and He will continue to do so until the end of the age. Oh, precious one, I beg you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God (2 Corinthians 5:20).
Oh Father,
My sin was ever before me, and how often I transgressed Your law, but You did not leave me without hope. You did not leave me to die in my sins. You came in the form of man, as Jesus Christ, to pay the penalty of my sin upon the cross. You tell us in 1 Corinthians 11:31 that “if we judge ourselves rightly we would not be judged.” Oh Father, I looked at myself and I knew that You spoke the truth about me. I was a sinner. I was dead in my trespasses. I had broken Your law and was deserving of Your judgment, and then I heard the good news of Jesus Christ. I heard that He had already paid my penalty, and if I accepted His substitute death for mine I could be made alive in Him (Colossians 2:13–14). My Jesus, thank You for the cross, for I died with You and have been raised in You a new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17). As of now I am still in this flesh, and so I struggle; and at times I still fail and sin against You, yet Your faithfulness remains. The more I understand and study Your Word, I begin to get a grasp of the power that is mine in Christ; the power to live righteously and in accordance to Your will and in obedience to Your Word.
My Jesus, I love You so, and it is in Your name I pray,
Amen.