Unconditional Forgiveness and the Trinity

Whenever I try to share my belief on forgiveness to my brothers in Christ at the Bereans Apologetics and Research Ministry Forum, I experience resistance, big ones. :-) In fact, there’s an informal forum debate going on regarding this issue.

Richard Tamayo, pastor of Connexions Ministries of Canada was my influence on this particular doctrine. To summarize this view, universal justification’s (or universal forgiveness’s) premise revolves around God’s objective declaration that the whole world, including the unrepentant sinners, are already forgiven of all their sins. This is the direct result of Christ’s death on the cross. He paid every man’s sins — past, present, future — when God decided to make Jesus as the ransom for the world’s sins. This is not universalism for even if the whole world has been forgiven of their sins, not everyone will be saved. Those who reject God’s wonderful grace as shown thru His forgiving heart will still be lost — that is, not because they are not forgiven but because they chose to have nothing to do with a God who is unconditionally forgiving.

There are two parties in the forgiveness process — the offended and the offendee. God, being the offended party, chose to objectively forgive in His heart the sinners thru the death of Jesus Christ. On the part of the offending party — us — in order to experience God’s forgiveness, we need to repent and come home to God. This is known as subjective or experiencial forgiveness.

This is untitypical in as far as the evangelical’s conservative view of forgiveness is concerned. Most evangelicals believe that one is forgiven only after his decision to accept Jesus as Lord and Saviour. Bible verses such as Acts 2:38, Acts 3:19, Acts 10:43, Acts 13:38,39, 26:17,18 and 1 John 1:9 seem to indicate that repentance is a prerequisite for God to forgive a sinner.

On the other hand, there are verses in the Bible that explicitely portray a God who has chosen to forgive the world even before they repent. Isaiah 44:22 says “I have swept away your sins like the morning mists. I have scattered your offenses like the clouds. Oh, return to me, for I have paid the price to set you free.” In cronological order 1) God “swept away your offenses” — forgiven 2) “return to me” — repent. Other verses such as 2 Cor. 5:19 and Rom. 5:18 allows God to declare the world — all men — as righteous in His sight.

I for myself found it hard to reconcile these verses. But just recently, 2 Chronicles 7:14 gave some light.

“If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”

Contrary to God’s declaration in Isaiah 44:22, this verse has a different order. God, in this verse 1) asked for people to humble themselves and turn from their wicked ways — that is, repent, and then 2) “I will forgive their sins”.

These two verses where given to the same group of people, the Israelites. But it does look like it’s contradicting. Or is it?

Is it possible that these two verses represents 2 angles of forgiveness? Is it possible that Isaiah 44:22 represents God’s heart — His objective declaration of forgiveness even before they repent? And that 2 Chronicles 7:14 represents subjective or experiencial forgiveness as evident by some subjective conditions (being humble, praying and turning from wicked ways) before they experience God’s forgiveness?

Some people in the forum suggested that objective justification is unbiblical simply because there are a lot of Bible verses that explicitly shows the repentance is first required by God to be forgiven. But take a closer look at the doctrine of the Trinity. There are verses that explicitly shows that Jesus is merely a human being. But sure there are verses too that are explicit — Jesus is Yahweh! Thus, the seamingly like unbiblical term “Trinity” is used to describe the totality of God as seen in different parts of the Bible.

The same thing with the doctrine of objective justification. To see the complete picture, one need not to look only at Biblical passages that suggests one should repent first before God can render forgiveness. There are quite a few, too, that describes the heart of God — an unconditionally forgiving God.

I believe that this view is a also a wonderful tool for evangelism. I was listening to a tape by Pastor Vince of the New Creation Church. He said, “The goodness of God leads one to repentance”. True. One can be drawn to God by seeing who He is first than knowing “what shall I do to be accepted by Him”. By realizing that God has alread forgiven him of his sins 2000 years ago thru the death of Jesus Christ, a sinner sure will run home, not walk home, to God.

Additional reading, mostly authored by Richard Tamayo.
How I understand the gospel – “Tie a Yellow Ribbon”
On Justification by Faith
How I understand the gospel