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Jesus said “forgive us our sins as we have forgiven those who sin against us” before the cross. He modeled the Lord’s Prayer before his blood was shed. And it’s a prayer that will condemn anyone. If we were to receive forgiveness from God that only mirrored our own forgiveness of others, we’d be doomed. On this side of the cross, our forgiveness isn’t gained by forgiving others first. Forgiveness is a gift in Christ, with no strings attached. We pass forgiveness on to others because we already have it in Christ.

No Asking Needed

Jesus’s prayer was designed to expose our hopelessness apart from grace. God wants us to realize that we’re going to need more than just the same kind of forgiveness we’ve been passing out to others. God wants us to see his forgiveness as a gift, not something earned through forgiving others first.

God’s forgiveness isn’t about listing every sin on a legal pad, asking for forgiveness, and then getting cleansed. Yes, it’s very religious to ask for forgiveness and rely on our own ability to confess everything. But it denigrates the work of the cross. Jesus took away our sins and cleansed us “once for all.” To ask, plead, beg, and wait for cleansing that we’ve already been given is to ignore what Jesus said from the cross: “It is finished” (John 19:30).

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There’s still one big worm in the apple when it comes to understanding our unconditional forgiveness and cleansing:

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1:9)

No other verse has caused more damage to Christians’ assurance of their forgiveness. If we take that opening phrase out of context, our whole understanding of God’s unconditional forgiveness can fall to pieces. It’s all too easy to interpret this verse to mean that God responds, daily, to our confessions by doling out new portions of forgiveness and cleansing. God forgives us Christians only if we confess our sins, we might think.

But this is not the context of 1 John 1:9.

Let’s examine this verse a little closer. First, this verse is a conditional statement. The passage includes a conditional “if” marker and additional grammar (in subjunctive mood) that indicates an uncertainty about whether someone will decide to confess. And there’s a corresponding uncertainty about whether they’ll be forgiven and cleansed. They’ll be forgiven if they confess, but they will not be forgiven if they don’t confess.

Now, ask yourself: Is this true for a Christian? If it is, then we must throw every other passage on forgiveness out the window. And we need to begin first-John-one-nining weekly, daily, even hourly so that we don’t accidentally miss a sin.

So what’s the deal with 1 John 1:9?

Gnostic Heresies

When we crack open our Bibles, we often assume that the verses we read must be addressing Christians. We forget that the early church was composed of believers, unbelievers, those on the verge of believing, and outright heretics. At that time, there weren’t a dozen denominations to choose from in a given city. There was one church, and it contained everyone remotely interested in the gospel, along with all their right and wrong beliefs.

Any apostle knew this. So in writing to the early church, they would often say things directed at unbelievers with the hope that they’d come to faith in Jesus. John’s first chapter is certainly one of these cases. Notice what John’s hope is for them:

We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. (1 John 1:3)

The audience John is addressing does not have fellowship with the Father and the Son yet. John is proclaiming these things to them so that they can have fellowship also. Why don’t they have it yet? What’s preventing them? As we read further, we find out:

If we claim to have fellowship with him yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live by the truth. . . . If we