Rick Warren's Daily DevotionalSample

God Wants to Forgive You

You don't need to carry a load of guilt around. Instead, accept God's forgiveness. Romans 3:23-24 tells us: "All of us have sinned and all fall short of God's ideal. Yet now God declares us "not guilty' if we trust in Jesus Christ who, in his kindness, freely takes away our sins." (LB)

That's the good news! That's the gospel. God wants to forgive you. Imagine a giant blackboard with all of your sins written across it, and God comes along with a giant eraser and erases it all. Learn to accept God's forgiveness.

If you are a Christian, you already know about God's forgiveness intellectually. But to feel it is something different. That takes forgiving yourself. In Proverbs 4:25, The Bible says, "Look straight ahead with honest confidence and don't hang your head in shame." (GNT)

Have you ever committed a sin and asked God to forgive you, but you still feel lousy? What do you do in that situation? Do you go back and ask Him to forgive you again? No. You only have to confess a sin one time and it's forgiven -- and forgotten.

You've already dealt with it; it's time to move on. Somebody asked Eleanor Roosevelt one time, "How did you accomplish so much with your life?" She said, "I never waste time with regrets." Accept God's forgiveness and forgive yourself.