To be justified is to be declared righteous. Justification includes release from a verdict of guilty. If you or I refuse to acknowledge our sin before God, we deny our sin and our guilt. How then can we ever be declared righteous if we deny our sin and our guilt? To deny sin and guilt is to self-justify.
Forgiveness cannot happen without repentance. Repentance is a “changing of the mind” which acknowledges our sin and our guilt before God. It recognizes God’s love in that He provided a substitute and vicarious atonement for us on the cross (John 3:16) in His own Son, who rose from the dead. Forgiveness is granted in receiving His mercy. Mercy is something that is only granted to the guilty. Confess your self-justification as sin and receive His mercy by trusting Jesus Christ and His merit alone as your only hope of salvation.
For when we were yet without strength (spiritually dead), in due time Christ died for the ungodly (you and I).
For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified (declared righteous) by his blood[1], we shall be saved from wrath (God’s judgment) through him.
For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. And not only so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement (reconciliation). Romans 5:6-11
[1] without shedding of blood is no remission (forgiveness). Hebrews 9:22b
Arise, My Soul, Arise*
Arise, my soul, arise; shake off thy guilty fears;
The bleeding Sacrifice in my behalf appears:
Before the throne my surety stands,
Before the throne my surety stands,
My name is written on His hands.
He ever lives above, for me to intercede;
His all-redeeming love, His precious blood to plead:
His blood atoned for all our race,
His blood atoned for all our race,
And sprinkles now the throne of grace.
Five bleeding wounds He bears, received on Calvary;
They pour effectual prayers; they strongly plead for me:
“Forgive him, oh, forgive,” they cry,
“Forgive him, oh, forgive,” they cry,
“Nor let that ransomed sinner die!”
The Father hears Him pray, His dear anointed One;
He cannot turn away the presence of His Son;
His Spirit answers to the blood,
His Spirit answers to the blood,
And tells me I am born of God.
[2]My God is reconciled; His pard’ning voice I hear;
He owns me for His child; I can no longer fear:
With confidence I now draw nigh,
With confidence I now draw nigh,
And “Father, Abba, Father,” cry.
Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. Romans 8:34
Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them. Hebrews 7:25
…let the word of Christ dwell (take up its life) in you richly…
*Charles Wesley, pub.1742, copyright status is Public Domain.
[2] W.E. Vine’s Expository Dictionary of OT & NT Words, page 514; Not once is God said to be “reconciled.” The enmity is alone on our part. It was we who needed to be “reconciled” to God, not God to us, and it is propitiation (the gift which satisfies God’s justice and delivers from His wrath), which His righteousness and mercy have provided, that makes the “reconciliation” possible to those who receive it. The phrase My God is reconciled, should be rendered: I now am reconciled!