Their sins are not your sins are not my sins - we can't repent for "generational" sins

 

It dawns on me that this whole business of evangelicals “repenting” of the sins of their forebears goes far beyond the biblical commands and, in fact, encroaches on the power of the Holy Spirit.  Ultimately, it is an usurpation of God’s work.  Hear me out.

In Mark 1:15 Jesus proclaimed that all should “repent and believe” that the kingdom of God was at hand.  In John Chapter 3, Jesus explains to Nicodemus that he must be born again.  Again and again we read in the Gospels and throughout the New Testament that true Christianity involves a movement of the individual person away from the old and toward the new (2 Cor. 5:17).  We are now a “new creation.”  Even the episode of the thief on the cross teaches that salvation comes to individuals who act upon the understanding of who and what Jesus is.

In other words, repentance for sin is a matter for an individual who responds to the Holy Spirit’s prompting and recognizes his or her unworthiness before a holy God.  Romans 3:23 tells us that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.  Yet, Romans 4:8 tells us “Blessed is the one whose sin the Lord will never count against him.”  The word “one” in the Greek is actually  a)nh\r which is the singular form.

Finally, in 1 John, the apostle explains that Christians have an advocate, Jesus, who will stand before God when they sin, indicating that Christians will not stop sinning until such time as we are with God in heaven.  There is no indication from John that Christians need seek any advocacy regarding the sins of others.  Jesus told us in Matthew 6:34 (my paraphrase) today has enough troubles of its own, so focus on those rather than on troubles over which you have no control.  While Jesus was discussing the anxiety of tomorrow, the reality is he could have been talking to us about the anxiety of the past.

Too many in the evangelical community are effectively taking on the sins for which Christ already suffered.  Frankly, it’s not simply seriously misguided, it’s rank heresy.  We are not required to repent for things we didn’t do.  I can’t repent for anyone else’s sins – there is no Scripture that allows me to do this.  I can lament, but I can’t repent for someone else’s sins.  More importantly, did not Jesus’ work on the cross already pay the price for all sin?  Think of it this way, if I got behind on my car loan and someone paid off the loan on my car, or the mortgage on my house, I no longer have to keep paying for it.  It’s done.  I get the title, free and clear.  No one can come back to me years later and demand more payments from me . . . even though I wasn’t the one who paid off the loan! Even more clearly, no one can ever come back and ask us for payment on loans for which we never signed a promissory note, especially when those notes were also paid off by someone else.

Jesus paid it all (as the old song says), so we not only don’t have to pay, we can’t pay.  We mar and mock the work Jesus did on the cross when we try to repent for sins we did not commit, as if we need to add something to what Jesus already completed.

Some will say I’m misunderstanding what’s going on here.  I’m mixing up repentance with the atonement.  But I’m not.  The atonement was only necessary because of sin.  Repentance is necessary for the sins I’ve committed (my mortgage to God if you will).  Once I’ve repented, I’ve appropriated the benefit of Jesus paying off my mortgage to God, if you will.  The analogy isn’t perfect (or it would be the thing analogized) but I trust it helps to understand why we should not get involved in the charade of attempting to repent for the sins of others, especially those long dead.