Free at Last - Point 2

But in order to really accept our new life, we have to also understand that we are Forgiven in Christ—Free from Guilt (vs. 13-15):

13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

Most people like an underdog. We like seeing the losers win occasionally. Nothing illustrates this more clearly than the Boston Red Sox. They were losers for so long. They couldn’t overcome the Yankees. I mean, think about all those years of failure. All those years of defeat. But when they actually won it all, the amount of revelry was unbelievable. They were celebrating their victory. They had parades where millions turned out to celebrate with them. They were celebrating their present and their future. The past was forgotten. And if it was brought up, it was to show how far they had come.

That is the very picture that Paul lays out. We were the Red Sox. We constantly lost. We could never beat our rival—sin. But then Christ came, and the championship was and is ours. He cancelled the written code that stood opposite us. He took our past history, and nailed it to the cross. All our failures are gone. There is no need to bring them up. As the classic by Queen states, “We are the champions, my friends. No time for losers cause we are the Champions...of the world.”
Right? We are the champions. We even have a parade. Paul says that Christ made a public spectacle of them. That references a Roman General when he would enter the city in triumph after a great victory. In such a parade, the Prisoners of War would be displayed as part of the procession. When Paul says that Jesus “disarmed” the powers and authorities, it has the connotation of discarding the enemy like a raggedy garment that you just throw away.

We can’t celebrate true freedom if we carry around those sins with us like a nasty old garment that just needs to be thrown away. Jesus is leading a parade that is celebrating God’s grace. We’ve been forgiven. The past is null and void. The guilt of our sins has been nailed to the cross. We are living a new, free life, no longer slaves to sin. People can bring up your past all they want. They can talk about what a hypocrite you are. How they know the real you and what you used to do. But they don’t understand that you are the current reigning Champion. All that failure before doesn’t matter. You have won because of Christ.