“The worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience of sins.” How few, comparatively, understand this simple truth! One is frequently amazed at the language made use of in prayer, by those who really seem to have the root of the matter in them. To judge by their words you would naturally suppose they had never believed in the value of the blood of Christ. For instance, take such language as the following, “We present our guilty, sin-stricken souls to thee, Ο God, that thou mayest wash them in the blood of Jesus.” Is this the utterance of a purged worshipper? Surely not. A guilty sinner is not a purged worshipper. It may sound like humility, but it is the very opposite. True humility can only flow from our being in our right position before God. And what is the believer’s right position? It is that of a perfectly purged worshipper—one having “no more conscience of sins”—one who is as free from every charge of guilt and every breath of condemnation as Christ. Such is the true position of the believer.
If, therefore, I am “once purged,” I have no need to be purged a second time. This is the plain doctrine of Heb. 10:22For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience of sins. (Hebrews 10:2). So also in John 13:10,10Jesus saith to him, He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit: and ye are clean, but not all. (John 13:10) we read, “He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit.” “The blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanseth us from all sin.” If I am “clean every whit” and “cleansed from all sin,” do I need to be cleansed over again? Does God’s work need to be repeated? Is the blood of Christ to be brought down to the level of the blood of bulls and goats? Is the believer never to know what it is to have a perfectly purged conscience? Must he be ever asking to have his sins put away? God declares, in the most absolute manner, “Their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.” Should the believer, then, be perpetually asking God to forget what He says He will never remember? Is it humility on our part to present before God’s face, every day, what He has cast behind His back forever? If God has put away my sins, am I to bring them back again? If they were all laid on Jesus, am I to have them on my conscience? Am I to be continually asking God to do what He assures me, again and again, He has done “once”—done “perfectly”—done “forever?”
These are plain questions. Let my reader ponder them, in the light of Heb. 9 and 10. The simple fact is this, Christ’s place at the right hand of God proves the complete removal of the believer’s sins. “When he had by himself purged our sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high.” And again, “But this Man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins, forever sat down at the right hand of God.” Hence, for the Christian to speak of bringing his “guilty, sin-stricken soul to God,” is tantamount to a plain denial of Christ’s right to a seat on the throne of God. For why is He there? Is it merely because He is God over all blessed forever? Clearly not. He could, at any time, have claimed a place there on that ground. But what is so deeply important to see is that Christ is on the throne as having accomplished redemption—having put away sins—having perfectly purged His people. He is there ear representative. He is there efficaciously for as. This is what gives peace. God sees the believer in Christ. This is enough. If we want to know the true standing of the Christian, we have only to look at Christ, for “As he is so are we in this world.” (1 John 4)
Now, seeing it is thus with the Christian, is it intelligent to be continually bringing our sins to remembrance? Is it consistent with our position as purged worshippers to be addressing God in the language of those who are not purged at all? True it is, that we are poor failing creatures, if we look at ourselves; but it is not at ourselves we are told to look, but away from ourselves altogether, straight to Jesus. God sees us in Him, and as He is. He can only think of us as perfect in Christ; and of this we may rest assured that it neither glorifies nor gratifies God for His people to be dwelling upon their sins, when He would have them dwelling upon that perfect grace which has put away those sins forever, by “the one offering of Jesus Christ, once.”
May God by His Spirit unfold to the Christian reader his privileges in Christ, that so he may know the deep blessedness of being “once purged,” and having “no more conscience of sins.”
Note. There is a wide difference between a consciousness of sin in me, and a conscience of sins on me. The former we shall have to the close of our career; the latter we should not have, if “once purged.” My reader should seek to understand this distinction. Many do not see it, and hence they think it right to be always occupied with their sins. But when God’s full salvation is laid hold of by faith, we learn that both the sins of our life and the sin of our nature were all judged and put away on the cross. To know and believe this on God’s authority is to be “once purged,” and to have “no more conscience of sins.”