THERE was never any doubt of their guilt. The two college students were caught by police as they burglarized cars on the university campus. When police searched their car they found stereo equipment linking them to eight burglaries at another campus over a hundred miles away.
Arrested, facing possible jail sentences, they were offered a "deal." A prosecutor would drop the charges if they completed probation and apologized. Accordingly, the two paid for advertisements in their school's newspaper and submitted apologies. One said, in part, "It wasn't worth it. I'm sorry."
Others have escaped jail terms by the same route: a teenager who sold cocaine, a lawyer who scuffled with a policeman, a convicted drug racketeer-a newspaper ad saying, "I'm sorry," has been the penalty.
But is it enough?
In the parking lot of a shopping center there was a crash—a sound of crumpling metal—and a driver hastily got out to examine the parked car he had so carelessly hit. After looking at the damaged car and finding it empty, he took out a piece of paper, wrote on it, and tucked it under the windshield wiper. Then he drove away. Soon the owner of the car came back from her shopping and saw what had happened. Shocked and dismayed, she turned to a man sitting in a car nearby.
"Did you see what happened to my car?" she demanded.
"Yes," he said, "I saw it all. He left a note for you on the windshield."
Visions of a big repair bill faded. Evidently the man had left his name and telephone number. Relieved, she opened the paper and read one word: SORRY!
Speechless, she showed it to the witness.
"Well," he said, "he said he was sorry; isn't that enough?"
"Sorry!" Her voice rose to a shriek: "SORRY! but who is going to pay?"
That is the point. "Sorry" wasn't enough. "Sorry" paid no bills, made no restitution. "Sorry" left the stereos ripped out of the cars; "sorry" would have left the woman's car as it was. (Happily, the witness had quietly written down the license number of the hit-and-run car, and we can hope that the driver eventually paid for repairs.) It is good to be sorry for wrong things done, to repent, even to determine to "do better next time," but there is still the question: "Who is going to pay?"
We have all done wrong things, broken God's laws, sinned. Is it enough to tell God that we are sorry and that we won't do it again? The Bible says that God requireth that which is past.
No amount of reformation will wipe out the sins of the past. There must be an atonement; someone must pay the bill.
Can we ourselves do that? Never. Only One could ever do it—the Lord Jesus Christ. He came to this earth and lived a perfect life down here—but that alone could not save a single sinner. He had to give His life, to die, the just for the unjust, to bring us to God.
God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us (Rom. 5:88But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)). Yes, the Lord Jesus paid the penalty for our sins and now God can justify all who simply by faith believe and receive the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
Yes, Jesus paid it all!