Being Held Accountable

Our daughter got herself into a bit of trouble last week. As a result there were some consequences, one of which was no TV until a particular thing had been made right.

Last night she asked if she could watch the end of her show. "There are only 15 minutes left." As the consequence for the trouble we had given her a particular project to complete, and when it is done she gets her TV privileges back. She's been working diligently and making progress, and so last night she asked for TV, thinking that she was close enough.

I reminded her of the project and asked if it was finished. Hearing "No" I said that nothing has changed. The project gets finished before the TV goes back on.

This morning I took a few moments to explain my reasoning to her. If I err as a parent with discipline, it is in having a soft touch. If I think the lesson has been learned, or at least as well as possible at the moment, I will often back off from the original decision. This morning I explained to her that I felt last night, and still did this morning, that she needed to be held fully accountable for what had happened and its consequences. She needed to learn that in "real life" when our actions have adverse results we often have to accept the consequences to the very end.

A bit later in the morning, when this conversation was percolating in my mind, I began to think about the similarities, and dissimilarities, between how I handled our daughter, and how God handles our sin.

All sin, no matter how great or small as it may seem from our point-of-view, is an offense against a God who is holy, righteous and just. These aspects of God demand that sin be dealt with by God. A god who lets sin slide is neither righteous nor just, and consequently not much of a god. The God of the Bible is holy, righteous and just, all the time, and so he must deal with sin, and he does. But this is where things begin to get interesting.

God could simply punish all sin. This punishment would be eternal, as a finite creature has sinned against an infinite God. The least sin and the greatest sin would demand this punishment. In a sense, this is simply being held accountable.

However, things aren't quite that simple, because God is also a God of mercy and grace. God offers to forgive sin, and let a substitute take the punishment that his justice demands. But forgiveness is conditional, and the condition is believing that God's Son, Jesus, laid down his life to take a person's sin, be it mine, your's, or the sin of anyone else. This, in its own way, is also being held accountable, with the difference being that someone else is held accountable for our sin, taking it's punishment on himself and exchanging our sin for his righteousness.

In 2 Corinthians 5:21 Paul writes it this way:

"For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God."

The day is coming when each person will stand before God, and hear the sentence that their sin deserves. Will it be "guilty" as you stand, or try to, on your own righteousness, or will it be "not guilty" as you stand clothed with the righteousness the comes by faith in Christ as your Savior and Lord?

Scripture quotations are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version® (ESV®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.