Then, Jesus our Groom, with His nail-scarred hands takes our hands and walks out with us from that ultimate courtroom, and into eternity – His eternity – and a never-ending wedding feast.

On the cross, God removed the load of every single one of your sins and placed it instead on Christ. Then, He clothed you with the fullness of His holiness and perfection.

Nothing is easier than making grace unamazing. Just do what comes naturally.

That’s where a true encounter with God leaves you. Unable to point the finger at anyone else, all you can do is fall on your face, confess your sin, be absolved, and join the angels in singing, “Holy, holy, holy.”

God’s grace and freedom announces the truth to us about ourselves. We need a real Savior.

God is for us in His foolish, scarred Word and Wisdom. Nothing is against us, nothing can separate us from the love of Christ.

And so we determine that God is a stern, short-tempered Lord and a gracious, long-suffering Father. And the fact is, He is both.

Christ intercedes on your behalf before the Father for all the sins that work guilt deep down in your soul.

In Christ we are freed to be for our neighbor without fear of sin and damnation falling upon us.

We demand that our Creator defend His judgment and justification of sinners in a courtroom where we are judge, prosecuting attorney, and jury.

In a world so wired by law and rules, judgement is everywhere.

His reaction was totally wrong. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. When I’d finished confessing, he didn’t start yelling. Out of his mouth came words like forgiveness, grace, Christ, clean slate. He was saying all the wrong things.