I’m lunch supervising in an elementary school cafeteria. One student calls his classmate a mean name or throws a piece of fruit. I ask the student to apologize, so he says, “I’m sorry.” The classmate responds with, “It’s okay.” Scenarios like this play out all the time, and I’m sure you’ve had a conversation like this or at least witnessed one. These instances frustrate me because society teaches us to respond to apologies with the words “It’s okay.”
When someone apologizes to you, what is your response? Do you say, “It’s okay” or is “I forgive you” the response you provide? The way you respond to an apology may seem insignificant, but these two different responses send two completely different messages. When you say, “It’s okay,” you’re sending the message that what the person did to you wasn’t wrong. When something is okay, it is satisfactory. So, telling someone it’s okay shows them you are accepting what they did. You are not acknowledging that they behaved inappropriately. However, when you say you forgive someone, you aren’t sending that message. You aren’t condemning them, but you also aren’t endorsing their actions.
Just as it isn’t okay in the school lunchroom, “It’s okay” is not an appropriate response in the Kingdom of God. Scripture shows that God’s response to us when we repent isn’t “It’s okay;” rather, it’s “I forgive you.” Romans 3:23-25 says, “For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. Yet God, in his grace, freely makes us right in his sight. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood.” If God wanted to look at us and just say “It’s okay what you’ve done,” he wouldn’t have had to send His son to die on the cross. It’s not okay, but we are forgiven. The Father looks at the Son and pardons us because of his death on the cross.
Knowing that sin isn’t okay should affect how we live. Even though we have forgiveness through the blood of Jesus Christ, we should not continue to live in our sin. It can be tempting to do something we know isn’t right because we know that God will forgive us. But intentionally sinning because we know God’s grace is not pleasing to God. Romans 6:1-2 tells us that we have died to our sin and can no longer live in it. “What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means! We are those who have died to sin; how can we live in it any longer?” We must choose daily to live righteously, remembering that it’s not okay for us to continue living in our sin.
Knowing that sin isn’t okay should also encourage us to hold others accountable for the way they live. Jude 4 talks about individuals who are telling others it is okay to live immoral lives because God is gracious and will forgive them. “For certain individuals whose condemnation was written about long ago have secretly slipped in among you. They are ungodly people, who pervert the grace of our God into a license for immorality and deny Jesus Christ our only Sovereign and Lord.” God did not give us grace so that we could continue living in our sinful natures. God gave us grace so that we could repent and turn to a fulfilling and satisfying life in Him. Sometimes we can see our friends, within the church, living and behaving in ways that are corrupt or unjust. We know that they are Christians and believe that we don’t have to do anything about it because God will forgive them. But God has called us to hold others accountable and help them to grow (Proverbs 27:17). We must approach situations in a kind and loving way (Galatians 6:1-2), but we should desire to keep our friends from stumbling so that they can experience life to the fullest. We must help them to understand that Jesus dying on the cross doesn’t make their sin okay, but it does save them from punishment.
Compassion and forgiveness do not equal acceptance and approval. We cannot equate God’s love with leniency. Not once in the Bible have I read where Jesus told someone that it was okay to keep living in sin. I also cannot recall a time where He shamed anyone for past choices. God is truth, but God is also grace. It can be hard to find a balance when it comes to sharing the truth and showing grace, but as we draw closer to God, we can become more like Him, finding a way to show love by helping others experience the fullness of life that glorifies God. In your personal walk and your interactions with others, remember God’s grace, but also remember His sovereignty and His call for the church to be holy.
