Keys to the Kingdom
By Carolyn Tucker
Ford LTD
I can remember childhood conversations that aren’t worth a hill o’ beans, but they’re my special memories and I cherish them. Once my folks and I were in the Lindley Prairie Cemetery area (Bear Creek) and Dad was carrying on a boisterous conversation with a long-time friend who drove a Ford LTD. These cars were massive V8-powered luxury sedans built to compete with the Chevrolet Caprice. Dad complimented Jack Fox’s nice car, even though Dad was a top-GM salesman. The friend laughed easily and said, “Yeah, the LTD stands for Long-Time-Debt!” Both men laughed heartily, but I was too young to “get it.” Even though I didn’t understand it at the time, I didn’t forget it!
The LTD initialism reminds me of the chorus, “He Paid a Debt” that we used to sing in church. Let’s take a nostalgic trip down memory lane together: “I owed a debt I could not pay, He paid a debt He did not owe. I needed Someone to wash my sins away. And now I sing a brand-new song ‘Amazing Grace’ all day long. Christ Jesus paid the debt that I could never pay!” Believers must not take for granted or forget the debt that Jesus paid for our sins. We would be living a most-miserable life without the benefits of Calvary.
Before surrendering to Christ, every person owes a debt to God due to sin, no matter how good we claim to be. But Christ Jesus settled our accounts payable with God. This is the best deal God ever devised for mankind. “For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. Yet God, with undeserved kindness, declares that we are righteous. He did this through Christ Jesus when He freed us from the penalty for our sins” (Romans 3:23-24 NLT). God’s one and only Son liberated us from the guilt, punishment, and power of sin!
In regard to unconfessed sin (racking up a debt), God is never going to say, “Don’t worry about it,” like sometimes a friend will say when we owe them a few dollars. Confession of sin paired with repentance will keep your spiritual checkbook balanced and your accounts up to date. Our sin debts separate us from God, but Jesus reconciled us to the heavenly Father and set us free from the chains of bondage and hell.
A magnificent divine exchange takes place – our filthy trash for God’s perfect righteousness. “For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ” (2 Corinthians 5:21 NLT).
“He canceled out every legal violation we had on our record and the old arrest warrant that stood to indict us. He erased it all – our sins, our stained soul – He deleted it all and they cannot be retrieved! Everything we once were in Adam has been placed onto His cross and nailed permanently there as a public display of cancellation” (Colossians 2:14 TPT). We were guilty as charged, but Christ Jesus erased the debt we owed. Now we have a new song to sing: “Gone, gone, gone, gone, yes my sins are gone. Buried deep beneath the sin of debt for me…”
The Key: Believers can celebrate their liberation because Jesus paid our sin debt in full.