Library Liabilities

A New York state graduate student was tirelessly working on her history doctorate’s dissertation when she checked out 119 books from the university library for her research. She became so absorbed with completing her thesis and studying for exams that she disregarded the prompts the library kept sending reminding her to return or renew the borrowed books. It wasn’t until she got an email stating that she owed a whopping $11,900.00 in late fees that she knew she better put her studies aside and deal with her debt.

I see myself in this girl. No, I have never accumulated a library late fine of this magnitude but I have racked up another kind of debt. In the often recited lines of the Lord’s Prayer are the words “Forgive us our debts”. This indebtedness isn’t a monetary liability; it is a deficit of disobedience, a mortgage of misdeeds, a reckoning of wrongdoing. Though I was deep in debt, I wasn’t in the red with the library, I was in arrears with almighty God. Like the graduate student, I too often chose to ignore warnings that the payment was coming due. It was only when I was alerted to the seriousness of my indebtedness to God that I stopped brushing off my burden.

What did Hannah Jones, the Binghamton University grad student do with her almost twelve thousand dollar IOU? Did she spend years scrimping and saving to chip away at her tab with the campus library? It turns out that when she went to the library to rectify her responsibility, the librarian extended grace and mercy to Hannah and greatly reduced her massive debt to a token twenty dollar fine.

I got off even more lightly than Hannah with my sin debt. When I went to God with the price tag of my unrighteousness, God completely wiped my entire debt slate clean. Totally forgiven! God could only do this because he sent his son Jesus Christ to pay the debt I incurred, a debt he didn’t owe. Christ paid the ultimate price for this debt with his death on the cross. I, altogether undeserving of this debt cancellation, can only marvel at God’s grace and mercy.

Thank you God, for alleviating the debt of sin that I owed you. Thank you Jesus for the shedding of your blood and your death on the cross to pay the price for my transgressions.

Consider This: All wrongdoing carries a penalty. Have you dealt with your debt? God is just as willing to forgive what you owe as he was with me. No debt is too great. He is waiting for you to go to him so that he can extend his unmerited grace and mercy to you too.