Isaiah 40:2 “Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the Lord’s hand double for all her sins.”

Cars are expensive. Everything about them cost money; from buying them to driving them and especially fixing them. We’ve had to do some work on our car recently, and it hasn’t exactly been cheap. Fortunately, we are blessed to have very kind and loving parents who still desire to help out their kids whenever possible. They’ve been kind enough to give us a blank check for our car repairs. While that’s been a big blessing, it’s also been a big responsibility; we don’t want to abuse the trust and kindness our parents have shown us with such a gesture. When Christ died on the cross for our sins and rose from the grave, he did essentially the same thing for the repairs in our lives. He wrote a blank check of forgiveness that covers all of our sin and opens the way for us to have the Holy Spirit do some repair work in us; to remove our sin nature and makes us more like Christ. While that blank check of forgiveness is a big blessing, we also must be careful not to abuse the trust and kindness our heavenly father has shown us in giving us such a gift. It’s tough when you’re faced with an expense you aren’t sure how to pay and a blessing when someone steps in and helps. Jesus Christ stepped in and completely paid for us a debt we couldn’t begin to pay down. As the old song says, “Jesus paid it all, all to him I owe, sin had left a crimson stain, he washed it white as snow.” That sounds like good news to me.