“But He was wounded for our transgressions,
He was bruised for our iniquities … and He bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.”
(Isa 53:5 & 12b NKJV)
In his psalm of shame, after falling into infidelity and murder, David prays the following in Ps 51:2-3 – “Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions, and my sin is always before me.”
We tend to use the collective term sin without distinguishing between its three forms of manifestation – sin, trespasses and iniquities.
A trespass is always linked to an agreement, law or norm. If you break that contract, you are guilty of a trespass – you have transgressed the norm. Trespasses include things such as not adhering to the speed limit or paying your domestic worker less than the minimum loan.
In the teaching of days 69-70 we looked at the meaning of the term sin. We noted that Satan’s primary attack on you is centered around ensuring that you do not function within the calling he has placed on your life. What does it mean when Gen 3:15 speaks of Satan, the old snake (Rev 12:9) biting your heel? In the original Hebrew the word heel is derived from a word that means “by the heel; figuratively to circumvent (as if tripping up the heels); also to restrain (as if holding by the heel)” (Strongs); also: “to supplant … to hold back” (Brown-Driver-Briggs’ Hebrew Definitions). His strategy is thus that of keeping you in a “refuge of lies” (Isa 28:15), in this way keeping you away from that which God had planned for you. The word sin, in its original meaning, points to the fact that you have missed your mark, you have not fulfilled your calling on earth. That’s what it’s all about. Although Adam and Eve’s eating of the forbidden fruit was a trespassing, this action gave birth to the notion of sin as in doing it they missed the purpose that God had for their lives.
Iniquities, in layman’s terms, can be referred to as sin that has been inherited. We often find something like alcoholism running through a family – the grandfather struggled with it, so did the son, so did his daughter. This is then called an iniquity or blood line curse. Adam’s family-specific heritage can be found in our inherited bloodlines.
It is interesting to note that sin, iniquities and trespasses can be forgiven, but that only iniquities can be visited – “keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children to the third and the fourth generation.” (Ex 34:7).
- Sela: Explain to someone the distinction between the three terms.
- Read: Joshua 5 (especially verse 9); Job 40; Isa 21
- Memorise: Isa 21:11-12
- For a deeper understanding: Read John & Paula Sandford’s The transformation of the inner man.
