Every one of us deals with guilt. Sometimes we struggle with unresolved guilt. Maybe we did something in the past and we buried the guilt feelings deep within our hearts. We may have tried to quiet our consciences in different ways. I remember my grandmother telling me about my grandfather. When she came to know the forgiveness of sins in Christ, he himself began to have struggles in his soul. He was losing sleep, he was afraid that he was going to end up in hell, and he was afraid he would never be converted like his wife; his guilt nearly drove him to despair. Finally, they took him to a mental hos­pital where they sought to counsel him about how to overcome these feelings. They told him that he should go back home and try not to think about these things. They said he should not feel so guilty about everything and not take everything so seriously. He should go back home and enjoy life and not be bogged down by all this guilt and religion that was filling his mind. Thankfully, the Spirit of God worked further in his life and brought him to a knowledge of Christ. This alone delivered him from all his previous guilt.

Guilt has a certain power over us; it can keep us in bondage, paralyze us, and condemn us. We were not created with guilt; it is the result of sin. Humanity was once in a free, healthy relationship with God, but through sin we became guilty. In one way or another, we all face the effect of guilt in our everyday lives. We feel in the pit of our stomach that we have done wrong, we feel sick, we feel dirty, and we even get irritable and angry if someone tries to expose our guilt.

We need to understand that there is a difference between actual guilt and “feeling guilty.” Most of the time, feeling guilty stems from our being actually guilty of something. However, this is not always the case; as we look at guilt, we realize there are two ways to approach it. There is objective guilt and subjective guilt. When these two are at odds, problems arise.

Objective guilt is factual, while subjective guilt is dependent on our feelings and emotions. If you pull a can of pop from a cold refrigerator where it has been for several hours, you can say for sure that the pop is cold. You objectively know it as a fact, and you can even verify it as you see the beads of water form on the outside of the can. But if you reach out and touch it, you now have a subjective experience which affirms what you knew or thought: it feels cold.

When we talk about guilt, we can say that guilt feelings are the personal, inward, subjective response to objective guilt. There is objective guilt when we have done something wrong; we have sinned, and sin is a transgression of the law of God. We have then an objective standard, God’s law, which does not change, that informs us objectively about our guilt. Feelings don’t change the fact. How we feel subjectively does not change the objective standard. Paul may not have felt guilty about certain things before he met with Christ on the Damascus Road, and yet he was guilty before God.

Take another example: a student throws an eraser when he thinks the teacher is not looking. But suppose that the teacher, in fact, did see it. Now imagine that, when the teacher con­fronts the student, the student says, “I didn’t do it because I don’t feel any guilt about doing it. I know I’m innocent.” We can all sense how foolish that argument would be. No matter how he feels, the student must face the punishment of the teacher.

Likewise in spiritual matters. Even though we may not feel guilty before God, yet what He says stands because He is totally objective. That is why the only place we can turn for instruction is the Word that God has given to us. That is the only place to find both the fact of our sin and guilt and, amazingly, the reality of forgiveness. Forgiveness is also something which can be viewed objectively and subjectively. I want to develop that a bit more next time, the Lord willing. Until then, consider the guilt in your own life and how you deal with it. Are you guilty or not? Are you forgiven or not?