In The Lord, Romano Guardini reflects on God’s forgiveness:
Men actually did not know that God must be as he is in order to be able to forgive, for what they formerly meant by forgiveness was no true forgiveness, but a covering up, a looking away, a gracious ignoring, cessation of anger and punishment. Genuine forgiveness is far superior to creation, as love is to justice, and if the mystery of creation out of nothing is already impenetrable, all human concepts are completely lost when faced with the mystery of God’s power to render a sinner sinless. Such creative power emanates from the pure liberty of love. Between the states of sinfulness and sinlessness lies a death, a destruction in which the sinner is submerged, in order to be lifted from it into a new existence.
When God forgiveness, it is not simply forgetting. It is an act of creation, or re-creation. The sinner is actually made sinless!
Wow!!!
“Behold, I make all things new.” (Revelation 21:5)