Bible Reading: Psalm 51:1-10

Brighton sprayed cleaning solution on the whiteboard in the room where she did her homeschool lessons. Then she took a cloth and wiped away all the colorful splotches left behind from the markers used on it. "There," she said. "That's better. Just erasing it doesn't get rid of all the marker spots, but cleaning it does!"

Mom smiled. "It looks brand new!"

That evening during family devotions--as she had been doing for the past few days--Brighton prayed for forgiveness for lying to her parents the week before. "I'm sorry I did that, Lord," she prayed. "Please forgive me and help me not to do it again."

Once again, Mom and Dad assured Brighton they forgave her, and that God did too. But Brighton wasn't sure. "When someone asks me to forgive them for something, I say I will, but sometimes I have trouble forgetting it," she told her parents. "I just want to be sure God knows I'm really sorry."

Later that evening, Brighton was surprised when Mom suggested she go clean her whiteboard before getting into bed.

"I wiped it down after school today," said Brighton. "It's clean."

"Well, why not do it again, just to make sure," said Mom.

"But I haven't even used it since I cleaned it! If I had just erased it, you'd probably still see some marker smears--sometimes you can even figure out what words were erased. But I washed it with cleaning stuff. You said yourself that it looked brand new."

Mom nodded. "When we confess a sin to another person, it's a bit like erasing your board. They generally forgive us, but sometimes they have trouble forgetting it--and we do too. But God isn't like that. When we confess a sin to Him, it's like wiping your board down with the cleaning solution. Our sin is totally removed--every bit is washed away! And God promises that He not only forgives that sin, but He sees us as totally clean and new again."

Brighton liked that. And when she prayed during devotions the following night, she omitted her usual confession about lying. God had already forgiven and forgotten that sin. All she needed to do was remember His promises.

–Nance E. Keyes