Newspaper accounts told of a famous playwright (who had given the entertainment world some of its most filthy literature) joining a church. He explained his actions by saying, “I wanted my goodness back.” There are many people like him today.
We start our lives with such innocence and purity, but gradually, through our sins and mistakes, there comes over us what Percy Bysshe Shelley called “the contagion of the world’s slow stain.” In our more serious moments we wish we could have our purity and innocence back. Like the Cardinal in that ancient comedy, A Royal Family, we wish we could be "born old and grow younger and cleaner and more innocent, until at last, with the white souls of little children, we lie down in the sleep of death."
We, of course, cannot do that. But we can have our goodness back. Through Jesus Christ, God offers to pardon and cleanse every sin in our lives and to give us a fresh start. In Acts 3:19, we are urged, “Repent … and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out.” That word blotted is vivid. It describes the way ancient ink was erased. It was acid-free and did not bite into the paper like modern pens do. The ink simply lay on the top and dried. To remove it, all one had to do was to take a damp cloth and wipe over it and it was easily and completely removed. This process was called “blotting.”
That’s what God does to our sins when we repent and are converted. Becoming a Christian is not just turning over a new leaf in life. It is having the old leaves wiped clean and starting over again.
Do you long for your goodness back? Trust in Christ. He will give it to you.