SINS OF IGNORANCE by George Dana Boardman

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Aug 24, 1888

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 14, No. 33.

SINS OF IGNORANCE.

By George Dana Boardman

WHAT a multitude of such sins hide in the nooks and crannies of the human heart! Even the wisest of us—those best skilled in the Christian morality—are perpetually stumbling through ignorance. For example, many are the occasions on which we sin through simple unacquaintance or misunderstanding of the circumstances in which we happen to be placed. This was the significance of the sin-offering as set forth in the fourth chapter of Leviticus. But, though ignorance may palliate a sin, ignorance cannot justify it. And he who sincerely longs for a complete purification of his nature, cannot bear that even the comparatively venial sins of ignorance should lurk behind to cast their shadows upon the heavenly pictures with which Christ has begun to adorn the chambers of his soul. Sins of ignorance may not rend asunder the new robe of righteousness, but they sully it. They may not be venial; nevertheless, they need forgiveness. For did not the Son of man, in the very act of being nailed to his cross, pray for his murderers, saying: "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do"? I do not think that Christ, in offering this prayer, had in mind the Jewish authorities so much as the Roman soldiers who were executing Pilate's sentence. These soldiers were pagans, under control of a pagan procurator, who himself was a representative of a pagan emperor. And this accords with what an apostle says: "Had the rulers of this world known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory." And yet can anyone believe that this sin of the crucifixion of Jesus, committed though it was ignorantly, and especially commended though it was to the forgiving mercy of the heavenly Father by his dying Son, was stripped of its wickedness because committed through ignorance? Alas! sins of ignorance may lie with terrible weight of vengeance on our heads. And as we think of the ten thousand unconscious sins which we have committed ignorantly, we may well exclaim, "Cleanse thou me from secret faults." —George Dana Boardman.