Sermon Transcript — March 24, 2007
Something that's no longer a part of our legal system here in the United States, but once was, was known as a debtor's prison. A debtor's prison. It was a jail where people were sent when they owed money to other people, but they couldn't pay it. Here is a short description of the debtor's prison. Actually, they were quite common in this country many years ago. It was not a pleasant environment. The public jail was a place of discomfort. The rooms were unheated, small and cramped and would be generally overcrowded. Jail fever – probably typhus – broke out from time to time. In the year 1736 in Maryland, a committee described the local Annapolis jail where debtors were held as a place of restraint and confinement. It would also have been a place of death and torment to many unfortunate people. In 1766 the same jail was described as so filthy and nasty that it was excessively nauseous. Some prisoners in nearby jails were held under these conditions for debts as small as fifty cents.
Well, the idea of a debtor's prison in mind, let's turn to Matthew 18:23. Peter had asked Jesus how many times he was required to forgive his brother when his brother sinned against him. Peter thought seven times was really plenty. In fact, he probably thought he was being generous in going above and beyond the call of duty by saying, how about seven times. And Jesus must have shocked Peter and the other disciples when He said, Not seven times, but seventy times seven meaning that we should forgive anyone and everyone as often as necessary, that actually it should be a way of life for us. Jesus followed this comment with a parable. In this parable in Mat. 18:23, our sins against God and the sins other people commit against us are compared to financial debts and the spiritual consequences are characterized as a prison.
Mat. 18:23 - "Therefore the kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. The king represented God, the Father, and the servants, of course, were us human beings.
Verse 24 - "And when he had begun to settle accounts, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. That is a huge some of money.
Verse 25 - "But as he was not able to pay, his master commanded that he be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and that payment be made.
Verse 26 - "The servant therefore fell before him... before the king ...saying, 'Master, please, have mercy and patience with me, and I will pay you all.'
Verse 27 - "Then the master of that servant was moved with compassion, released him, and forgave him the debt.
Notice why the king which is pictured by God, the Father, notice why He forgave the debt. Was it a tax write-off? Not in this case. He did it because He was moved with compassion toward the man. It continues in verse 28.
Verse 28 - "But that servant went out and found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii... a very small amount of money ...he laid hands on him and took him by the throat... got violent with him ...saying, 'Pay me what you owe!'
Verse 29 - "So his fellow servant fell down at his feet and begged him, saying, 'Have patience with me, and I will pay you all.' Notice, the second servant used the identical words of the first servant as spoken to the king. 'Have patience with me, and I will pay you all.'
As we will see, the first servant made a bad choice here which is a reminder to us, actually, that when we choose to forgive or choose not to forgive, it is always our choice.
The story continues:
Verse 30 - "And he would not... he would not be patient ...but went and threw him into prison till he should pay the debt.
Verse 31 - "So when his fellow servants saw what had been done, they were very grieved, and came and told their master all that had been done.
Verse 32 - "Then his master, after he had called him, said to him, 'You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me.
Verse 33 - 'Should you not also... notice what he said ...have had compassion on your fellow servants, just as I had pity on you?'
Verse 34 - "And his master was angry, and delivered him to the tormentors... most likely the jailers ...until he should pay all that was due to him.
In the next verse, Jesus gave us a very sobering warning about forgiveness. He said,
Verse 35 - "So My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from the heart, do not forgive his brother his trespasses."
Here's a mental picture that might be helpful to keep in mind. When we make the choice to not forgive someone, another person, it's as though we are putting a handcuff on the wrist of that person and sending them off to debtor's prison. But that's only half of it because God says the catch is that if we don't forgive, that He puts the other handcuff on us and we go to debtor's prison right alongside with the person that we refused to forgive. The choice is ours. We either will forgive or else we're locked up in this debtor's prison – figuratively, of course. That may sound harsh, but there's nothing else God can do in this case and we'll see why as we go along in this sermon today.
When we think about the subject of forgiveness, in principle it strikes us as being a noble thing, a beautiful thing, but when we're the ones that have to forgive – and at times that's going to be necessary – it's not quite the same, is it? It's easy to expect forgiveness, it's hard sometimes to forgive. It seems more reasonable, in fact, at times for God to forgive us than it is for us to forgive somebody else. It's hard sometimes to do that.
Jesus' warning is so serious about forgiveness that I think it's worth noticing another statement that Jesus made in Mat. 6:12 and we'll notice here what's emphasized in what is commonly called the Lord's Prayer which we would understand to be the model prayer, the example prayer. This is a prayer that Christ said essentially would be the model for us to follow each day. He said,
Mat 6:12 - "And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors.
Then in verse 14, just two verses later Jesus makes it very clear exactly what He meant. There is no question left at all. He didn't put any conditions on the duty to forgive, but He also made no exceptions.
Verse 14 - "For if you forgive men their trespasses, then your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
Verse 15 - "But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
Passover season is an uplifting and encouraging time of year because we focus on the gift of forgiveness – the forgiveness we've received from God, principally. Once we've repented and been baptized, our spiritual debt which was incurred by our sins has been paid. It's canceled. And we can go to God for forgiveness in the future when we do sin, we ask for forgiveness and we'll receive it when we repent. So we have been set free from the death penalty. We have peace and confidence in our relationship with God . Forgiveness is a lesson that we rehearse every Passover. It is the central theme.
So it is an important time of the year for us to ask ourselves 'how are we doing?' Are we fulfilling our Christian duty to forgive others? Do we live up the high standards that Jesus Christ set for us? Are we following the commandments that Jesus gave us?
In the sermon today, we are going to review the topic of forgiveness – forgiving other human beings. What's involved in forgiving? Why is it so important? How do we do it? And what do we need to watch out for? What are the hazards involved?
Although Jesus' warning as we read earlier was very serious and sobering, the Bible lays out for us really a very positive program – positive terms in this matter of forgiving others and I hope that you will find the rest of this sermon as positive as God's instructions are.
We are really a very privileged people to have the vision of the future that God has given us. He's opened our minds to understand that He is creating and building a family and He's inviting us and eventually everybody else into this family. Our destinies become part of the Family of God, to live with God and each other forever - billions and billions and trillions of years with God and with each other. We'll be perfect then. We'll live together in perfect peace. We'll love and enjoy each other. Eternal life will involve doing a lot of interesting and challenging and creative things as a family and friends and there will be no hurts, no offenses, no relationship problems at that time. But we've got a few things to learn in the meantime, don't we? But for this short time like a blink of an eye compared to eternity, we are imperfect and we do make mistakes. We do offend and we hurt other people from time to time even if we do it accidentally and unintentionally.
We're all familiar with lab work in school – projects that are done in a laboratory setting in order to learn lessons. Our Christian lives are really a living laboratory. God is teaching and preparing us to live in His family forever. He wants our relationships in our lives now to be characterized by peace and joy, not by hurt, bitterness and anger. So He gives us a solution to the problem – the solution to hurts and offenses that we imperfect human beings inflict on each other. He gave us a concept and a duty of forgiveness.
Forgiveness is like a spiritual first aid kit so the wounds we receive can heal and we, and others, can get through this short life in a spiritually healthy way. Forgiveness is a positive duty from more than one point of view. Our purpose in life is to develop God's character – character like Jesus Christ – to become like God, the Father, and Jesus Christ. God's nature is merciful and His nature is forgiving. He constantly is involved in forgiving our sins. In the future, God will have a family of perhaps billions of children – sons and daughters – spirit beings – and every one of those children in God's family will be individuals – sons and daughters – who God has had to forgive many thousands of our sins. We all have that in common that God, the Father, had to forgive all of our sins. And like I said, in some cases it's multiple thousands of times we have to be forgiven.
How do we, then, learn to be forgivers unless God puts us in situations where we have to learn to forgive. God allows some situations to occur. It's been said that true forgiveness is not easy, but it transforms us significantly. That's exactly what God wants to do in our lives. He wants to transform us to be like Him and to do that, we will have to be forgivers as He is a forgiver. Norman Cousins once said 'Life is an adventure of forgiveness." Interesting. Life is an adventure of forgiveness. There is a lot of truth in that statement. Forgiving others is not always easy. It can produce wonderful results when we learn to do it and do it right.
There's another quote, this time from the late Elbert Hubbard. He said something meaningful, but rather flowery. He said, 'The ineffable (or indescribable) joy of forgiving and being forgiven forms an ecstasy that might well arouse the envy of the gods." It's a flowery way of saying, Wow.
I'm not finished so bear with me. God's forgiveness really works and it's a wonderful experience. I've experienced that - I imagine some of you, maybe many of you, have done that, too. Sometime ago I wounded and hurt a friend of mine in the Church. I didn't mean to. In fact, my intention was to do just the opposite. I was trying to help. But, unfortunately, I didn't help. I hurt. And, by human standards, our relationship could have gone south very quickly. He very rightly could have walked away and cooled off and our relationship could have been over. But he didn't, an admirable person. My friend forgave me from the heart as Jesus told us to do. My friend never brings up the matter – not once. Every time I see him he gives me a bear hug and a warm smile. It's like the offense never occurred. It's an exciting and humbling experience all at one time. That's the way it should be. That's Christianity at work.
What's involved in forgiving other people? How do we define it? First, let's notice what forgiving is not. Sometimes it can be instructive to know what it isn't before we know what it is. Forgiving others is not identical to God's forgiveness – that is, God's forgiveness of us – in that our forgiveness does not remove the death penalty from their sins. Only God's forgiveness can do that. Our forgiving others doesn't mean condoning or minimizing sin. God doesn't condone sin, neither should we. The damage that sin does is real. We forgive the sinner, but we don't condone the sin. We don't pretend that there's no harm that has been done.
Our forgiving others does not automatically mean that there are no consequences for the person who sinned against us. For example, if a drunk driver should happen to kill one of our family members, we would be required by God to forgive him, but the drunk driver would still need to experience the consequences of going through the legal system and being punished.
Also, our forgiving of others does not mean that the person gets off scot-free in the spiritual sense. We won't turn to 2 Corinthians 5:10, but you may be familiar with it and I'll read it to you.
2 Cor. 5:10 - For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad.
Of course we, as Christians, in order to love even our enemies should want the offender to repent so that he or she can stand before the judgment seat and receive the same mercy that we hope to receive.
One more thing that our forgiving others does not do, it's not the same as reconciliation. It's not the equivalent of getting a relationship straightened out with the other person. Forgiveness does open the door for reconciliation. Many times it is the first step in the process and, ideally, especially within the Church as Christians, we hope that reconciliation will occur. But sometimes, reconciliation is not possible. For example, a Christian may need to forgive a relative who has died – who is dead. In that case, reconciliation is impossible. Or a Christian may be the victim of a violent person. Forgiveness is required, but it would be foolish to risk your life by having contact with a person unless we knew that person had genuinely repented and there was a real change in his life. There is a lot – we just covered part of what forgiveness is not, but I think you get a feel for that.
But then, what is forgiveness of another human being? The Bible makes it clear that there are many things that we owe to one another. For example, we are told that we owe one another love, honor, respect, faithfulness. We owe obedience to those in authority. When someone mistreats us and hurts us, not giving us what they really owe us, the offender has incurred a moral debt. For example, husbands and wives owe each other faithfulness and if one is unfaithful, the guilty party has incurred a moral debt. Our natural tendency is to want to get even. Have you noticed that? Our natural tendency is to want to get even with the person who hurts us – to settle things, to settle the score.
Forgiveness is a decision. It begins as an act of our will. It is something that we choose to do even before the offender repents and whether he deserves it or not. Forgiveness is a pardon releasing the offender from a legitimate moral debt. It is giving up our desire for immediate justice. It is giving up our so-called right to get even, to lash back at the person who has hurt us, who has offended us. It is giving up our desire to make the other person hurt as much as we're hurting. It comes so natural to us all to want to get even. Revenge.
A year or so ago I read in the paper about a man who was really upset that he was speeding and got caught. He got a speeding ticket and he was given a $120 fine and it really made him angry. He decided he would get even. He knew he was guilty, but he decided he would get revenge. So he got revenge by paying his fine in pennies – twelve thousand pennies. And then the judge got even with him by making him sit and wait until every penny was counted.
Forgiveness is the choice and promise not to hold the sin against the offender any longer. It's canceling the debt. It's burying the hatchet. It is a decision not to keep an insult or offense alive, but to let it die – let the offense die. It involves giving up anger, putting aside resentment and grudges. Forgiveness involves getting rid of ill will and bad feelings toward the other person. It is an active process of showing love. Sometimes the offenses we have to experience and we have to forgive are small offenses. Many times they are. Other times those offenses are quite large – big offenses, large injustices.
Let's look at a couple examples of small offenses that we may have to deal with and how we can deal with them in a Christian way. Let's say, for example, you have a friend out of town who is very sick and you send a nice card. You get a nice card, you write a nice message, you stamp it, you address it, you get it ready to send and your roommate is going to the post office anyway, so you ask her, 'Would you take the card with you to the post office and mail it? This is really important." And she says, 'No problem. Glad to." So you feel the job is done. Card is on its way and everything is great. A month later you happen to notice in a stack of books that your roommate has, sticking out of one of the books what appears to be the card that you were going to send to your friend and you pull it out and, sure enough, the card was never mailed. Now, that's an offense. You have been wronged, no doubt you are upset. This requires forgiveness.
Let's look at another offense. Let's say, for example, you are standing in line at a Church pot luck. We're not having a pot luck tonight. Otherwise I couldn't use this analogy. But you are standing in line at a Church pot luck and you hear a rather mean-spirited comment from a few people ahead of you about some of the food they are seeing. You hear them say, for example, 'Look at what's floating in that crock pot. Brussels sprouts and okra and the sauce is chartreuse. Who would bring that to a pot luck?" The problem is, you brought it and you're hurt by what you overheard. It's the kind of thing that actually happened. That happens. Now, I made up the Brussels sprouts and the okra part, but the principle is there, that people have been offended by comments they have heard standing in line by people in front or behind them about food that they saw. It could be very hurtful and that requires working through that situation and requires forgiveness.
Those are little offenses because many times little things like that happen. But sometimes big problems can occur, too. It has been said that it is easier to forgive an enemy than to forgive a friend. Now, I think sometimes that is true in the Church, as well, that we expect more out of our members, our brethren, than we do somebody outside the Church without God's Spirit. And sometimes it is easier to forgive somebody outside the Church than it is to forgive somebody inside the Church.
Here's an example of what I mean by a big offense that needs to be forgiven. This really happened. It's typical of things that go on in the world all the time. A man lost his job because someone at work circulated false information about this man. Losing his job was bad enough, but on top of that the man who was fired had terminal cancer and by losing his job, he also lost his health benefits. He also was a man who had a wife and five children to support. That's an example of a major offense that has to be forgiven.
There are all kinds of small offenses and big offenses that occur in our lives. It's interesting that Jesus did command us to address all offenses and to forgive all offenses. He did not compartmentalize and say, These, do and these, you don't have to. The consequences of not forgiving is the same for any offense whether small or large. But with that one handcuff on our wrist and we go to the debtors' prison.
Forgiveness is not always easy. It doesn't come natural for us. We can be thankful that God does require it because it does work and it does bring tremendous rewards when we practice it properly.
Let's go next to Luke 17. Here we see more instructions from Jesus regarding forgiving other people. The Bible really has quite a lot to say. What Jesus had to say shocked his disciples at this point – shocked them so much that they asked the question, How can we be expected to do that? We need help to do that. Jesus said:
Lk. 17:3 - "Take heed to yourselves... Now, let's stop there for just for a minute. Interesting thing that Jesus would say. 'Watch yourself,' He is saying. 'Be on guard. Watch what you do. Be careful, this is a dangerous area.' And we will see when we get to verse 4 what it is that can trip us up in this situation. It's easy to make mistakes in dealing with other people and it is hard to do this and do it properly. ..."Take heed to yourselves... Jesus said. 'Watch. Be careful,' He said. ...If your brother sins against you, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.
We are going to stop there and clarify just a few things so we don't draw wrong conclusions. It says, if your brother repents. Okay, now does that mean if your brother does not repent we don't have to forgive him – that forgiveness is contingent upon repentance? No, you see, that would contradict many other clear scriptures including ones that tell us to love and be merciful even to our enemies. Our enemy is, certainly, someone who is not going to be in a repentant frame of mind. We, as Christians, are required to forgive whether or not the individual repents. In this particular case though, the person does repent.
Notice also here in verse 3, we are told to rebuke a sinning brother. That doesn't mean we go around pointing everybody's faults out to them all day long at Church and afterwards, on the phone and in letters. In fact, one Proverb tells us a person with good sense is patient and it's to his credit that he overlooks an offense.(Pro 19:11) So we are being instructed when you can and every time you can, get over it. Forget it. Let it slide. Don't make a big deal out of it. Simply let it go. Delete it.
What does it mean when it says to rebuke an individual? The Believer's Study Bible says 'the idea connoted by the verb, rebuke, is that of a frank, but gentle rebuke." Frank, but gentle. Much like Ephesians 4:15 which says, speaking the truth in love. In other words, Jesus wants us to put effort into maintaining peaceful relationships. Peaceful relationships. Effort to maintain peaceful relationships.
Verse 4 makes it plain that not only are we required to forgive, but we also have to endure and persevere in forgiving. Verse 4 says "And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day returns to you, saying, 'I repent,' you... will ...you shall forgive him."
Seven times a day. Does that mean that the eighth time you don't have to forgive him? No, that would be inconsistent with the scriptures as well. Jesus is not putting a limit on the number of times we have to forgive. We are expected to forgive as often as we are mistreated. Every time. Repeated offenses in one day are very possible especially in certain relationships – close relationships like marriage, for example. There is lots of room for repeated often offenses and it has to be dealt with and addressed and a lot of forgiveness.
Imagine that you live next door to a member in the Church. Or, if you can't imagine that, let's imagine living next door to somebody else, anyway, because it works either way whether the person is in the Church or not. Could you see yourself forgiving your next door neighbor seven times in the same day for repeating the same offense? Or doing different offenses, seven different offenses? Let's say, for example, your neighbor has rabbits. Beautiful sunny day, the grass is starting to turn green. The rabbits have been in a cage for months and your neighbor decides that today is the day to turn out the rabbits just for a little air. He's going to keep an eye on them. He'll watch them, always got his cell phone with him and the phone's ringing and the next thing you know, the rabbits are in your garden. They are eating your lettuce and peas and spinach right down the row. Nothing is left but little stubs. Then he comes and apologizes and he says, 'I'm so sorry. I got hung up on the telephone. I meant to keep an eye on them. Please forgive me." And you swallow hard and you say, "I forgive you." Ahemmmmm. Well, fortunately, they didn't destroy your whole garden. They only got half of it. That's good.
An hour later, he's on the cell phone again. Rabbits in the yard again and they remember the delicious organic, natural vegetables you were growing and they make a beeline back to your spinach and lettuce and peas. And this time they finish it off. There's nothing left. Not even stubs this time. He comes over and apologizes, "Another business call. So sorry. What can I do? I'm really sorry about this."
Well, that's only two times so you have to say. "It's okay. No problem. Those things happen. I forgive you basically."
Two hours later, the rabbits are gone but he turns out his dogs. And his dogs come and dig your flower beds. All the plants are now on top. All turned bottom side up. That's three! Comes over and apologizes again. And your say, "That's okay. No problem. We're still neighbors. We'll work through this. No problem."
Well, if this happened seven times are you in a position to be willing to forgive him seven times? It could be different offenses. Can you do that? Can you, as a member of the Church of God genuinely, honestly forgive somebody seven times in the same day? I think that's a challenge for all of us. But I think it's something we have to learn to do. It's something that we have to grow to be able to do.
It is interesting to notice that Jesus did not say that we should pretend at the end of the day that we have a pleasant and ideal relationship with our neighbor. We have to work through some of those feelings, no doubt. He also did not say that we could not build a fence between his property and ours. Maybe an electric fence. No. No. No. No, not an electric fence. Not an electric fence. Just a high enough fence to keep dogs and rabbits out. But we have to forgive before we build the fence.
What Jesus was focusing on is what goes on in our hearts and our minds when we are mistreated. For our part, we're required to forgive. And our forgiveness of our neighbor is supposed to be genuine – as genuine the seventh time as it was the first time. Genuine. Not just the words. We have to mean it every time. Jesus told us what we are required to do. He expects us as Christians to learn to do that. And there's a good chance we might be tested in exactly that area time after time. In a situation where there are repeated offenses, it is clear that there must be a commitment to forgive. There has to be an understanding, but there has to be a determination, a commitment to forgive. We have to persevere in forgiving. It's not something that we just do naturally and easily. We cannot let grudges and offenses pile up in our minds.
We can compare this repeated forgiveness to keeping weeds out of the beautifully manicured lawn. That works best by dealing with the weeds as soon as you see them. The instant you see them, you pull them up because if you let them go any time at all, the roots get deeper and they begin to spread. It's the same way with us dealing with individuals who offend us. As soon as it occurs we need to deal with it so it does not become deeply ingrained. Jesus tells us to deal with offenses quickly and as often as they come up. Every hour that we stay in an unforgiving attitude is an hour of time that seeds of resentment and hate and bitterness begin to grow. Too often we let hurts and resentments build up, accumulate instead of keeping up with the hour-to-hour, minute-to-minute spiritual maintenance. No wonder Jesus said, Be careful 'This is a sensitive area. This is a dangerous area. Do this right.'
How is it possible to live up to such a high standard, to forgive so freely and to forgive when we have been affected by someone else's failings, mistakes? When we are the ones who suffer, and yet, we are the ones who have to forgive. That's a good question.
Paul wrote about it in Galatians 2:20. Let's go to Gal. 2:20 because Paul said it is possible and he told us exactly how. If we are honest with ourselves, we will admit that there are times when we don't want to forgive. But if we have God's Spirit and if we are using it properly, we can never say, "I can't forgive that. It's impossible for me to get over that." We cannot say that. Christians cannot say that.
Gal. 2:20 Paul wrote - "I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.
If Jesus Christ is living in us through the Holy Spirit, then we will have the capacity to forgive other people because it's God's nature to forgive. It is God's nature and if Jesus Christ is living in us and we have God's Holy Spirit and we're building the nature and character of God, then we will also be able with God's help - in every case - without exception - to forgive. How much have Jesus Christ and God, the Father, been willing to forgive us? How many times a day has God had to forgive us? Seven? Seventeen? Who knows.
In the parable of the unforgiving servant we read at the beginning of this sermon, Jesus made a point of contrasting the two debts. The first servant owed the king, remember, a fortune - ten-thousand talents. The second servant owed his fellow servant a measly one-hundred denarii. Those terms don't really mean a lot to us because they are not American monetary terms. William Barclay explains how those two amounts compare. It is a vivid picture to contrast the two debts. "Suppose the servants were paid in sixpences." Sixpences are British currency worth six pennies. We might say a fairly close comparison for us Americans would be a nickel. Okay. So let's suppose the servants paid the individuals their debts in nickels. "The one-hundred denarii could be carried in one pocket." I've got one, two, three, four pockets in my trousers, one, two three, four, five pockets in my jacket and one in my shirt. Probably almost everyone here has a pocket. Even our children have pockets. So you have an idea of how many coins, how many nickels you could get in a pocket. That's the hundred denarii. You have a pocket full of nickels. "The ten-thousand talent debt would take to carry it an army of 86,000 men – each carrying a sack of sixpences that weighed sixty pounds apiece. And they would form at a distance of a yard apart if they were walking" – 3 feet apart – "a line five miles long. The contrast between the debts is staggering and that's the whole point. The point is that nothing men can do to us in any way can compare with what we have done to God. And if God has forgiven us the debt we owe to Him, we must forgive our fellow men the debts they owe to us. Nothing that we have to forgive can even faintly or remotely compare with what we have already been given. We have been forgiven a debt which is beyond all pain for the sin of man brought about the death of God's own Son and if that be so, then we must forgive others as God has forgiven us or we can have no hope of mercy."
How is it possible to obey Jesus' command to forgive? In addition to receiving God's help, of course, our capacity to forgive is directly related to the awareness of how much God, the Father, and Jesus Christ have already forgiven us. That was the point of the parable – to understand what God has already done – how much we deserve God's condemnation and how much we need God's mercy every day. Understanding that is going to soften our hearts toward other people and make it easier for us to forgive them. It's good from time to time to ask ourselves a question - I think every year around Passover time is the ideal time.- 'How am I doing in forgiving other people? Do I forgive easily? Do I only forgive after getting an apology? Do I, typically, have trouble forgiving people?'
Our need to forgive becomes a test, a test of our love for God and a test of our appreciation for Christ's sacrifice. We need to forgive others because it becomes a test of our love for other people. Our calling as a Christian is a calling to love and to forgive other people. Along these lines, I'd like to read a short paraphrase of part of 1 Corinthians 13. That's the love chapter. It's a very interesting paraphrase and I think it helps drive home the point that forgiveness is an extension of loving other people.
"I am patient with you because I love you and want to forgive you.
I am kind to you because I love you and want to help you.
I do not envy your possessions or your gifts because love you and I want you to have the best.
I do not boast about my attainments because I love you and I want to hear about yours.
I am not proud because I love you and I want to esteem you before myself.
I am not rude because I love you and care for your feelings.
I am not self seeking because I love you and want to meet your needs.
I am not easily angered because I love you and I want to overlook your offenses.
I do not keep record of your wrongs because I love you and love covers a multitude of sins."
That's the kind of love that motivates us to forgive people when they hurt us.
What are the steps we need to take? I want to esteem you before myself. I am not rude because I love you and care for your feelings because I love you and want to meet your needs. I am not easily angered because I love you and I want to overlook your offenses. I do not keep record of your wrongs because I love you and love covers a multitude of sins. These demonstrate the greatness of God, what He's done already to forgive us and what it cost Him to forgive us was the very life of His Son, Jesus Christ. We can then ask God to help us forgive and help us make the choice to forgive this individual. We might even go as far as to say, 'I'm going to obey You, Father, I'm going to forgive' – and mention the individual's name. 'I am forgiving this individual.' If the offending party has asked for forgiveness and it's good when somebody officially asks for forgiveness it's important to formally acknowledge that and tell them we do forgive them if they have asked for our forgiveness.
One of the nuts and bolts of forgiving has to do with getting rid of anger. Anger is a real contributing factor. Let's go to Ephesians 4:26. It's important to understand that not all anger is sinful and it's true in the true example that we referred to earlier about the man with terminal cancer who lost his job wrongfully, his initial anger was justified. He had been sinned against; he was seriously violated. It's understandable he would be angry. But the catch is that even appropriate anger can so easily become sinful anger. In the book of Proverbs we are taught that anger becomes sinful, for example, when it is uncontrolled, when we explode and hurt other people. Here in Eph. 4:26 we see another way that even appropriate anger becomes a sin and that's when it lasts more than a short time. Notice what it says.
Eph. 4:26 - "Be angry, and do not sin": do not let the sun go down on your wrath... on your anger.
We are told to not stay angry – not even for a day. To not let a single day go by with unresolved anger stored up inside us. We have a sense of urgency about resolving our anger. We need to address this and deal with it appropriately and in a timely fashion. Otherwise, if it takes root, it becomes resentment and bitterness, and then that is sin. Remember, we read the example prayer that said, forgive us. We're supposed to pray this every day, or at least follow the example. Forgive us our debts as we forgive others. It should be part of our daily routine. Grudges and resentment are a form of getting even and retaliation. It is a way of keeping an offense alive. It becomes a poison and will eventually destroy us spiritually. Anger that festers continues on and it consumes us. We won't turn to Hebrews 12:5, but I think we've read that many times. It warns us against bitterness and says many - the verse says, many will become defiled by it. Many become defiled by bitterness.
The next verse, Eph. 4:27 – just a verse down from where we were. It says, nor give place to the devil.
Another translation says, don't give the devil any opportunity to work.
Satan uses unresolved anger to influence us to having an unforgiving spirit. What so often happens is that when somebody mistreats us, we easily respond in a sinful way. No wonder Jesus said, 'Be careful here. Watch out. This is a spiritually dangerous area.' The example that I gave earlier about the individual who lost his job, had terminal cancer, lost his health benefits – there's a lesson in there for us about the need to quickly get rid of anger. The man who was fired, who lost his job unfairly, who had the terminal cancer, his wife when she heard the news was extremely angry. I think we can understand that. In her case, it was sinful anger. She hated the man who had written the letter. She thought about revenge. She even admitted that some of her thoughts were murderous thoughts. She was that angry. She was so terrified by her own reaction when she realized how she was thinking – terrified by her reaction and her thoughts and she spent the whole night praying. Praying. And that by morning, she said she had finally dealt with it. She finished dealing with the anger and the hate toward the offender. She said, "It cost me something. It cost me my will because I wanted to get even." But what became more important was doing God's will and forgiving the individual.
The lesson here is the sooner we are able to forgive, the less damage is done to us; there is less chance of bitterness and resentment to take hold.
Verse 30 here in Ephesians 4 goes on to say - And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God... Now, who is being addressed here? Who can possibly grieve the Holy Spirit of God? Only people that have the Spirit of God - Christians. That's us. ...by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption...This is warning us: don't grieve God's Spirit.
Verse 31 - Let all bitterness.. that's deep seated anger that builds up day after day ...wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking... including jumping at the chance of saying something bad about the offender ...be put away from you, with all malice. Malice refers to bad feelings about someone – another evidence of an unforgiving spirit. In fact, everything listed in that verse is a component in an unforgiving spirit.
Verse 32 - And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ forgave you.
It is so important to ask God to take away the anger that we are unable to deal with immediately ourselves. We are to quickly have it put aside. Deal with it promptly. It is a very big and important key in the scriptures. It has been said, "Anger makes you smaller while forgiveness forces you to grow beyond what you are." It is true. Anger makes you smaller while forgiveness forces you to grow beyond what you are.
Another helpful principle on forgiving others is to take the emotional energy of our anger and direct it toward the problem instead of directing it toward the offender. For example, in the situation where your roommate forgot to mail your card, put your emotional energy into getting in touch with your sick friend. Call them on the phone. Explain, perhaps, you intended to send a card. How are they doing? Show concern. If you are having a hard time forgiving the people at Church at the pot luck that made those mean comments about your vegetables, direct your energy toward the problem. If after six months, you are still angry and still resentful, then maybe the problem is bigger than you think. Maybe you need to face the issue that you have some pride. We might ask ourselves in that situation, why would other people's comments about my food bother me so much? It's just food. It's okay for people not to like okra and Brussels sprouts and chartreuse sauce – it is. Is it my pride that is preventing me from letting go of the hurt and the anger? Or the man who wrongly lost his job, his emotional energy and his wife's energy should be directed toward solving the problem of no job and no health benefits. They have to work hard at this, attacking the problem. And probably that would translate into a lot of prayer and fasting on their part for God to help them find the solution. Often we have the most success in forgiving others when we make a conscious effort to put extra effort into drawing close to God. That's, perhaps, the most sweeping way to attack the problem rather than the person that offended us.
Another important step in forgiving is to turn our thoughts outward, as opposed to inward, focusing on involvement and serving of others – getting our minds off ourselves – and including focusing outward concern on the person that offended us.
Notice Matthew 5:43. This is a section of the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus talked about loving our enemies. And if we do that to our enemies, we should also do that to anyone that we need to forgive. I would like to read William Barclay's definition of Godly love. He said, "it is that unconquerable benevolence, the undefeatable good will which will never seek anything but the highest good of others, no matter what they do to us, no matter how they treat us."
Mat. 5:43 – Jesus said, "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'
Verse 44 - "But I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you,
If we have a hard time getting rid of anger and forgiving, then maybe it is because we are not doing those things. In the case of the man who lost his job unfairly, if he learned, for example, that the offender's wife was seriously ill, one way to show love in that case would be to send her a get well card with a very sincere, meaningful message in it.
Verse 45 - "that you may be sons of your Father in heaven; for He makes His sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.
Verse 46 - "For if you love those who love you, what reward have you? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?
Verse 47 - "And if you greet your brethren only, what do you do more than others? Do not even the tax collectors do that?
Verse 48 - "Therefore you shall be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect.
What are some barriers to forgiveness? A big barrier to forgiveness can be self-pity. That one - watching out for self-pity - might ruffle a few feathers for us when we are suffering unjustly because someone else has hurt us unfairly, when we are suffering for their misdeeds. But forgiving is a promise to not bring up the offense that we have forgiven. Not bring up that offense to ourselves, to the individual, or to other people. We promise not to continue bringing that issue back to mind, mulling it over in self-pity and resentment. I hope that it is clear that we are not saying that a person certainly – I mean, they can discuss the relationship issues with the offender, they can seek counsel in how they can improve the relationship. That would not be inappropriate. Working on human relationships is a whole topic in itself. The point I am making is that each time that we choose to remember the offense and brood over it, we are reopening the wound, we are putting up a barrier to true forgiveness. If we forgive someone and slip back into anger - which we sometimes do – and bad feelings toward the person, we should go back to God and again ask for forgiveness and ask for God's help to not make the same mistake again. Even when we've genuinely forgiven someone, the hurt of the offense may still last awhile. Disappointment and sadness may last for sometime. Those feelings are not the same as self-pity or anger or lack of forgiveness. But ill will, bad feelings toward the offender, is a red flag that we do have an unforgiving spirit.
Another barrier to forgiveness is a lack of faith. Turn to 1 Peter 2:21. Part of forgiving others - and especially for serious offenses - involves the ability to put our confidence in God to deal with the issue, to deal with the results of the offense, to take care us, our situation and to work things out for good. And Christ certainly exemplified that.
1 Pet. 2:21 - For to this you were called... part of our Christian calling ...because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow His steps:
Verse 22 - Who committed no sin, neither was deceit found in His mouth";
Verse 23 - who, when He was reviled, did not revile in return... He did not have a revengeful, unforgiving spirit ...when He suffered, He did not threaten, but committed Himself to Him who judges rightly;
He trusted God to work it out. He had the kind of faith to trust the Father to work this out. And true forgiveness involves believing and trusting in God and in the values of the kingdom of God.
What about forgiving and also forgetting? Forgiving and doing it properly does not automatically result in an instant memory loss. We don't necessarily instantly forget, but we do forget things by not thinking about them – especially on smaller offenses – not dwelling on them. It's time that we should just forget them, move on and don't even think about them any more. Put them out of our minds. When we're dealing with bigger hurts and big offenses, we may never completely forget the situation, but neither should it be in the forefront of our minds. The man who wrongly lost his job could get to the place where he could see the man who wrote the letter and the first thought that would come to his mind could be the man's ill wife, not what the man did to him. He could get to that place.
I'd like to end the sermon today with another real-life story about forgiveness. It's not all that uncommon to find inspiring, true stories of forgiveness in magazines and newspapers. There are people who have learned to forgive who don't have God's Spirit, have not been called yet, but they still choose to forgive. How much more should we, as God's people with God's Spirit, be able to forgive every time?
This is a true story written several years ago by a young man who's name was Chris Carrier. The story included a picture of Chris giving comfort to a frail, elderly man in a nursing home bed and Chris's little daughter is in the picture too, looking on and smiling. Chris Carrier wrote this:
"I was ten years old when I got off the school bus that day a few doors from our house in Coral Gables, Florida. A man came up to me and introduced himself as Chuck and asked if I would help him with decorations for a party he was hosting for my father. Thinking he was a friend of my Dad's, I agreed to go with him."
"After I agreed to accompany him, he drove his motor home to an isolated area north of Miami where he stopped by the side of the road and stabbed me in the chest several times with an ice pick. He then drove west to the Florida Everglades, walked me out among the bushes, shot me to the head and left me to die. Fortunately, the bullet passed behind my eye and exited my right temple without causing any brain damage.
"When I regained consciousness six days later, I was unaware that I had been shot. I sat by the side of the road and was found by a man who stopped to help me. Two weeks later, I described the person who assaulted me to a police artist and my uncle recognized the resulting portrait as that of David McAllister . He was brought in along with other suspects, but for some reason I was unable to identify him. Unfortunately, the police could not obtain any physical evidence to link him to the crime, so he was never charged. "The assault left me blind in my left eye, but otherwise uninjured and with the love and support of my family and friends, I went back to school and resumed my life.
"For the next three years, I lived in tremendous anxiety. Most nights I would wake up frightened, imagining I heard someone coming in the back door and I would wind up sleeping at the foot of my parents' bed. Then, when I was thirteen, all that changed. One night I realized" - he was thirteen, a teen-ager – "that God's providence and love, having miraculously kept me alive, were the basis for my life's security. In His hands, in God's hands, I could live without fear or anger. And so, I did. I finished school and after graduating from college, I married my wonderful wife, Leslie, and we have two beautiful daughters.
"In September of 1996, a man who had worked on the original investigation of my case came to tell me that seventy-seven year old David McAllister had finally confessed. Blind from glaucoma, in poor health without family or friends, he was in a North Miami Beach nursing home. I visited him there. The first time I went to see him, he apologized for what he had done. I told him I had already forgiven him.
"I visited him many times after that, introducing him to my wife and daughters, offering him hope and some semblance of family in the days before his death. He was always glad when I came by. I believe that our friendship eased his loneliness. It was kind of a relief to him after twenty-two years of regret. I know the world might view me as a victim of a terrible tragedy, but I consider myself a victim of many miracles: the fact that I am alive and have no mental deficiencies defies the odds. I have a loving wife and a beautiful family. I have been given as much promise as anybody else and ample opportunities. I have been blessed in a lot of ways and while many people can't understand how I can forgive David McAllister, from my point of view, I couldn't not forgive him."
He ended the article by saying, "If I had chosen to hate him all these years, or spent my life looking for revenge, then I would not be the man I am today, the man my wife and children love." End of story.
As we approach the Passover, brethren, let's ask ourselves the question, is there anyone we have not forgiven?