Give Grace

I truly believe that no one expects the church to be perfect. But at the same time being hurt by the church is not something that happens just now and then. I have heard stories from people who have found church to be confusing, hypocritical, or even damaging. If you have been hurt by the church, I have good news, not every church is like that.

Some people are hurt through their own mistakes, others because of sin committed against them, and still others because of failed leadership. This reality can leave them reluctant to re-engage, afraid of being hurt again, wanting to protect themselves, and questioning the place of church in their lives. The good news for the hurting is that God has spoken to your pain in the Bible.

Most of the writing in the New Testament about how to live in a church exists because the church has never been perfect. Most, if not all, of the letters were written to solve problems in the church:

Galatians to solve legalism (Galatians 1:6–7, 3:1–3, 4:9, 5:1).

Colossians to solve heresy (Colossians 2:4, 8).

2 Timothy to solve tension in succession (2 Timothy 4:9–16).

Philippians to solve conflict and selfish ambition (Philippians 2:3–22).

1 and 2 Corinthians to solve a whole host of problems centered around the issues of human pride in gifting and speaking that led to loveless and arrogant religious activity.

And that’s not even to mention the letters to the churches in Revelation (chapters 2–3), one of which is so unhealthy, it makes Jesus want to vomit (Revelation 3:16).

And we think we’ve got problems. You see friends the church is a body of believers, who are not perfect people, which means we all need to give grace because we all desperately need grace.

This passage that we just read is known as the parable of the unforgiving servant. In the story, a man owes a king a large sum of money. It’s an exaggerated parable used to make a point, so Jesus sets the debt at the loanee’s yearly salary, times twenty. The king could obviously throw him in jail for failing to pay back what he owes, but instead he forgives him.

Then the twist, twists.

In the parable, the man who owed twenty years’ worth of wages later chokes out someone who owes him a day’s wage. He wants his money back—immediately. Why did he do this after all that was given to him? He should be rotting in a debtor’s prison!

The typical interpretation is that this man committed an unspeakable act because of his ungratefulness. The king forgave him, but the man chose not to follow his example. The story concludes with the king hearing the news and punishing the man he originally let off the hook.

In To My Friend Who Left the Faith, Bearden writes about how his understanding of the parable began to change over time: “I remember, years ago, talking to my future father-in-law about the parable. He was skeptical of how most people discussed the story and offered me his theory: The main character went after the individual who owed him next-to-nothing because he didn’t really believe the king had forgiven him. He likely thought his day of reckoning would still come—only later. … The man believed the king would one day call on him to repay his generosity—and he needed to be ready. Collect debts. Invest. Start saving. You’re going to have to pay the king back, and you better have something to show for it when the piper struts down Main Street” (18).

Now this interpretation makes best sense of Jesus’s teachings. Jesus isn’t saying we must earn forgiveness by forgiving others; he’s letting his followers know that those who have truly experienced God’s grace will naturally want to give it to others. The man in this parable choked out the man who owed him money because he didn’t trust that the king’s gift was truly free. Now is that irony or hypocrisy? It is ironic that the king forgave such a large debt, but hypocritical for the servant to attempt to collect his debt after being forgiven such a large amount.

And so, I think when we examine this parable through our lens, we look to compare our sin debt to others. Sometimes we say or even think it, “Jesus didn’t have to forgive me as much as He had to forgive you.” Or “Your sin was worse than mine.” This is some of they hypocrisy that we all have witnessed in churches everywhere, and if you haven’t seen it then you haven’t been to church very long.

This parable speaks to both those inside of the church and those who have left the church because of hypocrisy.

To Christians: We must continually remind ourselves of God’s grace. Do we truly believe it is free? If not, we’ll turn our faith into a competition. We’ll treat others poorly because we must find a way to “get ahead.” We’ll create hierarchies to buttress our supposed standing before God.

And to those outside of the faith: I apologize for the hurt you’ve received from the church. As you can see from this passage, God is a God of grace and forgiveness. Because God invites everyone to his table, life in Christian community will be messy—because people are messy. But we must continually strive to offer the same grace that God offers through Jesus Christ. Martin Luther once said, “forgiveness is not an occasional art, it is a permanent attitude.” A Christian must and I repeat must have an attitude of forgiveness. You have been forgiven much so you too must forgive others as Jesus has forgiven you.

Just like all of you I know how hard it is to forgive. We have trouble with forgiveness because we are still imperfect. But I’m convinced that relationships are built not on a standard of perfection, but on our ability to ask for forgiveness, and upon our willingness to extend forgiveness. In other words, grace must impact both our friendships and our forgiveness. This is a lesson that will help all of you graduates in your future endeavors, forgive, forgive, forgive, and forgive some more.

Forgiveness is costly -- it’s not easy to ask for forgiveness and it’s certainly not easy to extend forgiveness to those who’ve wronged us. Proverbs 18:19 says that, “An offended brother is more unyielding than a fortified city, and disputes are like the barred gates of a citadel.”

Forgiveness is the virtue we most enjoy and least employ. There are at least two reasons why we struggle with forgiveness:

Forgiveness is not natural. That’s why it’s so hard to do.

Forgiveness is not fair. Our sense of justice wants to be vindicated. As Moody would say, “The voice of sin is loud, but the voice of forgiveness is louder.”

When you think about it, we all have some barriers that keep us from giving the gift of forgiveness to others. We have a threshold that we don’t want to cross, a limit we won’t go beyond. I can think of at least three barriers of an unforgiving heart:

Revenge ­ “I’m going to get even!”

Resentment ­ “I’m going to stay angry!”

Remembering ­ “I’ll never forget!”

But if we go back to the passage and notice the number that Jesus suggests, seventy times seven means there is no limit to the number of times we are to forgive someone. Actually, if you were to count, by the time you reach 490, you would be in the habit of continual and unlimited forgiveness. That’s precisely the point Jesus is making -- you don’t keep score when it comes to forgiveness. Like grace, forgiveness has about it a maddening quality because it is undeserved, unmerited, and unfair.

What happens if you don’t forgive. Well there are some hidden tortures that tags along with unforgiveness.

The hidden torturers of anger and bitterness that eat your insides out. The torturers of frustration and malice that give you ulcers, high blood pressure, migraine headaches, and lower back pain. The hidden torturers that make you lie awake at night stewing over every wrong that someone has done to you. The torturers of an unforgiving heart who stalk you day and night, who never leave your side, who suck every bit of joy out of your life. Why? Because you will not forgive from your heart.

Here’s the rub. While we often try to punish and imprison those who hurt us, the reverse actually happens. When we don’t forgive we end up being tortured. Do you know where the worst prison is in the entire world? It’s the prison of an unforgiving heart. If we nurture feelings of bitterness we are little better than inmates of an internal concentration camp.

Many of us lock ourselves in a lonely isolation chamber, where we are tortured incessantly, walled in by bitterness and our own refusal to forgive. When we chose to not forgive, we are imprisoned in the past and locked out of all potential for change. Have you ever noticed that some of the most miserable people in the world are those who are unwilling to forgive others?

Did you hear about the two men who were in a nursing home and had been quarreling for years? One of the guys thought he was on his deathbed so he called his foe over to his bed and said, “John, I forgive you for what you have said and done against me over the years, and I want you to do the same for me.”

The other man, with tears in his eyes, agreed that he too would like to forgive and be forgiven. Then the man in the bed said, “But if I get better, this doesn’t count!”

Friends, don’t put off forgiveness. Don’t allow the root of bitterness to grow into a tree of hatred and resentment. Hebrews 12:15 challenges us to not miss the grace of God so that “…no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.”

If we don’t forgive, we remain bound to the people we cannot forgive, held in their vise grip. And yet, many of us persist in demanding that others act in a way that we ourselves can never achieve. Lewis Smedes has said, “When I genuinely forgive, I set a prisoner free and then discover that the prisoner I set free was me.”

The Bible says that when we wrong someone, we are to go and meet face-to-face. Not surprisingly, the Bible is also clear on what to do when someone has wronged us. Earlier in this same chapter, Jesus put it this way in verse 15: “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over.” If someone has wronged you, you have the responsibility to go to him or her and work it out.

Friends, we’re a lot like the unforgiving man in the story that Jesus told. We stand before a holy God with our sins piled up higher than Mount Everest. Our sins are like a $25 million debt that we can never repay. And yet, out of compassion for our moral predicament, and motivated by His grace, God sent His Son Jesus to pay off our spiritual debts.

Colossians 3:13 says: “Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.” We can tolerate those who irritate us, and forgive our friends and family members when they wrong us, precisely because Jesus has forgiven us. Since those of us who have received Christ as our Savior have been forgiven for so much, then, out of gratitude, we should practice unlimited forgiveness in all our relationships.

3 Reasons to Give Grace and Forgiveness

Because we’ve received grace and forgiveness

An unforgiving spirit inflicts torment

Forgiveness frees people ­ including ourselves

Do you need to give someone the gift of forgiveness? Are you tired of living with the venom of an unforgiving spirit? Are your grudges structuring your total outlook on life? If so, cancel that debt today. Restore that friendship by being a grace-giver.

Do you need Divine forgiveness? Have you ever come face to face with God, owned your sin, and then asked Him for release? You need to do it, if you haven’t already done so -- forgiveness is our deepest need and God’s highest achievement. Once you experience God’s forgiveness, you’ll be better equipped to forgive others.

Ernest Hemingway loved to write about the country of Spain. In his short story, The Capital of the World, Hemingway tells of a father and son who had stopped talking to one another. Things got so bad that the son left home. After several years, the father wanted to mend the relationship and so he looked everywhere for his son. When he came to the capital city of Madrid, he decided to go to the newspaper office and take out a big ad in the newspaper that said this: “Paco, please meet me at 12 noon tomorrow in front of the newspaper office -- all is forgiven. I love you. Your Father.”

The next day at 12 noon, there were 800 men named Paco standing in front of the building! I suspect we have some Paco’s here this morning in need of forgiveness. We also have some who need to give the gift of forgiveness to others.

Before we partake in Holy Communion I want you all to do a Forgiveness Inventory. Don’t leave this service without making a decision that can radically change your life -- and the quality of your friendships.

Do you need to ask forgiveness from someone? Can you think of a person right now? Is there someone you’ve wronged and you haven’t owned up for it? Are you ready to make the decision to go to that person and make things right? Just do it.

Do you need to extend forgiveness to someone? Have you been nursing a grudge? Are you giving someone the silent treatment? Are you ready to forgive the debt? Just do it.

Do you need to admit your sins to a holy God and receive His forgiveness? If you haven’t done so, now is the right time. The cost of our sins is more than we can pay. The gift of our God is more than we can imagine. If you are ready to receive the gift of divine forgiveness this morning, would you please make that commitment today!