Peace through Forgiveness
Welcome to the Greater Life: Studies from the Sermon on the Mount • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Motive: Transformational Living
Mark: Mouth for Encouraging
Introduction: You ever try to bring 2 little kids together who are fighting and angry with one another and try to get them to make up and play nice?
We can try to instill in them the important of saying sorry and hugging it out.
But at the end of the day. Forgiveness and reconciliation do not make sense to a little kid.
As adults we are well meaning, but we have a difficult time teaching what we don’t know.
What we do know is that we are supposed to say sorry and the person is supposed to accept out apology.
That doesn’t often happen.
In reality we are often too stubborn to say sorry, and to hurt to offer forgiveness.
And here we have one of the most difficult concepts to grasp in all of our faith in Jesus Christ.
Repentance and Forgiveness are not options….they are essential to the Christian faith.
Transition to the Text: Turn with me in your Bibles to Matthew 6:14-15. These are just verses on the back end of the the Kingdom Prayer that seem to come out of nowhere. We were just praying. And now Jesus wants to talk about forgiveness.
But what we see is that these 2 verses are connected to
12 and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And that one of the biggest temptations that we as Christians face as well as what the devil most wants you to do is to withhold forgiveness. We think of forgiveness as something we need from God, but it’s linked to you offering forgiveness to others.
As we look at the kingdom life, what we have called the greater life, some very clear expectations pop out to us.
You will be persecuted and mistreated.
17 Beware of men, for they will deliver you over to courts and flog you in their synagogues,
18 and you will be dragged before governors and kings for my sake, to bear witness before them and the Gentiles.
20 Remember the word that I said to you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they kept my word, they will also keep yours.
This means that if you find yourself persecuted and crying out to God, you shouldn’t feel like God abandoned you or forgot about you. It’s happening as expected.
2. You must forgive those who hurt you.
44 But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
34 And Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” And they cast lots to divide his garments.
And then when Stephen was being stoned to death…
60 And falling to his knees he cried out with a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” And when he had said this, he fell asleep.
Persecution and Forgiveness. Do you think there is any connection between these 2 expectations are connected in anyway?
Because the heart of the kingdom life is to be at peace with God and others.
And everything surrounds that idea.
Peace with God through the forgiveness offered at the cross and peace with people through forgiveness offered because of the cross.
Introduce:
Big Idea: Make every EFFORT to be at PEACE with God and others.
Big Idea: Make every EFFORT to be at PEACE with God and others.
Read: Matthew 6:14-15
14 For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you,
15 but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
Big Idea: Make every EFFORT to be at PEACE with God and others.
Big Idea: Make every EFFORT to be at PEACE with God and others.
Something that has become somewhat of a subtheme in the Sermon on the Mount is “PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY.”
You, your you, you, your, your
Jesus is talking about your responsibility in forgiveness, not their responsibility in making amends.
Now this is where I’m supposed to tell you that this is just hyperbole and not to be taken literally. Sure God’s forgiveness isn’t based on anything more than our faith and His grace.
Or I’m supposed to to say that there are exceptions to this rule of people you don’t have to forgive.
Like murderers, Nazis, people who kick puppies and drive slow in the fast lane.
Or that you should forgive but you don’t have to forget. You don’t have to reconcile.
All of these things would not be in our text today. And aren’t anywhere in the Bible.
Jesus was combatting a culture that taught….
That murder is wrong, but hating your brother is ok.
That adultery is wrong, but looking without touching is fine.
That divorce is is ok.
That finding loopholes in your commitments is ok.
An eye for an eye or a tooth for a tooth.
And that you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.
All of these things he needed to correct with “but I say to you…”
And how he turns to forgiveness.
Jesus’ teaching on forgiveness, just like everything else, is difficult and impossible on our own. We need His spirit to do the hard things.
And as we have seen over and over again, it comes down to attitude and self-reflection.
So what is the attitude Jesus wants us to have in forgiveness?
1. FORGIVE others because you have been FORGIVEN. (Matthew 6:14)
1. FORGIVE others because you have been FORGIVEN. (Matthew 6:14)
Explanation: Jesus put this in the future tense. I’m placing it in the past tense for one very important reason. When Jesus gave this instruction, the basis of forgiveness was still future.
The cross hadn’t happened yet. And the kingdom of Heaven would be built on the foundation of the cross.
For us, we look back at the cross as our forgiveness applied which makes forgiveness all the more essential in our time because we should know better.
So let’s look at what Jesus said....
For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you,
This phrase seems out of place on the tale end of the Prayer Jesus just taught His disciples. But it makes perfect sense as an extension of our petition
and forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
Now we didn’t talk about that verse that much last week, but I think it bears mentioning the way Jesus phrased it. You may notice that when we petition God to forgives us our debts, the assumption is that we have already forgiven our debtors.
Our goal here is peace with God. And Jesus is saying that you can’t have true peace with God if you are at war with everyone around you.
Now, this is a difficult statement for many of us because it makes our understanding of God’s forgives as something like a quid pro quo. We do something and God is obligated to do something for us. And also that our forgiveness from God is dependent on us doing the same for others.
We know that all of scripture says that God’s forgiveness is dependent only upon faith and repentance. So either Jesus is contradicting Himself and all of scripture or He’s saying something else. So what is Jesus saying here?
First there is a big difference between our forgiveness of others and God’s forgiveness of us.
Our forgiveness to others is relational.
God’s forgiveness is relational but it’s also judicial.
Hell is not a place for people that God doesn’t like per se. It’s a place of judicial punishment where they pay the penalty of their sins for all of eternity…because they did not trust in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.
As a forgiven people, we are in the business of forgiving.
Essentially what Jesus is establishing is that it is a sin to withhold forgiveness from others in a relational manner. You may not have any judicial authority over those who wrong you. Their sin against you is also against God and God has said
Vengeance is mine, and recompense,
for the time when their foot shall slip;
for the day of their calamity is at hand,
and their doom comes swiftly.’
All sin will eventually be accounted for either at the cross of Jesus Christ or in hell.
So when you feel like a pushover or a doormat. No one gets away with anything.
So there is no reason to worry about vengeance in this life. We have to trust that God has everything under control.
And God has instructed us already on how we are to deal with that all that way back earlier in our study on the Sermon on the Mount.
Remember?
Matthew 5:38-42 forbids retaliation against those who harms you or sues you or oppresses you.
Matthew 5:43-48 speaks to how we are to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us.
What we would should want most for those who harm us is for their repentance and faith in Jesus Christ because when we truly know what’s at stake, even the worst thing someone can do in this life can be atoned for at the cross.
Illustration: The truth is that most of us will never have to put this teaching into practice beyond the usual of “Letting things go.” They are often small things.
But around the world in war torn parts of the world, coming to Christ means taking His words literally.
One of North Hill’s former pastor Bill Steele was a missionary with the International Mission Board serving in the former Yugoslavia. His primary mission was forgiveness and reconciliation among people who had been wronged.
He tells the story of Dragan. Dragan had lost everything because of the war, but what hurt the most was he had lost contact with family in an occupied area of Croatia. He waited for 2 years hoping against all hope when the the Red Cross contacted him to let him know that they have found the bodies of his sister and aunt in a burned out house. They had been shot and killed and then their house set on fire over them. They had been murdered by their neighbors.
Dragan wanted vengeance. He had a good feeling of who it was and all he needed was time and opportunity. But then Jesus intervened. During the war, a missionary shared the gospel with him and he had come to know the grace and forgiveness of a God that he didn’t deserve.
Dragan attended a seminar on forgiveness Bill was leading in Croatia. Dragan shared his story and how he could only learn to let go of vengeance and to offer forgiveness.
To Bill’s knowledge, Dragan had not been given an opportunity to meet his sister’s and aunt’s murderers. but he was ready to should God give him opportunity.
Dragan’s story is not one of reconciliation. It’s one of forgiveness. We do not have to wait for people to ask for forgiveness to offer it.
Application: May you be motivated to forgive everyone as you have been forgiven.
Peter asked Jesus: Matthew 18:21-22
Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.
Forgiveness is not optional or relative dependent upon how bad it was.
We forgive others because it’s part of who we are. And God will forgive us because we are His.
2. Be AFRAID to withhold FORGIVENESS from others. (Matthew 6:15)
2. Be AFRAID to withhold FORGIVENESS from others. (Matthew 6:15)
Explanation: What we have learned from Jesus is that “FORGIVEN PEOPLE FORGIVE.” There is no option here.
And Matthew 6:15 is the warning of what happens if you don’t.
15 but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
Now some people want to argue that Jesus is hyperbole here. He’s giving us the shock treatment so that we’ll understand what’s at stake here.
But I’m not sure that’s true at all. Again this isn’t Quid pro quo here. It’s not that God will forgiven you if you forgive others.
This has more to do with revealing your heart.
God’s forgiveness should fundamentally change us.
17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
Part of the old self is the self that holds grudges and refuses to forgive.
The new self forgives because it has been changed by the power of the Gospel.
So if your life is characterized by unforgiveness and grudges and hatred of those who persecute you, you might not be saved in the first place.
That’s what Jesus is saying. The clearest example of this comes later in Matthew. No surprise, Peter still doesn’t get it. And this is illustrated in a question.
Illustration: Matthew 18:21-33
21 Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?”
22 Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.
23 “Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants.
24 When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents.
25 And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made.
26 So the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’
27 And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt.
28 But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii, and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you owe.’
29 So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’
30 He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt.
31 When his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place.
32 Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me.
33 And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’
Again, this is not saying that the first servant lost his salvation.
His actions revealed that his heart was not changed by the master’s grace.
The kingdom of God is different. And if you want to be a part of the kingdom of God you must be different as well.
And everything that we have heard so far in the Sermon on the Mount is about what’s so different about citizens.
And these differences reflect a heart that is changes by the grace and mercy of our king.
So how do we characterize what that heart change looks like?
Well it looks like a people that are committed to pursuing peace with God and others.
Application: Paul talks about being at peace with one another:
Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.
The barriers to relational forgiveness are bitterness, weather, anger, clamor and slander. The opposite is kindness, tenderheartedness, and forgiveness. One side of this implies association with the world. The other implies association with Christ.
And again, our motivation is that God forgave us in Christ.
In other words, citizens of the kingdom should be the most unbothered people in the world. Not because we’re pushovers or doormats but because we understand what’s really going on.
Sin is real and is at the heart of our relational stress.
Too many people think that they can have a strong relationship with God when their other relationships are in turmoil…even if, in our minds, it’s not our fault.
If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother.
I will say this, of all the stuff that the Bible teaches us that seems controversial, Jesus’ teaching on forgiveness is perhaps the hardest.
We find every reason in the world why we say we don’t have to forgive.
What they did was unforgivable.
We don’t want to give them an opportunity to continue to hurt us.
We don’t want to appear weak.
We don’t’ want to be a doormat.
We want them to suffer for what they did.
But each of those things could be said about us in the eyes of God.
But all of a sudden when we make a mistake and sin, we expect others to forgive us. And if they don’t theyu are being unreasonable.
And beyond that….
Every day I commit sin that makes me deserving of God’s wrath, yet, Christ died to pay the penalty of my sin.
Every time I sin and offend a holy and righteous God and then confess it to Him, He offers forgiveness, knowing I’m going to do it again.
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
But also…. Prov 26:11
Like a dog that returns to his vomit
is a fool who repeats his folly.
Does God appear weak every time He forgives?
Is God a doormat?
And rather than want us to suffer, He sent His only begotten Son Jesus to die in our place.
But he was pierced for our transgressions;
he was crushed for our iniquities;
upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.
If you think forgiveness makes you weak, what does that make you think about God?
But what about reconciliation? Surely we don’t have to seek reconciliation right?
Again, look at God? He didn’t just forgive us, but offerer a way for us to be reconciled to Him for eternity.
18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation;
So yes, even after forgiveness, we must leave the door open to reconciliation. Because that’s what it means to be at peace with God and others.
Response: Are you living in PEACE with GOD and OTHERS?
Response: Are you living in PEACE with GOD and OTHERS?
Summation: This starts with being forgiven.
Every single one of us has sinned against God and taken on an unpayable debt. But in God’s grace He sent Jesus to pay the penalty of our sin and, when we repent of our sin and come to God in faith, we are forgiven and changed.
And then, having been forgiven, we forgive.
Closing Illustration: I’ve said it before, the sermon on the mount is about the culture of the Kingdom.
These are the things that are important to God.
And right up near the top is the call to forgiveness.
Why?
Because of what we are called to do.
We are called to take the Gospel to the nations to proclaim that there is forgivness of sin through the blood of Christ.
If we are proclaiming the gospel to a world that needs to hear it, how can we withhold forgiveness for people that need to experience that same grace in a more tangible way…those who have been forgiven offering forgiveness as a model of what Christ did.
At North Hills we talk about changing the world through the power of the Gospel.
And we often don’t realize the power that a simple act like forgiveness can have in our pursuit of changing the world.
Not forgiveness for the sake of forgiveness, but for the glory of God working through us.
Jim Elliott and Nate Saint: January 8, 1956. Nate radioed back to his wife: “Pray for us! We’re sure we’ll have contact again today! Will radio you again at 4:30.” That was the last they were ever heard from. A few days later, their bodies were found in the river. It’s a tragic story that many would think was foolish on their parts. But they didn’t think that way. Later on, these words were found in his journal. “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.
Rachel Saint (Nate’s sister) and Elizabeth Elliott determined that their sacrifice would not be in vain. And rather than be angry or bitter at God or the tribe, they chose a different path. They saw the bigger picture and dreamed of greater glory for God. They forgave and went to live among the tribe. Learned their language, translated the Bible into their language and led the entire tribe to Jesus.
Mincaye was one of the warriors who killed Jim Elliott and Nate Saint and 3 others. He later embraced Christ, became a preacher and travelled the world proclaiming the Gospel of forgiveness.
He passed away in 2020 and I am sure that the cheers in heaven came loudest from Jim and Nate when he entered glory.
When we all get to heaven, even the greatest atrocities committed against us in this life will seem small in light of eternity.
17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison,
If you haven’t received peace with God through the forgiveness available to you at the cross, I invite you to come to Jesus today.
If you are withholding forgiveness from someone today, by remembering all that you have been forgiven of by God, freely let things go.
Not for our glory, but for His.
Let’s pray.
