A Call to Prayer (5)

50%

I remember when I was in grade school. Back then milk only cost a quarter. The California raisins were hip, parents sided with teachers, student could actually fail and repeat a grade and the pass mark was 50%.

That’s right you heard me correctly you only had to do 50% of the work and remember 50% of the information in order to pass a class and I was the king of doing just enough.

My most stellar year, some may call it my defining year, was in grade 7. I specifically remember a conversation with my mom who must have gotten a call from the school telling her I was on the verge of failing. My mom’s motivational speech included but was not limited to, if you fail your the one who has to repeat grade 7 not me.

I passed that year, I passed every year but grade 7 I passed with an overall average of 53%. That is where you add up you percentages from all your classes and divide by the number of classes then multiply by 100.

If math is not your thing all you need to know is of the 5 or 7 classes I had that year I can’t quite remember but all my classes I passed with a 50-55%.

That is what you call doing just enough. To this day I can’t believe 50% was a pass mark. That tells me even the school board was like half this stuff is worthless, just remember half of it. The day I realized this was kind of ridiculous was at youth group as one of our leaders was trying to get us to try harder at school and they said would you be happy if the plow driver only plowed 50% of the road, or the garbage man only took 50% of your garbage.

It was then I realized that is a pretty low benchmark for adequacy. That’s when I realized you know what you call a doctor who did just enough to graduate. You call them doctor. How many are here are glad that a pass mark in med school is higher than 50%? I guess it would depends on which 50% they didn’t learn.

So what does this have to do with the Lord’s prayer? Because if you are a regular attender you know we are now on week 5 of this series called A call to prayer. In this series we have been looking at the different sections of the Lord’s prayer and trying to become better prayers.

Week 1 we learned We need to refocus on God and His holiness

Week 2 we learned when we pray for the return of Jesus this is good for some and bad for most so we need to let that remind us Jesus is coming back so we need to do what we can toy see as many as possible to be ready

Week 3 that praying God’s will be done we are asking God to give us a realignment, aligning our will to His.

Week 4 we learned the difference between needs and wants, and that we can ask God for both, but we need to know the difference.

This week we will be looking at ;

Matthew 6:12 NLT

and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us.

;

Matthew 6:14–15 NLT

“If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.

Matthew 6:

So what does me doing just enough in grade 7 have to do with the Lord’s prayer?

Well honestly it has to do with forgiveness. See forgiveness is one of those areas where Christians are happy to give 50% or less forgiveness to those who have wronged them but expect those whom they have wronged to give them 100% forgiveness.

What do I mean by that? Simply put when it comes to forgiveness most Christians stop short of offering full forgiveness. Don’t get me wrong, they say they have forgiven the person, they may even try really hard to treat that person well in public but for many Christians that is as far as their forgiveness goes if it get’s that far.

And so the question I want to ask today is?

% enough?

No

What is the danger of stopping short?

You will only be forgiven with the same measure you forgive!

Me: A few years ago I came across a a German word that really helped me to understand what less than 100% forgiveness looks like.

Schadenfreude

Does anyone here know what this word means?

Schadenfreude: pleasure derived by someone from another person's misfortune.

Leave it to the Germans to have a word for this. There is no English word for this emotion. You know what that tells me? Germans are more honest with their emotions.

We: Because whether we have a word for it or not we have all felt it. For example every time we watch America’s Funniest Home Videos. (Show a video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8oKJDjzOeA)

There we all just experienced Schadenfreude

You know when else we experience Schadenfreude? Whenever someone who has wronged us, and I quote “Get’s what they deserved”!

Let me ask when someone who has wronged us suffers and it makes us feel better does that sound like we have forgiven them 100%?

God: Now let me ask you. When it comes to your sins, who here will be ok if God only forgives 99% of them? Or Maybe He forgiveness them all but only offers 99% forgiveness. Would that be ok?

Well let us look at 12 again

Matthew 6:12 NLT

and forgive us our sins, as we have forgiven those who sin against us.

I want you to consider that word as. That word in this context and emphasis read like this.

Forgive me my sins in the same way or (as) I forgive others.

That is a scary thought isn’t it. Because if we are not offering full forgiveness what does that mean for us. Well we don’t have to guess because Jesus makes it very clear in verses 14-15

Matthew 6:14–15 NLT

“If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.

When it comes to forgiveness I want God to forgive me 100%. Which tells me I need to forgive others 100%. What does that look like. Well let’s look at

Luke 23:34 NLT

Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.” And the soldiers gambled for his clothes by throwing dice.

Luke

Here is an example of 100% true forgiveness, where Jesus didn’t just say He forgave them, He prayed for them asking the Father to forgive them.

Essentially Jesus was saying don’t give them what they deserve. Now that is Forgiveness. That is more than just words, that is even more than just being nice in public He prayed for those who were killing Him and gambling for His clothes while they waited for Him to die.

You: So let me ask do you pray for those who have hurt you? More over do you pray that God would forgive them and not give them what they deserve? Or do you suffer from a case of Schadenfreude where you find joy in the suffering of those who hurt you and secretly hope they will suffer in Hell.

We: Too many in church’s today cannot worship in certain churches because someone who hurt them is there, or can’t sit next to someone because it would hinder their worship. What happens if they both get to heaven? Do you think God will offer a second service just for one of them? What if that person who wronged us get’s saved then what? The bible tells us we need to be happy for them celebrate and worship with them, and that can’t happen unless we forgive them 100%.

So does this mean if we struggle to forgive, because let’s face it, forgiveness can be hard, so if we struggle with it does this mean we are not saved? That would come down to the intent of our hearts.

Do we desire to forgive 100%? If so we will keep trying and with the help of the Holy Spirit we will get there. Or are we happy and content to just pay lip service secretly hoping for them to suffer? If so why would we expect God to forgive us of a much larger debt.

Next Step:

Pray for them

And if this mornings message has brought more questions than answers let’s get together and talk.