TO FORGIVE IS DIVINE

Matthew 6:12 ESV

and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.

Jesus oriented “The Lord’s Prayer” to reorient our hearts because our hearts fluctuate between order and disorder. We need daily ordering, and this is the Lord’s design for prayer.

In this section, Jesus wants to reorient our relationship with Our Father and fellow man.

Before we see how this section reorients our relationship with Our Father and fellow man, let us establish a clear understanding of this word, forgive.

Forgive is a word used to indicate the sending away of an object or person. The Old Testament provides a clear picture of this action in Leviticus 16:20. On the Day of Atonement, one goat was offered as a sin offering, while a second goat would symbolically have the sins of the people placed on him and then released into the wilderness.

Forgiveness is a voluntary release of a person or thing over which one has legal or actual control. It means to abandon, to leave behind, to be done with to go on to other things.

Forgive is a verb in the aorist active imperative signifying that the action to be carried out effectively and with urgency. Forgiveness carries an expectation of exhaustive and expediency.

In preparing for this sermon, I came across a story concerning TV personality Erin Andrews. A man named, Michael Barrett, secretly filmed Andrews in her Nashville Marriott hotel room in 2008. He went on to post his inappropriate video online. Barrett was arrested, plead guilty and in 2009 began serving time in prison. In a 2017 interview, Meagan Kelly asked Andrews if she could ever forgive Barrett for his actions. Without hesitation, Andrews replied, “No, never! I have to relieve it all the time. It has shaped who I am as a person. It messed with my family, and you don’t get any pass for doing that.”

Medical science tells us that forgiveness is necessary for mental and physical well being — all types of health issues such as heart attack, blood pressure, and depression are associated with unforgiveness. Forgiveness weakens our immune system’s ability to fight off disease.

Later in her interview, Andrews revealed a recent diagnosis of cervical cancer. Consider but don’t conclude that Andrews's cancer could be related to her now almost decade long unwillingness to forgive.

Jesus teaching on forgiveness is not directed toward physical but spiritual health, though our obedience does provide an indirect benefit. Jesus does not want us to forgive for the sake of our endocrine or lymphatic system but our soul. Forgiveness is not a matter of health but heaven and hell.

Jesus designed this section of the Lord’s Prayer to preserve our salvation and to prove our salvation.

In Mark 1:15, Jesus says, “the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe the gospel.” The verbs repent and believe are presented in the present continuous tense. Repenting and believing is not a one-time act but an ongoing action in the life of a Christian. Repenting and believing is part of a Christian’s daily life.

THE LORD’S PRAYER PRESERVES OUR SALVATION

How many of us begin our prayer’s confessing sin? Interestingly, in the Lord’s Prayer, confession of sin is located at the end, not at the beginning. This opposition reinforces our need for reorientation.

Our Father designed the beginning of our praying to give us an Isaiah 6 experience. We need both wow and woe to worship.

Isaiah 6:1–7 ESV

In the year that King Uzziah died I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. And one called to another and said: “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory!” And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.”

Isaiah’s experience began with “woe is me.” It ends with wow, “my eyes have seen the king, the Lord of hosts.”

In our sermon on “hallowing our Father,” we said failure to hallow would lead us to botch the remainder of the prayer. Hallowing (beholding, bethinking, be appraising, be expressing) Our Father’s name allows us to experience both woe and wow. This experience fine-tunes our heart for what is to come.

Praying “forgive us our debts,” reinforces a dominant design in the Lord’s prayer, dependence. We are incapable of paying off an incalculable debt.

Many have asked, “why must Christians continually ask for forgiveness when they are completely forgiven?” Our initial request is to the Judge of the universe, asking him to reconcile us to himself. Our subsequent request is to Our Father, asking for restoration. Sin causes relational issues. In Psalm 51, David candidly shares sin’s relational impact. In verse 2, he says that it soils the saint. In verse 3, it saturates the mind. In verse 8,12, it saddens the heart. In verse 8, it sickens the body. In verse 10, it sours the spirit. In verse 13-15, it seals the lips.

Jesus demonstrated the answer to this question when he washed his disciple's feet.

John 13:5–10 ESV

Then he poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet and to wipe them with the towel that was wrapped around him. He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, do you wash my feet?” Jesus answered him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but afterward you will understand.” Peter said to him, “You shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no share with me.” Simon Peter said to him, “Lord, not my feet only but also my hands and my head!” Jesus said to him, “The one who has bathed does not need to wash, except for his feet, but is completely clean. And you are clean, but not every one of you.”

Jesus teaches us to daily petition the Father for He is forgiving. You are never closer to the grace of Jesus Christ than when you confess your sins to him. As Judge, God is eager to forgive sinners, and as Father, He is even more zealous to keep on forgiving His children. “Thou art a God of forgiveness, gracious and compassionate, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness.”

The Father demonstrates his zealousness to forgive in the story of the Prodigal Son. The Father, the victim of his son’s sin, ran to the Prodigal, the perpetrator. Forgiveness is not about recompense but reconciliation and restoration.

The Lord’s Prayer is a daily reminder confirming our Father’s commitment to us. A prayer designed to anchor a heart that is prone to drift. A prayer purposed to preserve our salvation — a petition of preservation.

THE LORD’S PRAYER PROVES OUR SALVATION.

Our new birth experience establishes an expectation of forgiveness towards our fellow man. When we ask God to forgive us, we declare to him that we have forgiven those who are indebted to us. Furthermore, we say to God that there is no bitterness, no spirit of unforgiveness, in our hearts.

Matthew 6:11 sets the forgiveness standard, which God follows. We establish the pattern in how God deals with us. When you pray this prayer, you are saying, “O God, deal with me as I deal with other people. Deal with me as I have dealt with others.”

Matthew 6:14–15 ESV

For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

While a missionary in Georgia, John Wesley met General Oglethorpe. In one conversation, Oglethorpe informed Wesley, “I never forgive.” To which Wesley replied, “Then, sir, I hope you never sin.”

The basis of forgiveness is the truth that God in Christ has forgiven us, not on what is fair. You cannot reconcile the words forgiveness and fairness.

Once our eyes see the enormity of our offense against God, the injuries which others have done to us appear by comparison extremely trifling. Jesus taught us in Matthew 18 that to withhold forgiveness proves that we are not of his kingdom.

You are never closer to the grace of Jesus Christ than when you confess your sins to him. You are never more like Jesus than when you forgive those who have sinned against you. To err is human, to forgive is divine.

Corrie Ten Boom once said, “you never so touch the ocean of God's love as when you forgive and love your enemies.”

Corrie ten Boom, the author of The Hiding Place, was taken captive and spent time in Nazi concentration camps during World War II. While in prison, Corrie saw incredible abuse, so inhumane that it drove the prisoners to unimaginable depths, including intentionally allowing lice to breed on their bodies because the more lice they had, the less likely it would be that the guards would molest them! And Corrie even witnessed the death of her dear sister.

After the war, God sent Corrie ten Boom on a mission of mercy through the war-torn cities to encourage residents to choose forgiveness over bitterness. She would motivate her audiences by sharing some of the atrocities she had experienced, implying that if she could forgive such horrors, so could her listeners. One night speaking, she immediately recognized the man who came walking down the aisle as a particularly cruel guards in one of the concentration camps. The man did not recognize her however. As he approached Corrie he said...

Fraulein, you don't know me, but I was a guard in one of those camps. After the war, God saved me. I wish I could go back and undo those years. I can't, but I've just been prompted by God to come tonight and ask you, would you please forgive me?

Then he extended his hand to her. Can you imagine the horrible thoughts and memories that raced through Corrie's mind as she recognized his face and then even worse, heard his incredible plea for forgiveness? How could she? Corrie said her arms froze at her side, and she was unable to move. The flashbacks in her mind replaying the atrocities, the death of her sister, the abuse. And then God's Spirit said to her, Corrie, what have you been telling everyone else to do? As an act of your will, will you choose to forgive? Corrie went on to explain what happened next. I reached out my hand, and I put it in his, and I said, 'You're forgiven. She later reported that at that moment, it was like a dam broke loose—all the bitterness and resentment—and God set me free.

Jesus commands all those who follow him to forgive because sin is natural; forgiveness is not. A non-christian can forgive for they bear God the Father's image. Yet their forgiveness doesn’t make them a Christian. However, a true follower of Christ can't withhold forgiveness. It is impossible. If your life has experienced forgiveness, then your lifestyle is forgiveness.

Two truths are evident in Scripture for those who claim Heavenly citizenship; the forgiveness of personal sin and the forgiveness of those who sin against you.

You can forgive others and not be forgiven, but you cannot be forgiven and not forgive others.

"Forgive us our debts AS we forgive our debtors." A completely forgiven sinner must completely forgive.

When we forgive, we enter into a small experience of Jesus' life. Jesus absorbed all the punishment due our sin. When we forgive, we abandon our rights to punish those who sinned against us. Jesus does not forget our sin for he is omniscient. He no longer holds our sin against us and we should treat others likewise.