How Many Times Should I Forgive?
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INTRODUCTION
Context
STOP
S – What is the situation
T – Type of literature
O – Who is the Object of the passage
P – Is the passage Prescriptive, Descriptive
6 Things Forgiveness is Not
1. FORGETTING
When you forgive someone, your memory isn’t suddenly wiped clean of the offense. Our brains can’t do that. God could do that, but it seems that would be the easy way. God wants forgiveness to be more intentional than that.
2. REMOVAL OF CONSEQUENCES
Even though you forgive someone, they may still have consequences to face because of their actions. (Thief on the Cross)
3. ABSENCE OF PAIN
When the pain of a past hurt still stings, we tend to think we haven’t forgiven the offender. While we make the choice to forgive, it doesn’t mean we instantly feel better. Healing is a journey best done with our heavenly Father. But know this… forgiveness is a necessary ingredient in the healing process.
Without forgiveness, bitterness and resentment begin to take root. That same bitterness and resentment will slow, possibly even stagnate the healing.
4. RESTORING THE SAME RELATIONSHIP
The relationship may be closer than before or not, but most likely it will never be the same. Forgiving an offense does not mean tolerating behavior that is hurtful. On the contrary, we are called to speak the truth in love
5. Not Predicated on the Guilty Party Repenting
Luke 17:3 Pay attention to yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him,
6. A LEVERAGE OF POWER
Granting forgiveness does not give a person power over the person being forgiven. That would violate the entire principle and purpose of forgiveness.
“If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother.
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.
Lamech said to his wives: “Adah and Zillah, hear my voice; you wives of Lamech, listen to what I say: I have killed a man for wounding me, a young man for striking me. If Cain’s revenge is sevenfold, then Lamech’s is seventy-sevenfold.”
As much as Lamech wanted to get revenge we should have the same veracity to forgive
To Drive the meaning home Jesus tells a parable
“Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants. When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents. 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. So the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt. 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.’ So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. 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. Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers, until he should pay all his debt.
So if one denarius was what a man like the ungrateful servant could earn in a day, he would need to work 6,000 days to earn one talent. Ten thousand talents would equal 60 million denarii or 60 million days of work.
Who was is the best position to pay off the dept?
When we obeyed the Gospel what did God do with our sin?
How what this possible?
He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.
He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.
What do we continue to do after baptism?
What is God continually willing to do?