Divine Forgiveness
Apologetic Series: Forgiveness • Sermon • Submitted
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Today we start a series that God has put in my heart over a year ago.
Every year, I want this church to focus on a subject that everyone wrestles with.
But I want to look at this topic from a biblical perspective.
For this year,
I want us to think through forgiveness.
As Christians,
how should we approach forgiveness?
Today, I will be presenting a biblical perspective on divine forgiveness,
on God’s forgiveness.
Next week,
we will have Alyda Arroyo,
my beautiful wife,
share what God has revealed to her about forgiveness.
And in the following week,
Oscar will share some thoughts about forgiveness.
Then, we will be ending our time,
by looking at human forgiveness,
and getting some practical tips.
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Forgiveness is hard,
but I pray that we can help you think through forgiveness.
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Let’s pray.
If you look at Christianity,
you might narrow Christianity down to one point:
The forgiveness of sins.
The great reformers,
the great leaders of the Protestant church,
Martin Luther and John Calvin really hammered this truth:
the forgiveness of sins, which they called justification by faith.
Are we right to narrow the Christian faith to this single point—to the forgiveness of sins?
I say, to a degree, yes.
There’s the kingdom but the forgiveness of sins is key.
I quote Karl Barth, one of the most influential theologians of the 20th century,
For the forgiveness of sins is the basis, the sum, the criterion, of all that may be called Christian life or faith.
Without the forgiveness of sins,
there is no Christianity,
no Christian,
no Christian faith,
or Christian living.
The forgiveness of sins is central.
Christians are reminded about the forgiveness of sins each time we pray the Lord’s Prayer.
And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
We pray that God would forgive our debts.
That he would forgive our sins.
But in this prayer,
not only are we reminded about divine forgiveness, God’s forgiveness,
but we are also reminded about human forgiveness.
Forgiving others is also part of the Christian message.
Christianity has always taught forgiveness,
and I think we live in dire times,
when the church needs to preach forgiveness.
The world is looking for how to forgive.
You can do an easy search online and see that popular books on forgiveness are these:
How to Forgive When You Don’t Know How
• How to Forgive When It’s Hard to Forget
• How to Forgive Your Children
• How to Forgive Yourself and Others
• How to Forgive Your Ex-husband (and get on with your life)
• Caring Enough Not to Forgive
• Forgiving Your Parents
• Forgiving the Unforgivable
• The Twelve Steps of Forgiveness
People are trying to forgive,
or are trying to learn more about forgiveness,
and the church should help people learn about forgiveness.
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And a great way to start is by defining forgiveness.
Here’s one definition of forgiveness:
The overcoming on moral grounds, of what I will call the vindictive passions—the passions of anger, resentment, and even hatred that are often occasioned when one has been deeply wronged by another.
Overcoming on moral grounds,
these vindictive passions.
Somebody did something wrong.
You are right to get angry.
But you overcome that anger.
You forgive.
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Here’s a more theological, biblical, traditional definition of forgiveness:
the remission of sins
Or the cancellation of punishment.
Another view is that forgiveness is the
removal or annulment of some obstacle or barrier to reconciliation.
Forgiveness allows the possibility of the restoration of something.
I hope we’re getting an idea of what forgiveness is.
It could also be helpful to state what forgiveness is not.
Forgiveness is not,
deciding that the act was not morally wrong.
Forgiveness is not saying that the person did not mess up.
No,
forgiveness includes recognizing that the other party has messed up.
Forgiveness is not,
changing one’s judgment of the offender, despite the offense.
It’s not saying that the action was wrong or that the person was not guilty.
No, forgiveness affirms that the perpetrator is guilty.
Forgiveness is not just overcoming resentment.
It’s not just like,
uh I’m over it, so let’s move on.
That is not forgiveness.
Forgiveness frees us from bitterness, hatred, guilt.
Forgiveness reestablishes personal relationships and mutual affirmation of worth and dignity.
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Today we will look at the Bible’s treatment on forgiveness,
and a big deal of it is on God forgiving.
Ultimately,
the Bible presents that God is a forgiving God,
and the New Testament teaches that human forgiveness is possible because God has forgiven.
As God’s people, we must reflect God’s character.
God is merciful, and thus, as bearers of his name, we must be merciful.
Look at what Paul said in Colossians 3:13
Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
We forgive because the Lord forgave us.
The Lord forgives.
The OT reveals that
sin leads to suffering for the sinner,
but repentance will lead to divine forgiveness.
Sin also makes sinners uncleaned.
They feel guilty, defiled, as a result of sin.
But yet the Bible presents forgiveness as cleansing.
It’s super important in the Bible.
Psalm 51, one of my favorite psalms, says,
Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin! Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow. Create in me a clean heart, O God. (vv. 2, 7b, 10a)
And then in the New Testament,
we see water baptism in relation to the forgiveness of sins.
In addition to being cleansed,
the Bible also presents God’s forgiving power as the restoration of relationships.
The reestablishment of a broken relationship.
We had broken the relationship with God,
but God is willing to restore his relationship with us by forgiving us.
I believe that we can benefit from believing in a forgiving God.
I also believe this,
and one of the consensuses of secular psychologists is this:
only one who has experienced forgiveness can truly be forgiving, for this is not something that can be taught; it must happen.
I can not teach you how to forgive.
Oscar or Alyda cannot teach you how to forgive.
You can only really forgive when you yourself have experienced forgiveness.
And as Christians have taught over the centuries, you can experience forgiveness.
In fact, you can experience true forgiveness from God.
Christianity should be full of forgiving individuals because we have experienced God’s forgiveness.
Let’s just see how we have experienced God’s forgiveness.
To understand God’s forgiveness,
it’s important to understand that God is the judge of all the earth.
He judges with righteousness and justice.
As Psalm 96:10, 13 says
Say among the nations, “The Lord reigns.”
The world is firmly established, it cannot be moved;
he will judge the peoples with equity.
Let all creation rejoice before the Lord, for he comes,
he comes to judge the earth.
He will judge the world in righteousness
and the peoples in his faithfulness.
God sees injustice, sin,
and as a righteous judge,
he must bring judgment.
But yet,
God is not just a judge.
God is also merciful and gracious,
slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.
And he passed in front of Moses, proclaiming, “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.”
This is the most quoted verse in the Old Testament.
Quite interesting.
The prophets and other Old Testament authors regularly quote this passage.
The context of this verse is interesting.
The Israelites had made a golden calf,
and said that they would worship it.
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The Israelites had sinned against God.
And here we see that God reveals himself as a merciful God.
The Hebrew words that speak of God’s forgiveness and mercy speak of how God pardons sins,
how God lifts the guilt from a person.
God’s forgiveness is also connected to healing and atonement.
And God forgives cow-worshippers.
Cow-worshippers who had been delivered by God.
God had delivered Israel,
but Israel had made gods,
and said,
He took what they handed him and made it into an idol cast in the shape of a calf, fashioning it with a tool. Then they said, “These are your gods, Israel, who brought you up out of Egypt.”
God looked at this scene as a judge,
Like how could the Israelites have done this?!
but God also looked at this scene with mercy,
because God is merciful and gracious.
God would forgive Israel.
God will continue to have a relationship, a berit, a covenant with Israel,
because God is merciful.
Over the years,
people have thought about the mercy of God.
The prophet Micah thought about God’s mercy when he said,
Who is a God like you,
who pardons sin and forgives the transgression
of the remnant of his inheritance?
You do not stay angry forever
but delight to show mercy.
You will again have compassion on us;
you will tread our sins underfoot
and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea.
You will be faithful to Jacob,
and show love to Abraham,
as you pledged on oath to our ancestors
in days long ago.
There is no God like Yahweh.
No God like the God of Israel.
He is merciful.
He pardons sins.
Crazy.
He doesn’t remain angry forever.
He has compassion.
He casts sins into the depths of the sea.
And because the Israelites knew that God was merciful,
they prayed, asking God to forgive.
Psalm 25 is a prime example of a prayer for forgiveness:
Do not remember the sins of my youth or my transgressions; according to your steadfast love remember me,
for your goodness’ sake, O Lord! (v. 7) For your name’s sake, O Lord, pardon my guilt, for it is great. (v. 11) Consider my affliction and my trouble, and forgive all my sins. (v. 18)
The psalmist recognized that
he was a sinner and that his sins were a big deal.
You only ask for forgiveness when you recognize the gravity of your sin.
And the psalmist recognized that he had sinned since his youth.
Since his youth, the psalmist had sinned and transgressed against God.
Because the psalmist had sinned,
he asked God to forgive him.
To not remember the sins of his youth or his transgression.
And the psalmist didn’t rely on his deeds, his credentials, or resume.
Instead, the psalmist knew that if God would forgive him, it would only be because of God’s own character.
Therefore, the psalmist said forgive me,
according to your steadfast love.
Imagine if it was according to our faithfulness.
If it were according to our faithfulness, we would have a challenge trying to obtain forgiveness.
But fortunately, we rely on God’s character for forgiveness.
And he forgives us because of his love and for his own purposes.
In verse eleven,
the psalmist noted that his guilt was great.
He was guilty.
He needed forgiveness.
And he asked for forgiveness,
for the sake of the LORD.
For the purpose of God.
The psalmist recognized that his guilt was great,
he recognized that his sin stops him from experiencing abundant life.
He recognized that sin breaks his life-giving relationship with God.
Let’s return to my favorite psalm, Psalm 51, a penitential psalm.
and I want to focus on the first section:
the psalmist prayed to God for forgiveness.
The Psalmist first appeals for forgiveness:
Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your unfailing love;
according to your great compassion
blot out my transgressions.
Wash away all my iniquity
and cleanse me from my sin.
In this psalm,
we really understand forgiveness in terms of cleansing.
Blot out my transgressions.
Wash away all my iniquity.
This is a wonderful psalm,
and I encourage you to pray it whenever you have sinned
and need forgiveness.
And God will forgive you.
He will.
And hopefully you could sing Psalm 103:2-3
Praise the Lord, my soul,
and forget not all his benefits—
who forgives all your sins
and heals all your diseases,
Amen.
During Jesus’ day,
the Israelites,
the Jews,
continued to see God as a merciful God.
In the Sirach (2:11),
a Jewish text during the time of Jesus,
it says this,
“For the Lord is compassionate and merciful; he forgives sins and saves in time of distress”
The Jews during Jesus’ time continued to see God as being compassionate and merciful.
And they also saw that the forgiveness of sins is connected to salvation.
We’ll get to Jesus and forgiveness in a moment,
but let’s first see what the church of Jesus believed after Jesus ascended.
The church believed this:
if you believe in Jesus,
you will receive the forgiveness of sins in his name.
All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”
The church believed that the prophets of the Old Testament testified about the future forgiveness that Jesus would bring.
The church saw that because Jesus had died, resurrected, and ascended to heaven,
people can have the forgiveness of sins and the gift of the Holy Spirit.
The apostles preached this.
The apostles believed that faith in a man,
that faith in Jesus brought forgiveness.
There is nothing like this in the Old Testament.
And this makes me think
Like why do we have to believe in Jesus now to experience forgiveness?
Why were the apostles so confident that if people believed in Jesus, they would be saved.
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The Apostles were just doing what their savior had said.
Before Jesus ascended, he told his disciples,
and repentance for the forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.
Preach in his name that forgiveness has come.
Repent and you will be saved.
Repent and you will receive forgiveness.
And the apostles preached
that we are living in a new age
because of the ministry, death, and resurrection of Christ
because Jesus is at the right hand of God,
because the king has come,
and sent the Holy Spirit,
the Apostles preached that the forgiveness of sins is available.
Therefore,
in Acts 2:38, the apostle Peter said
Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
God raised Jesus from the dead.
Therefore, repent.
Turn away from your sins.
Be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ,
be baptized for the forgiveness of sins.
Of your sins.
In Acts 3:19, it talks about a complete wipe out.
Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord,
Repent and turn to God.
Why?
So that your sins may be wiped out.
Your sins, your wrongdoings, your rebellion against God,
can be wiped out.
It doesn’t matter what you have done,
doesn’t matter who you have been with,
doesn’t matter how long you have been playing church,
God is a forgiving God,
and if you repent,
if you recognize the severity of your sin,
and genuinely decide to leave sin to turn to God,
God will wipe the sin,
the junk,
from your heart.
You can have forgiveness.
You can experience forgiveness.
Your sins can be wiped out.
Your sins can be washed away,
as Acts 22:16 says.
And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name.’
On his name,
calling on the name of Jesus.
The name, power, authority, person of Jesus is important.
He is the Son of God.
He is king.
And he has brought salvation and the forgiveness of sins.
This is all part of having shalom with God again.
All part of having peace with God and others and with the world.
And God wants this,
that’s why he is building the church.
That is why he empowered and chose Paul, to write the epistles that we have in our Bible and to reach the lost.
Acts 26:18 talks about Paul’s role.
to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, so that they may receive forgiveness of sins and a place among those who are sanctified by faith in me.’
God had chosen and empowered Paul so that Paul could be God’s representative on earth.
So that Paul could do God’s work of helping people see,
to help them turn from darkness to light,
from the power of Satan to God,
so that they may receive the forgiveness of sins.
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The apostles knew that Jesus had brought forgiveness through his work.
They were there at the Last Supper.
Remember,
Jesus said,
This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
Jesus spoke about the pouring out of his blood which would bring the forgiveness of sins.
In the Greek,
if I remember correctly,
the words for poured out conveys this sense of blood shedding violently like in a battle.
So this bloodshed that Jesus would suffer would bring forgiveness of sins.
And this was prophesied by the prophets.
The prophet Jeremiah spoke about God installing a new covenant where there will be the forgiveness of sins.
“The days are coming,” declares the Lord,
“when I will make a new covenant
with the people of Israel
and with the people of Judah.
It will not be like the covenant
I made with their ancestors
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
though I was a husband to them,”
declares the Lord.
“This is the covenant I will make with the people of Israel
after that time,” declares the Lord.
“I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
No longer will they teach their neighbor,
or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,”
declares the Lord.
“For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more.”
God would make a covenant,
and he would forgive his people’s sins.
He would no longer remember their sins.
And through his blood,
Jesus brings this new covenant.
Through his blood,
Jesus brings forgiveness.
And now we can have something that we had lost.
Through our sins,
we broke our relationship with God.
But through the blood of Jesus,
we can have a perfect and permanent relationship with God.
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Jesus regularly demonstrated that people can have a relationship with God even if they had sinned.
There are a handful of stories where Jesus brings shalom to people by forgiving their sins.
He brings peace to a paralyzed man in Luke 5:17-5:26
we won’t read it because of time,
but there was this man who was paralyzed on a bed.
Some men carried this man to Jesus.
They put the man who was paralyzed in front of Jesus.
And guess what Jesus did
When Jesus saw their faith, he said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven.”
He looked at the paralyzed man,
he saw faith,
and Jesus said,
“Friend, your sins are forgiven.”
The pharisees saw this and asked
The Pharisees and the teachers of the law began thinking to themselves, “Who is this fellow who speaks blasphemy? Who can forgive sins but God alone?”
Only God could forgive,
but here is Jesus,
saying that he forgives sins.
Jesus looks at the Pharisees,
asks them
“Which is easier to say, ‘your sins are forgiven’ or ‘stand up and walk.”
He then heals the paralyzed man,
and the man begins to walk.
It’s a crazy scene.
Jesus, as the Son of God,
forgave the sins of a man,
and subsequently healed the man,
because that is what God wants to do.
He wants to forgive you.
We see a story here.
A paralyzed man healed and forgiven.
Jesus can forgive the sins of humanity.
Your sins can be forgiven,
because the Son of Man, Jesus, has authority on earth to forgive sins.
Jesus is God with us.
He is Immanuel.
And Immanuel forgives us.
Jesus has the power to forgive.
In Luke 7:36-50,
there’s another interesting story about forgiveness.
Jesus is eating with the Pharisees,
and he sees a woman who was a sinner.
Tradition says that she was a prostitute.
This woman fell at the feet of Jesus and began washing his feet with tears and dried them with her hair.
This was more common back then than now,
but still pretty intimate.
The pharisees saw this and were baffled.
Why is a sinner so close to Jesus?
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Jesus then begins to teach a parable.
In the parable, there’s this creditor with two debtors.
One debtor owed five hundred denarii, which was like $4,000.
And another debtor owed the creditor fifty denarii. So like $400.
The creditor realized that neither of his debtors could pay the debt.
So the creditor cancelled, forgave, their debt.
Now which debtor would love the creditor more?
The one that owed $4,000 or the one that owed $400?
Obviously, the one who owed $4000,
since it is a more substantial amount.
He had a greater debt.
Well,
Jesus said that this woman loved Jesus more.
The pharisees didn’t wash Jesus’ feet,
but the woman did.
Why?
Because her greater debt has been forgiven.
Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little.”
Then Jesus said to her, “Your sins are forgiven.”
Jesus doesn’t deny that the woman had sinned.
No she had sinned, A LOT.
Her sins were many.
But all her sins had been forgiven.
Therefore, she showed deep love.
Jesus says,
“Your sins have been forgiven.”
Powerful words.
Jesus forgives sins.
Jesus said to the woman, “Your faith has saved you; go in peace.”
As a forgiven person who believed in Jesus,
she had peace.
Shalom.
Peace that points to the new life that she entered.
In this state of forgiveness,
she is saved.
She has salvation.
Salvation here is used as a form of rescue.
Rescued from sin.
And she just believed, and Jesus forgave her.
I like what one writer said,
A personal relationship with Jesus Christ—faith—brings about a personal relationship with God the Father that transcends everything in one’s life that has damaged that relationship in the past.
By believing in Jesus,
by having a personal relationship with Jesus,
the woman had gained a personal relationship with God.
And it didn’t matter what had damaged the relationship between God and the woman,
through the forgiving power of Jesus, the woman could have peace that only comes through knowing God.
The woman was lost in sin.
Was lost in chaos.
Was lost in tohu vabohu.
No order,
no peace.
But as we see in the Bible,
through forgiveness,
Jesus redeems his people from darkness into light.
and people have shalom—peace.
Obviously,
the sins that his people commited needs to be dealt with,
so Jesus absorbed their sins,
he became a substitute,
he got the sins of humanity,
and died on the cross.
He didn’t have to die on the cross,
but Jesus chose to,
because he loves you.
He loves you so much that he wants to forgive you.
He wants to forgive you so much that he went to the cross and absorbed your sins so that you could be free.
Now we can be reconciled.
Now we can be healed.
Now we can have a relationship with God.
And now those who have been forgiven can forgive.
There were debts that we could not pay.
But God forgave our debts because Jesus paid the price.
It didn’t cost us anything,
but it costed God his only son.
Now, all those who believe in the Son can have forgiveness and a harmonious relationship with God.
Paul sees that because we have been forgiven,
we have been justified.
Scholars have said that for Paul,
the essence of justification is the forgiveness of sins.
Clearly, the forgiveness of sins is a basic component of justification.
No longer are we seen guilty in the eyes of God,
but instead in the eyes of the ultimate judge,
in the eyes of God,
we are innocent.
In his letter to the Romans,
Paul talked about everyone having a conscience.
And we break that conscious—that intrinsic morality.
Us failing.
We lie.
When we think of goodness,
we fall.
We have sinned.
God has put morality in all of us.
And we break it.
Therefore, we are guilty.
But God forgives us.
Jesus takes our guilt,
he takes the punishment of our sin on the cross.
Therefore,
we can be free.
We can be forgiveness.
I believe in the forgiveness of sins,
brothers and sisters in Christ.
And I believe you can have forgiveness of sins,
because our God is a merciful God and he has sent his Son.
So repent and be baptized for the remission of your sins.
Believe in Jesus Christ,
and confess him as lord.
As we move forward with this series,
remember that forgiven people forgive.