Working It Out Jesus’ Way (Part 3)
Matthew 18:21-35
July 8, 2007
Introduction
An elderly man on the beach found a magic lamp. He picked it up and a genie appeared. "Because you have freed me," the genie said, "I will grant you a wish." The man thought for a moment and then responded, "My brother and I had a fight 30 years ago and he hasn’t spoken to me since. I wish that he’ll finally forgive me."
There was a thunderclap, and the genie declared, "Your wish has been granted. You know," the genie continued, "most men would have asked for wealth or fame.
But you only wanted the love of your brother. Is it because you are old and dying?"
"No way!" the man cried. "But my brother is, and he’s worth about $60 million." (SermonCentral.com. Contributed by Mike Leiter)
Today we’re going to talk about forgiveness.
I’ve mentioned before that one of the things I like the most about Scripture is that it deals with the everyday stuff of life.
The issue of forgiveness is one of those issues.
It’s impossible to go through life for very long without someone hurting you and you’re faced with the issue of forgiving that person.
Not always easy, is it? Especially if they’ve hurt you badly. I think that just about everyone in here can identify with that. And so can I.
Two weeks ago we began to look at Jesus words about how to work out conflict between individuals and in the church.
We started by looking at verse 15 of this chapter, and we said that If you haven’t talked to the offender, it is sin to talk to anyone else.
In other words, you are not allowed to gossip and backbite against someone – you need to go to them and work it out.
Then we continued last week by finishing our look at the process Jesus gives us in handling conflict in the church, and I challenged you to Commit to working it out Jesus’ way, using the process and procedure He commands us to use.
We can’t skip any of the steps He lays out, and we can’t make our own rules. We need to obey Jesus’ words about the church He invented and died for.
This week we look at one of the underlying principles behind the whole process of working it out Jesus’ way, and that is forgiveness.
Matthew 18:21-35 (p. 695-696) –
21 Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, "Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?"
22 Jesus answered, "I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.
Let’s stop for just a moment. Why would Peter ask such a question?
Well, the answer lies in the fact that popular Jewish teaching in that day said that forgiving people up to three times was really all that was needed.
If the person kept it up after 3 times, forgiveness by the person was not necessary, and was discouraged.
Peter was being extremely generous in offering to forgive more than twice what was expected.
And Jesus blows that idea completely out of the water. His answer is basically this: you keep forgiving. Over and over again.
And He goes on to say that forgiveness is much more than what a lot of people think, and that’s the gist of the parable that follows.
Let’s keep going:
23 "Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24 As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. 25 Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
26 "The servant fell on his knees before him. ’Be patient with me,’ he begged, ’and I will pay back everything.’ 27 The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
28 "But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ’Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.
29 "His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ’Be patient with me, and I will pay you back.’
30 "But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31 When the other servants saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed and went and told their master everything that had happened.
32 "Then the master called the servant in. ’You wicked servant,’ he said, ’I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33 Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ 34 In anger his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.
And here is the point of the whole passage, and where I want us to focus today:
35 "This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart."
The bottom-line point of the parable Jesus gives here is this: if we have been forgiven of our sins, we need to forgive those who sin against us.
What does it really mean to forgive? Does it mean forgetting? Does it mean acting like nothing ever happened? If I forgive someone, does that mean I have to trust them again or on the same level?
Those are great questions, and I’m going to address them and some others next week. We simply don’t have time to cover them today.
Forgiveness is at the very basis of what it means to be a Christian. Christ died so we could be forgiven, and we need to reflect that forgiveness to others.
And if we don’t get a good grasp about what forgiveness is all about, then we can’t experience the way we should, and we can’t offer it the way we should.
So let’s start off with a definition of forgiveness, as offered by Jesus in this story. I think it can be boiled down to this: canceling a debt. In the parable, it is a debt of money, but the point of the parable is the debt owed by those who sin against us.
When the debt is canceled, not only is the person not obligated to repay, but the one who is owed is no longer allowed to hold that debt against that person.
In the case of someone who sins against you, you release the right to keep bringing it up to the person. You release the right to keep hanging it over their head. You release the right to keep it within arm’s reach in case you want to make them squirm. You release the right for retribution.
You didn’t have those rights in the first place, by the way.
Late one summer evening in Broken Bow, Nebraska, a weary truck driver pulled his rig into an all-night truck stop. The waitress had just served him when three tough looking, leather jacketed motorcyclist’s- of the Hell’s Angels type- decided to give him a hard time.
Not only did they verbally abuse him,
• One grabbed the hamburger off his plate,
• Another took a handful of his French Fries, and
• The third picked up his coffee and began to drink it.
He calmly rose, picked up the check, walked to the front of the room, put the check and his money on the cash register, and went out the door. The waitress followed him to put the money in the till and stood watching out the door as the big truck drove away in the night.
When she returned, one of the bikers said to her, “Well, he’s not much of a man, is he?” She replied, I don’t now about that, but he sure ain’t much of a truck driver. He just ran over three motorcycles on his way out the parking lot.” (SermonCentral.com. Reese Blanchett)
Since retribution and revenge are out of the picture, let’s look at four facts about forgiveness that we can learn today:
1. Sometimes forgiveness involves a debt that cannot be repaid.
The first servant in this story owed what today would amount to many millions of dollars. And in his position as a servant, there was absolutely no way he could repay it, even if he and his family were sold into slavery.
Yet the king forgave the servant, giving up all those millions of dollars for the sake of mercy.
It could be that there are those here today who have been sinned against in such a way that it seems impossible to forgive. It’s just too big of a sin, and there’s no way they could ever make it right.
But Jesus’ point here is that forgiveness is still to be offered.
And guess what? You can’t do it. You need God to help you.
I think one of the reasons people withhold forgiveness is that they don’t understand that God wants to help them do it.
They think that they have to do it on their own, and they don’t think they can do it, so they don’t even try.
But God will help you forgive the huge sins, just as He’s forgiven your unpayable debt.
2. Forgiveness is not based on the other person, but based on what Christ did for you.
In our parable, we find the words of the king in verse 33 –
‘Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’
In the Lord’s Prayer we ask the Father to forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. Or trespass or debts, whichever you prefer. They all mean the same thing.
Have you really thought through the implications of that prayer?
You’re asking the Father to apply to you the same measure of forgiveness that you have applied to someone else.
If you have not forgiven somebody, then what does that say about how God should treat you?
This is where you come to the understanding that forgiving the other person has nothing to do with the other person, but rather with the fact that God forgave at least one other undeserving person – you.
When you come to the point where this fact is driven like a stake into your heart, then forgiveness stops being about the other person, and becomes an issue of Christlikeness.
And folks, that is what it’s all about. Being like Jesus so that the world can know Him and the full life He offers to those who follow Him.
And that is why this next fact is so important to grasp, and that is that…
3. Withholding forgiveness is a sin.
I know you don’t want to hear that, but it’s what the Bible says.
You’ll notice in this passage that Jesus doesn’t give us a pass here.
There’s a very important word that’s missing for those who want to find a loophole. That word is “except.”
“You must forgive except when you don’t feel like it.”
“You must forgive except those times when the person doesn’t deserve it.”
“You must forgive except when it costs you money.”
That word “except” isn’t in here. There are no “exceptions.” We are commanded by Jesus to forgive.
To withhold forgiveness is to say to God, “Thanks for forgiving me of all the sins I’ve committed against you that I can never pay you back for, but I’m not willing to do the same for this person or those people.”
In other words, you become the unmerciful servant in this parable.
To withhold forgiveness is to invite punishment from the Father.
Look back to verse 35 –
35 "This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart."
And we need to remember the words of Jesus back in chapter 6, as He finished giving us the Lord’s Prayer.
In verses 14-15 of chapter 6, He says –
14 For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.
Folks, withholding forgiveness isn’t just sin, it’s downright dangerous to you. There is simply no other way to say it. You can’t sugarcoat Jesus’ words here.
Withholding forgiveness is a sin. Here’s the last fact about forgiveness that I want to leave with you today:
4. The fruits of unforgiveness are contrary to Christlike character.
Unforgiveness brings bitterness and rage, among other things.
Let me read a couple of Scriptures to you:
Hebrews 12:14-15 –
14 Make every effort to live in peace with all men and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. 15 See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.
Bitterness defines the lives of more Christians than you can imagine. They live in the world of their hurt and refuse to give it up.
They like being bitter and unforgiving – and they will nurse that grudge until it’s a full-grown monster, destroying their own spirit that is supposed to be reflecting the love, grace, and forgiveness of Jesus Himself.
Ephesians 4:31-32 –
Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.
I alluded to it last week, but have you noticed that bitterness, rage, anger, brawling and slander are not listed among the fruits of the Spirit?
A few weeks ago as I was returning from an emergency trip to Rapid City, I went through a small town, and a church sign had this on it: “Sour grapes make rotten wine.” How true.
If I could boil down what this passage is saying to us today, it would be this:
Let the reality of your forgiveness cause you to freely offer forgiveness toward others.
Refuse to allow the enemy gain a foothold in your life by withholding forgiveness. Write it off. Let it go. Look forward and let the past stay in the past.
Easy? I didn’t say that. And as I’ve said, there are things that are hard for me to move on from.
But one thing I do: I refuse to let yesterday’s hurts dictate my present and future.
Here are a few suggestions I have that help me:
* Declare your forgiveness, even if it’s only for your own ears.
Form the words in your brain, and if you can, say them out loud. It’s very freeing to not only say them, but to hear them.
“I choose to forgive so and so for doing that to me. By the grace of God and with His help, I choose to not hold this against them any longer.”
* If possible, and if appropriate, declare your forgiveness to the other person.
This is especially important if the other person knows you have not forgiven them about whatever it is, and it is hampering their fellowship with you.
Sometimes, however, it’s not appropriate, and it’s up to you to pray about that and maybe get some guidance from a mature believer to see if you should contact them or not.
* Remind yourself of your forgiveness when reminded of the sin.
There are times when a painful memory comes up, and I actually have to say in my mind, “I’ve forgiven that. It’s in the past, and I won’t dwell on it and let it burrow back into my heart.”
Then I intentionally begin thinking about something else so I can move on.
How do you know if you have truly forgiven someone? Well, there might be a few ways, and we’re going to look more deeply at that next week, but let me tell you one way that I think you can know: when you can pray for God’s blessing in their lives.
Jesus said we’re supposed to love our enemies and pray for those who hurt us. Only a person who is intent on following Jesus’ words about forgiveness can do that.
In 1960, Adolph Coors III, of the Coors Brewery, was kidnapped and held for ransom, and later killed. His son, Adolph Coors IV, then 15 years old, developed a hatred for the killer Joseph Corbett.
In 1975, young Coors became a Christian and divested himself of his interest in the family brewery business. One day, he visited Corbett at the maximum security unit of Colorado’s Canon City penitentiary. Corbitt refused to see him. Undeterred, Coors left a Bible for him, inscribed with this message:
"I’m sorry we could not meet. As a Christian, I am summoned by our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, to forgive you. I do forgive you. I ask you to forgive me for the hatred I’ve held in my heart for you."
Later, Coors confessed that: "I have a love for that man that only Jesus Christ could have placed in my heart." —Don Maddox—Encyclopedia of 15,000 Illustrations
Did you hear that? In spite of the fact that this guy had murdered his dad and he had nursed nurtured his hatred for 15 years, he had come to the point where he could actually say that he loved him.
How could that happen?
Only by letting Jesus transform him. It took a literal act of God in his life to be able to do that.
What I’m suggesting to you is to let God do a work in you that will allow you to not only forgive, but to love that other person in spite of what they’ve done against you.
We have a great model for that, don’t we? The Bible says that Jesus died for us when? While we were still sinners.
He died for you and me in spite of the fact that He knew that we would sin against Him.
Folks, the world has plenty of unforgiveness and bitterness. It thrives on it.
And the enemy of your soul loves it when Christians let these things live in them.
When a Christian is filled with bitterness and unforgiveness, they miss out on the joys that are part of a life unshackled by them.
They miss out because they’re poisoned in their spirits toward those Jesus died for, forgetting that Jesus loves those people just like Jesus loves them.
The world has plenty of bitterness. And unfortunately, there is plenty in the church of Jesus as well.
But it doesn’t have be the case. When we commit to working things out Jesus’ way, and offering forgiveness even when the world would call us crazy, we demonstrate the fact that we have something that the world can’t offer: real peace between God and each other.
I want people to come into this church and see that bitterness and unforgiveness are not welcome here, and that grace and forgiveness are the order of the day.
I want people to see that we are so grateful for our own forgiveness that we offer it freely to others, so that souls are not poisoned and the kingdom of God is not hindered.
I hope that’s what you want.
Unforgiveness and bitterness are not Christlike. They have no place in the Body of Christ. And I want it to show to everyone who comes through those doors or bumps into one of our people.
Let them see it in you.
Let’s pray.
