(Slide 1) It was a conversation that has stuck with me over the years. I was not a part of the conversation, per se, but I was a part of the audience that listened. I think that it took place in 1986 but I cannot remember. It was, I remember, a Sunday night at the church where I was serving as a youth pastor.
A woman who had grown up in the church was now, along with her husband and children, returning not just to the church but the Christian faith. They had joined a cult and as they found out more and more about the cult, they realized that it was not true Christianity and began the journey back to the faith.
A retired pastor whose daughter attended our church stood to ask a question. ‘Did something happen that caused you to leave this church?’ I remember the woman’s expression changed and she quietly, almost sheepishly, said ‘yes.’
It turns out that a disagreement or misunderstanding with a high school friend (and current church member) had taken place surrounding a wedding. I cannot remember the details but I remember that it had to do with a conflict over who was going to be what, in that particular wedding. Yet whatever it was had caused a good friendship to facture and a young women (then) had left the church. When this conversation ended, the two friends embraced in our presence and were reconciled.
The other day one of my on-line friends, who I think was having a tough day wrote, “I’m pro "go to bed angry." You can’t force agreement/restoration. Things look different after some time.” Is she right?
As we near the end of our post-Easter series on love, we have to address the issue of forgiveness. Our main text for this morning is Luke 6:27-28: (Slide 2)
“But if you are willing to listen, I say, love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Pray for the happiness of those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you.
Rick Warren offered his congregation this true/false test.
(Slide 3)
Forgiveness Quiz
• T or F A person should not be forgiven until they ask for it.
• T or F Forgiveness includes minimizing the offense and the pain was caused.
• T or F Forgiveness includes restoring trust and reuniting a relationship.
• T or F You really haven’t forgiven others until you have forgotten the offense.
How do you answer those? Let’s take a few moments to examine these statements.
(Slide 4) ‘A person should not be forgiven until they ask for it.’
First of all, can anyone tell me if this view is supported in the Bible?
I cannot recall anywhere in the Bible that this view is supported. In fact, in Matthew 6:14-15 Jesus makes clear the necessity of forgiveness without delay. “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.
That is a very pointed statement and, I don’t know about you, but it makes me uncomfortable sometimes. If forces me to ask, “Have I forgiven those that have ‘sinned against me?’” Have I forgiven those that have offended me and hurt me? Or do I still hold _______ against them?
Let’s go to the next statement.
(Slide 4a) ‘Forgiveness includes minimizing the offense and the pain that was caused.’
Again, is there Biblical support for this?
In Colossians 3:13 we read, “You must make allowance for each other’s faults and forgive the person who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others.”
But are we to stuff our pain and minimize the offense? And by offense, I am not talking about those minor irritations that we all get and give to others. I am talking about the ones that really hurt from the words of a friend or family member that wound us to the actions of someone that threatens or harms us.
A few weeks ago, we were told that one important way to love God with our hearts was to tell God how we feel. That is nevermore true than when we are struggling to forgive someone who has deeply hurt or wounded us.
What about the next statement?
(Slide 4b) Forgiveness includes restoring trust and reuniting a relationship.
Is there Biblical support for this? Certainly there is!
In Matthew 5:22 and 23 we read, “So if you are standing before the altar in the Temple, offering a sacrifice to God, and you suddenly remember that someone has something against you, leave your sacrifice there beside the altar. Go and be reconciled to that person. Then come and offer your sacrifice to God.”
I want to read this passage again.
What is Jesus’ point? It is conflict resolution. It is immediate and thorough conflict resolution.
In the verses prior to this passage, Jesus talks about anger being just as devastating to a person as murder. The kind of anger that He is talking about here isn’t the mild irritation we deal with on a daily basis that comes and goes. It is about a deep and seething rage and resentment that causes us to withdraw…brood… and plot to hurt the other person.
Left unchecked and not Biblically dealt with, it can lead to murder. It becomes a motive for murder. Physical murder and the murder of someone’s reputation.
What about the last statement Warren gave his congregation?
(Slide 4c) You really haven’t forgiven others until you have forgotten the offense.
Is there Biblical support for this view?
Is ‘forgive and forget’ a Biblical truth?
This is the attitude of some. “Forgive and forget!” “Let it roll off your back like water like off a duck.” But we have trouble with forgiving and forgetting don’t we?
Anger is a normal part of life. We have angry moments. There is a normal and proper purpose to anger! It can help us resist threatening situations and cause us to stand up for someone else’s rights and concern.
I think that when we hear the phrase ‘forgive and forget’ we perhaps think of the ‘sea of forgetfulness’ which is not, as far as I was able to determine, in the Bible. This is in reference to Micah 7:19, ‘Once again you will have compassion on us. You will trample our sins under your feet and throw them into the depths of the ocean!”
And while God will forgive our sins, as we confess them to Him, and throw them into the depths of the ocean, is this the same as ‘forgive and forget?’
Let me suggest this morning that to forgive and forget is to first forgive as Jesus has told us to forgive and then to continuously make the choice to not hold out for revenge or keep allowing bitterness in our heart. There is no room in our hearts for both forgiveness and bitterness. It also means that forgiveness cannot be switched on and then everything is, as they use to say, ‘hunkey-dorey.’
So which of these statements is the Biblically correct one? (Slide 4d)
I think that this one is. I believe that this is the goal for us as followers of God. He wants us to be reconciled with others in a manner that begins to rebuild trust.
(Slide 5) So What?
“So what Jim that this is what Jesus said to do, I am having trouble doing it. I am not quite willing or ready to seek to kiss up to so and so. Not until they make the first move!”
“Jim, do you know what I have had to put up with over the years with so and so? The words, the actions, the attitudes? I find forgiveness very hard to do.”
I do, too. I remember a friend who I felt betrayed me at one point. It took a while, a long while for me to be able to no longer harbor feelings of resentment or ill will toward him. So, I know that forgiveness is not easy.
But Jesus clearly requires us, as His people, to forgive. He calls us, very clearly to love our enemies and to do good to those who hurt us. And it is not in our power that we can do this but it is in His power that we can.
Tom Holladay makes this clear as he talks about breaking the cycle of hurtful words (something very much related to forgiveness). “You must change the focus of your heart – and Jesus tells you how to do it. Jesus often taught about a broad reality that points the way to a change of heart.”
Holladay goes on to write about who tries to ‘wear the crown’ in any conversation (or relationship.) What he means is that there is a tug-of-war for who is going to rule the roost; who is going to be right; who is going to win no matter what the cost. And he makes clear one thing will make us stop trying to wear the crown – a change of heart that requires us to recognize ‘God is the only rightful wearer of the crown. He is the only king.’
Michael Watson was a promising boxer when his career, and almost his life, was cut short by a blood clot in his brain. He collapsed after fighting for the world super-middleweight championship. He was in a coma for 40 days, which left him partially paralyzed.
12 years later, he completed the London marathon. It took him 6 days. But, he was assisted by, his opponent in that fateful match.
He goes on to say this,” Before the accident, I was not a committed Christian. I believed but I was too busy, rushing this way and that, with no time to reflect. Yet I was a loveable person in society and I was doing well. My ultimate goal was to be World Champion.
After the accident, it took me a long time to face up to reality. One minute I was a top celebrity, in the ring going for the ultimate prize. The next minute, blank… I woke up in a hospital ward with strange people all around me. I was totally confused and terribly frustrated.
Before my accident, even though I believed in God I didn’t go to Church because it didn’t suit my image. I was too wrapped up in the pleasures of the world – fast cars, expensive clothes, girls. But from the moment I regained consciousness in hospital I took refuge in God.
Could he have blamed his opponent for his misfortune? Absolutely!
But he said this about his opponent, Chris Eubank, in the ring that day. “I prayed for Chris Eubank. I knew he was suffering. If you’ve got a heart – and he has – you can never be the same after something like this happens. I didn’t feel any anger toward him because it could have happened either way. You have to let bygones be bygones. Getting angry won’t correct the past. Instead, I knew I had to concentrate on the future and look to starting a new life. If I had animosity about what Chris had done to me, I’d be breaking myself down mentally as well as physically. How could I then move on?”
If we want to love as Jesus calls us to love, then we have to do at least two things: 1. We have to let God be our leader and allow His power, to change our heart from one controlled by bitterness, resentment, and even a hateful spite and rage. 2. We have to start doing some forgiving. We have to start clearing away that pain and that hurt and rage that is still within us because we have not forgiven. Until we do, we are going to be miserable. This leads me to our assignment for the week.
(Slide 6)Who do you need to start forgiving and what is the first step you need to take?
While forgiveness is a requirement of God to live obediently for Him, it is also takes time in some instances. The greater the wound and the pain, the longer it may take.
Yet don’t we get tired of carrying this monkey on our back? Don’t we get weary of stepping around this 500-pound elephant in our midst?
The first step is to ask God to help you have a change of heart toward the person or persons that you are in conflict with. The person(s) that you are needing to forgive.
It is only by this change of heart that forgiveness can begin to freely flow. It is this kind of heart change that will allow us, through the power of God, to do what Jesus said for us to do in our main text. “…love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Pray for the happiness of those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you.
Obey God this morning as you need to and let Him have His way in your heart and life today. Amen.
Tom Holladay, The Relationship Principles of Jesus.
Michael Watson’s story can be found at the http://www.forgivenessproject.com
