Corrie Ten Boom was arrested, along with her father and her sister, Betsie and two brothers, for helping to hide Jews from the Nazis during World War II. That’s a very simplistic statement of their work and all that happened to them; but what I want to say about them here is that her father died early in his captivity, and Corrie watched her sister Betsie suffer and finally die under the harsh treatment of the Concentration Camp’s guards.
Two years after the war, in 1947 as she was speaking in Germany about her family’s ordeal and God’s goodness to them throughout, she was approached one day at the end of a lecture, by a man who looked familiar to her.
This is what she later wrote:
“One moment I saw the overcoat and the brown hat; the next, a blue uniform and a visored cap with its skull and crossbones. It came back with a rush; the huge room with its harsh overhead lights; the pathetic pile of dresses and shoes in the center of the floor; the shame of walking naked past this man...
The place was Ravensbruck and the man who was making his way forward had been a guard - one of the most cruel guards.
Now he was in front of me, hand thrust out; “A fine message, Fraulein! How good it is to know that, as you say, all our sins are at the bottom of the sea!”
And I, who had spoken so glibly of forgiveness, fumbled in my pocketbook rather than take that hand. He would not remember me, of course - how could he remember one prisoner among those thousands of women?
But I remembered him and the leather crop swinging from his belt. I was face-to-face with one of my captors and my blood seemed to freeze.
“You mentioned Ravensbruck in your talk,” he was saying. “I was a guard there.” No, he did not remember me.
“But since that time,” he went on, “I have become a Christian. I know that God has forgiven me for the cruel things I did there, but I would like to hear it from your lips as well. Fraulein,” -again the hand came out- “Will you forgive me?”
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What would you do?
When God’s Word exhorts us to bear with one another and forgive one another, just how seriously are we to take that? Aren’t there limits? Isn’t there just so much we can be expected to forgive, and beyond that God will understand if we don’t...because that other person and the things they’ve done are so very terrible?
Paul addresses his readers in these few verses of Colossians 3, as those who have been CHOSEN OF GOD, and as those LOVED BY GOD, and as those FORGIVEN BY GOD.
Let’s use these things as an outline, and discover what implications they have in reference to our duty to forgive.
CHOSEN OF GOD
This is a very special term referring to Christians, that is not understood deeply enough by most Christians.
When someone uses the term ’chosen’ in Christian conversation it usually ends up in a debate over predestination. Did we choose God, or did He choose us? Did we really have a part in the decision to become Christians, or was it written into His plan for us, and we were bound by destiny to one day believe and accept Him?
What we really need to know and understand about this term, “Chosen of God”, is that if we have repented of our sin and believed from the heart that Jesus died to pay the penalty for our sins, then we are now one of the elect. We are members of God’s eternal family. We are His ’chosen’. Chosen of God.
“But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light: for you once were not a people, but now you are THE PEOPLE OF GOD; you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.”
-I Peter 2:9.10
Here in first Peter chapter 2, Peter says two things in reference to our being chosen of God and being made His people. ONE, is that His purpose in choosing us was that we may proclaim His excellencies; and TWO that we have received His mercy.
So it is by the very mercy of God that we are chosen by Him and are now called, “Chosen of God”.
Does God owe us anything? No. We are chosen of God by HIS mercy; not our merit.
Brothers and sisters, it is only by the mercy and longsuffering of God that unrepentant sinners do not immediately fall headlong into Hell.
It is only because He is not willing that any should perish, that the guilty remain and are given time and opportunity to find repentance and seek forgiveness.
Those of us who have responded to his call, and have repented, and have received His forgiveness, are only now one of His ‘chosen’, because of His mercy; and now we are called and sent to ‘proclaim His excellencies’.
THIS WE CANNOT DO, WHILE HARBORING HATRED IN OUR HEART FOR SOMEONE WHO HAS INJURED US.
So we are now exhorted by the Holy Spirit through Paul, to bear with one another and forgive one another, because we are “chosen of God”; by His mercy; and therefore we must show mercy, so that we may be free to proclaim His excellencies.
In truth, believer, to show mercy and forgiveness from a Christ-ruled heart, is to proclaim His excellencies. Because none of us could find the love in our heart to forgive, had He not first forgiven us. “We love, because He first loved us”, said John.
LOVED BY GOD
“And so...” back to Colossians 3, “...as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved...”
Do you know that you are holy?
The Bible calls you ‘holy’, if you are a believer in Christ and have entered God’s eternal family through faith in Jesus.
“Holy” means to be pure. Clean. Set apart for special use. God has made you holy, as you have been washed clean in the blood of the Lamb.
That’s why we sing those hymns. “Are You Washed In The Blood?” etc.
There’s one we don’t have in our hymnal, called, “The Cleansing Wave”
Listen to the words of two of the verses:
“Oh! Now I see the crimson wave, The fountain deep and wide;
Jesus, my Lord, mighty to save, Points to His wounded side.
O rise to walk in Heav’n’s own light; Above the world and sin,
With heart made pure, and garments white, And Christ enthroned within.
- Knapp
Do we always act holy? Nope. I don’t think any of us can get through a 16 hour period of being awake acting holy the whole time. In fact, the harder we tried, the more likely we’d be to fail; because after about an hour of being real holy we’d get so puffed with pride that we’d be sinning.
But God calls us holy, because He sees us only through the righteousness and holiness of Christ our High Priest, Who represents us within the veil. So we are sanctified. Holy.
And beloved. Loved.
“...as those who have been chosen of God, holy and LOVED...”
How are we loved? How does God show His love for us?
“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:8
“By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him.
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.”
I John 4:9-11
This is how God loved us...
FORGIVEN BY GOD
“...just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you.”
At the moment Jesus was raised up on Calvary’s cross, the unkindest, cruelest, most hate-filled act of wickedness and selfishness and greed and lust and cowardice ever committed by men was taking place.
The One who spoke all things into existence and holds all things together by the word of His power; the One who determined before the foundation of the world that He would suffer and die to pay the penalty for us; the One who had carefully guarded His people through the wilderness and graciously given them a home in the promised land; the one who had healed limbs and raised the dead and taught with patience and endurance, in humility and love,..
...was now nailed hands and feet to a rough-hewn timber, and raised naked and mocked in the hot sun to die a criminal’s death.
And what were His first words there? “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing”.
This was not what was heard from this place of torture! What was heard from crosses was cursing and swearing and hatred and vileness and cries of anguish and pleading and remorse and screaming...not forgiveness!
That is why the Roman soldier standing below was moved to exclaim, “Truly, this is a son of the gods”. He had heard it all...but never forgiveness!!!
Now I know that there are those reading this, who have been severely wronged in your life. I know that some of you have come a long, long way down the road since becoming a Christian, and there’s not a lot of evidence showing from you anymore, of the person you were before Jesus changed you.
I know there are folks reading this who have memories that still burn when they touch the surface; and I know that there may be some who are saying inside a hurting heart, “Clark, if only you knew; you wouldn’t be saying I should forgive. If you knew what was done, if you could feel the pain, you’d understand that I just...can’t...forgive!”
And if you are thinking that, you are right.
I can’t understand. I can’t feel your pain. I don’t know what you went through then; I don’t even know what you’re going through now.
But brother’s and sisters in Christ, I’m not the one telling you to forgive. I’m not the one who can help you forgive. I’m not the one who has the right to demand that you forgive.
The one who knows, who understands, who has the right to demand, who can help you, is the One who has forgiven you so much, and continues to offer you forgiveness daily.
Paul does not say this directly in Colossians, but Jesus Himself made the point that God cannot extend His forgiveness to one who refuses to forgive. In teaching the disciples to pray He included this phrase: “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And in Matthew 18 He tells a parable, the moral to which is that if we do not forgive, God cannot forgive us.
Paul doesn’t just throw out the suggestion and leave us hanging though. He tells us how to go about having this relationship of forgiveness with one another.
It is something God has provided, just as He provided covering for Adam and Eve in the garden after the fall. But just as they had to put those garments on in order to show acceptance of His provision, so we must put on the provision He has made for us.
“...put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience...” he says in verse 12; and if you skip from there down to 14 he adds the most important element.
“...and beyond all these things, put on love, which the perfect bond of unity.”
So you see, although our tendency when confronted with the need to forgive, is to cry, “I can’t do it! I don’t have it in me! This thing was too terrible, and I can’t get over it! I can’t forgive!”
The truth is that we’re not told to find it within ourselves; we’re not told that we should have the ability. We’re not even told that we should look at the thing we’re forgiving as not being so terrible, or that person not quite so guilty.
What we are instructed to do, is don the covering that God has provided. To go forth in Christ’s righteousness; not our own. To go in His strength and His provision.
Put on these things. Not, dig down deep and find these things buried within ourselves and bring them up...but PUT ON...
hearts of compassion
kindness
humility
gentleness
patience
love, ...the perfect bond of unity.
“...just as the Lord forgave you...
SO ALSO SHOULD YOU”
There it is again, huh? LOVE AS CHRIST LOVED US
As those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, we’ve got it to do.
Neither the passage we’re studying here, nor any of the other passages I can find in scripture pertaining to forgiveness or holiness or brotherly love, are worded as a suggestion. None of them optional.
They are all worded in the context of being our duty; rightfully expected of us as those who have gratefully received to ourselves His forgiveness; to forgive in return, with the same kind of humble, unconditional, self-sacrificing forgiveness that was extended to us from that raised cross so long ago.
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“And I stood there” (continues Corrie Ten Boom) “...I whose sins had again and again to be forgiven - and could not forgive. Betsie had died in that place - could he erase her slow terrible death simply for the asking?
It could not have been many seconds that he stood there - hand held out - but to me it seemed hours as I wrestled with the most difficult thing I had ever had to do.
For I had to do it - I knew that. The message that God forgives has a prior condition; that we forgive those who have injured us...
I knew it not only as a commandment of God, but as a daily experience. Since the end of the war I had had a home in Holland for victims of Nazi brutality Those who were able to forgive their former enemies were able also to return to the outside world and rebuild their lives, no matter what the physical scars. Those who nursed their bitterness remained invalids. It was as simple and as horrible as that.
...And so woodenly, mechanically, I thrust my hand into the one stretched out to me. And as I did, an incredible thing took place. The current started in my shoulder, raced down my arm, sprang into our joined hands. And then this healing warmth seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears to my eyes.
“I forgive you, brother!” I cried. “With all my heart.”
For a long moment we grasped each other’s hands, the former guard and the former prisoner. I had never known God’s love so intensely as I did then.” 1.
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Reach your hand out like Corrie did. She couldn’t find it within herself. Her forgiveness wasn’t an act of graciousness on her part. She reached because she knew she had been forgiven; and she knew it was commanded and expected of her that she forgive.
She reached out her hand, not in kindness or brotherly love, but as a child who has been instructed by her father to do something she loathes, but wants to be obedient. So she reached.
It was THEN, that the love filled her heart and overflowed; not until. Yet there was no delay. She obeyed, and the love and healing came.
Put on God’s provisional covering. feel the warmth. Feel the intensity of God’s love.
1. Corrie Ten Boom quote copied from “Tramp For The Lord”, Flemming H. Revell, 1974, pg 55-57
