Walking With Christ

(Part 4 of 8)

Matthew 6:14–15  (14)For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, (15)but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.(ESV)

We like forgiveness.  That’s probably one of the safest statements anyone can make about Christianity.

We preach forgiveness.  We sing about forgiveness.  We thank God for forgiveness.  We tell people that no sin is beyond the reach of Christ.  We point toward the cross and celebrate the mercy of God.  And we should.

Without forgiveness, the gospel isn’t good news.

But then Jesus says this.  “If you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you…”

Good.  That sounds familiar.

Then He continues:  “…but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”

And we keep reading.

Maybe we shouldn’t.  Pause.

Jesus didn’t bury this statement in an obscure corner of Scripture.

It appears immediately after the prayer Christians have repeated for centuries.

The Lord’s Prayer includes:  “Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.”

Then Jesus finishes the prayer and returns to one subject.

Forgiveness.  Not daily bread.  Not temptation.  Not God’s kingdom.  Not God’s will.

Forgiveness.

If we’re paying attention, that should tell us something.  Jesus apparently thought this part needed additional emphasis.  And what He says might be uncomfortable.

We’re asking God for something while being told to give the same thing to others.  That creates tension because receiving forgiveness feels very different from giving it.

When I need forgiveness, I understand mercy.  I understand context.  I understand weakness.  I understand regret.  I understand how one terrible decision should not define an entire life.  I understand that people can change.  I understand that grace should be greater than failure.  I understand all of that very well.

Then someone sins against me.  Suddenly justice becomes much easier to understand.  Now consequences matter.  Now accountability matters.  Now intent matters less than damage.  Now I remember exactly what was said.  Exactly what was done.  Exactly when it happened.  Exactly how much it hurt.

That difference should make us pause.

We often want God to examine our sins with mercy while examining other people’s sins with precision.

We want our motives considered.  We want their actions judged.

We want God to remember our weakness.  We want Him to remember what they did.

Jesus interrupts that arrangement.

Forgive.

That doesn’t mean pretending nothing happened.  Forgiveness isn’t amnesia.

It doesn’t require calling evil good, restored trust.

It doesn’t eliminate consequences, or require returning an unsafe person to a position where they can hurt you again.

It doesn’t mean justice becomes unnecessary.

Forgiveness and reconciliation are related, but they aren’t identical.

Reconciliation requires participation from more than one person.  Forgiveness can begin even when the other person refuses repentance.

But we can become so skilled at making distinctions like that that we never actually forgive anyone.

We explain boundaries.  We explain consequences.  We explain why trust has been broken.  We explain why reconciliation is impossible right now.

All of that may be true.  And bitterness may still be sitting underneath it.

That’s the part Jesus won’t allow us to hide.

Forgiveness means I surrender the right to make hatred my permanent response.  It means I stop feeding the debt.  It means I stop needing the offender to suffer in order for me to be whole.  It means I place judgment in hands more qualified than mine.

That doesn’t happen because the offense was small.  Sometimes forgiveness is difficult precisely because the offense was enormous.

A person can forgive and still grieve.  Forgive and still remember.  Forgive and still establish boundaries.  Forgive and still testify truthfully.  Forgive and still allow lawful consequences.  Forgiveness doesn’t erase reality.

It changes what we do with the debt.

That’s why the language of debt in the Lord’s Prayer matters.

A debt says:  You owe me.

Sometimes they really do.  An apology.  Restitution.  Honesty.  Responsibility.  Years they can’t return.  Trust they shattered.  Safety they destroyed.  A reputation they damaged.  A relationship they broke.

There are debts people cannot fully repay.  That’s when bitterness becomes tempting.

If they can’t repay the debt, we may decide to keep collecting interest.  Every memory adds more.  Every retelling adds more.  Every imagined argument adds more.  Every new failure becomes attached to the old one.

The debt grows because we keep the account open.  Then we come before God.

Forgive us.

Jesus makes us look at the ledger in our own hands.  “As we also have forgiven our debtors.”

That’s a dangerous prayer if we’re paying attention.  It forces us to ask whether we really want grace to work only in one direction.  Because every Christian lives by mercy.

None of us stands before God saying:  “Give me exactly what I deserve.”

The gospel would be terrifying if that were our request.

We ask for mercy.  We ask God not to define us forever by our worst act.  We ask for cleansing.  We ask for restoration.  We ask Him to remember Christ.

Then Jesus asks what we’re doing with the people who owe us.  That doesn’t mean human forgiveness earns divine forgiveness.  The gospel doesn’t become a transaction where we accumulate enough forgiven enemies to purchase grace.  But Jesus clearly refuses to separate a forgiven life from a forgiving heart.

That should make us careful.

A person transformed by mercy should become increasingly capable of mercy.  Not perfectly.  Not instantly.

Sometimes forgiveness is a decision we have to reaffirm many times because the wound keeps hurting.  But the direction matters.

Toward release.  Toward mercy.  Away from hatred.  Away from revenge.  Away from the fantasy that another person’s destruction will finally heal us.

Peter eventually asks Jesus how many times he must forgive someone who sins against him.  Seven times?

That probably sounded generous.  Jesus answers with a number designed to destroy the ledger.

Then He tells a story about a servant forgiven an enormous debt who refuses to forgive a much smaller one.

The point is hard to miss.

The servant wants mercy above him and judgment below him.  That arrangement doesn’t survive Jesus’ teaching.  Neither should ours.

Maybe that’s why Matthew 6:14–15 is so easy to pass.

We know forgiveness is Christian.  We agree with it.  We approve of it.

Until a name appears.  Then suddenly the doctrine needs qualifications.  Again, some qualifications are real and necessary.  But the command remains after every proper qualification has been made.

Forgive.

So ask the question we would rather avoid.

Who do you still need to owe you something?

Who must apologize before you can stop hating them?

Who must suffer before you can feel justice has happened?

Who are you still prosecuting in conversations they aren’t even present for?

Who are you keeping alive in your mind because you refuse to close the account?

And perhaps the hardest question:  Are you asking God for a kind of mercy you refuse to extend?

Don’t answer quickly.  Jesus didn’t.

He finished teaching His disciples to pray and immediately came back to forgiveness.

There was a reason.

“Forgive us our debts…”  We like that part.

“…as we also have forgiven our debtors.”  That part should slow us down.

Then Jesus makes it even clearer.

If you forgive.  If you don’t forgive.

Read the whole sentence.

Don’t stop where it feels comfortable.  Don’t rush toward explanations before the words have done their work.

We all want forgiveness.

Jesus asks what happens after we receive it.

Pause there.