THE LORD'S PRAYER (Part #3) - "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses."
The final piece of the Lord's Prayer is truly where the rubber meets the road for a Christian. Jesus began His teaching by calling out the do's and don'ts concerning how we should pray, then provided a complete example on what prayer should look like, and finished with a stern warning. The exhortation is simply this: If we want our prayers to be heard and answered, we must avoid the common pitfall of forgiveness which has been plaguing man since the beginning of time. Honestly, how many of us even realized this 2-verse passage is the bookend for the Lord's Prayer? When we think of forgiveness, we typically focus our attention vertically between ourselves and God, rather than horizontally toward our fellow man. It is easy to wrap our heads around asking God to forgive our sins because that is the reward for genuine repentance, but do we fully grasp and embrace every step along the path of reconciliation? The recipe for repentance contains admission, guilt/shame/regret, sorrow, confession, and acceptance of consequences. It is the foundation God requires in order to transform these ingredients into forgiveness, and we are wise not to neglect any component if we desire the end-result. Picture baking a cake or a loaf of bread. Would we expect that omitting flour but maintaining all the other recipe ingredients would still result in a finished product? Of course, not. Therefore, how can we experience forgiveness if we're willing to admit we made a mistake but are not truly broken over our sin or willing to accept the consequences? The final product will never be what it should if we leave out a key ingredient, and such is the case with forgiveness.
In many ways, we must recognize whether we're going through the motions or not when we seek forgiveness of sins through repentance. "For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death" (2 Corinthians 7:10). We are fooling ourselves if we believe we can hide our true feelings and intentions from God, but often times we fail to recognize how worldly grief has infiltrated our prayer life. The ESV Study Bible offers the following commentary regarding this issue: "Grief that comes from God is characterized by repentance, (i.e., remorse caused by having lost God’s approval and the consequent resolve to reverse one’s conduct and live for God). Grief that comes from the world, (i.e., a remorse brought about by losing the world’s approval), leads to a resolve to regain that approval, and this produces death, or divine judgment." If we desire the fruit of healing through forgiveness, we must begin our repentance with godly grief which saves us, rather than worldly grief that deceives us into thinking we're safe and secure in our own strength. It is no different than what the prophet Obadiah wrote concerning the Edomites who pridefully trusted in their inaccessible location as their ultimate security, rather than the Lord almighty. "The pride of your heart has deceived you, you who live in the clefts of the rock, in your lofty dwelling, who say in your heart, 'Who will bring me down to the ground?' Though you soar aloft like the eagle, though your nest is set among the stars, from there I will bring you down, declares the LORD" (Obadiah 1:3-4). In the end, we will always be disappointed when we place our trust in the security of the world, because the world is in constant opposition to God's sovereignty.
Scripture warns, "Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world—the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life—is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever" (1 John 2:15-17). When we consider the topic of forgiveness, we quickly realize that God's will for our lives is counter-cultural. Those who love the world are enticed by instant gratifications and personal retribution. Forgiveness is not a first reaction nor even a last resort, because holding a grudge and inflicting vengeance is more pleasing to the flesh. The flesh craves divisiveness because it fuels animosity and elevates us into a position of power and dominance over those who have sinned against us. In many ways, withholding forgiveness is more comfortable because forgiving others of sins committed against us brings more uncertainty than it's worth. We would rather bask in the misery of our bitterness than relinquish control of our fear or anger. "The heart knows its own bitterness, and no stranger shares its joy" (Proverbs 14:10). That is why Jesus sternly warns of the consequences that await when we choose to satisfy our flesh rather than obey the Word of the Lord. Bitterness leads to hardheartedness, which binds our hearts under the stronghold of slavery. No good comes from bitterness—only the desire to lead others down the same destructive path, like a contagious sickness that plagues the soul. Therefore, "See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no “root of bitterness” springs up and causes trouble, and by it many become defiled" (Hebrews 12:15).
What we must personally wrestle with is why we would ever consider NOT forgiving others of their trespasses. When we became born-again, we pledged allegiance to the Lord because of the wrath He took upon Himself for the forgiveness of our sins. He didn't have to die—He choose to die! Yet if we're honest with ourselves, the eternal sacrifice Jesus made is rarely real to us. We take for granted the unfathomable anguish he endured because our salvation is secure in Christ. Like reading the end of a novel without reading the majority of the book, we trust more in our superficial knowledge of the Gospel story rather than the life-giving instructions contained throughout appx. 1,300 pages or 750,000 words of the typical Protestant Bible. Brethren, how can this be? Have we truly become so numb to the reality of what Scripture says that the manifestation of God's Word, Jesus Christ, has become merely words on a page? Remember: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it" (John 1:1-5). If we are to understand the depth and breadth of how critical forgiving others is, the prophetic words Isaiah wrote 700 years before the birth of Christ must transform our perspective and awaken our hearts to the sacrifice God made to forgive our sins.
"He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned—every one—to his own way; and the LORD has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth; like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent, so he opened not his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? And they made his grave with the wicked and with a rich man in his death, although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth. Yet it was the will of the LORD to crush him; he has put him to grief; when his soul makes an offering for guilt, he shall see his offspring; he shall prolong his days; the will of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death and was numbered with the transgressors; yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors" (Isaiah 53:3-12).
No one said forgiving others was easy. If we have been grievously sinned against as in the case of physical abuse, adultery, etc, the thought of forgiving seems unbearable. The wounds are too deep, the scars are too fresh, and not enough time has passed to allow healing. On the other hand, others may be experiencing the struggle of an unrepentant offender or a missed opportunity due to the person being deceased or unavailable to reconcile with. In any case, the instruction Jesus gives is simply to forgive. We cannot be held captive by fear of reoccurring sin nor withholding forgiveness based on personal judgment regarding whether the grief we see is godly or worldly. Jesus said, "Pay attention to yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him, and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him" (Luke 17:3-4). If we want our prayers to be heard, our supplications answered, and forgiveness showered down upon us when we confess our sins to the Lord, we must forgive others unconditionally. There can be no strings attached or negotiations made as if suddenly we have the right to enact a zero tolerance policy with forgiving others. The Lord does not treat us that way, so we should freely forgive others through the power of the Holy Spirit. We certainly can make adjustments to protect ourselves from future harm, but forgiving others is non-negotiable. Therefore, let us heed Jesus' warning, inspired to forgive others based on the promise God declares in His Word for our salvation: "He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities. For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his steadfast love toward those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us. As a father shows compassion to his children, so the LORD shows compassion to those who fear him" (Psalm 103:10-13).
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