Retaining Sin

I do not take the responsibility that comes along with this ministry lightly. I write about how the Bible teaches us to forgive others even as they sin. I know sometimes it’s easy to see those who write such words as ignorant. We only see things in a theoretical way, and if we really knew how people really had to live we would never write such things. If we really knew the pain you feel because of the betrayal of another there is no way we would think it was possible to do that.

Do me a favor. Don’t use that garbage on me. I am human. All ministers are human. I live on the same earth as you, and am surrounded by the same humanity you are. I have been betrayed. I have been hurt by others in ways that impacted my life for years. Some of those hurts still impact me. So when I ask you to forgive others for what they do you can know that I have had to make sure I did the same. Jesus never asks us to do something He was not required to do. I try to follow His example, and I will never ask others to do something I haven’t had to deal with.

I say this because there are good biblical reasons to forgive. John 20:23 states:

“If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

I almost didn’t use this verse because it’s potentially dangerous. It tells us we have the power to make sure others are never forgiven for their sins. That is not a power any forgiven person should ever want to use. I instead use it to show why we have to forgive others as they sin against us, or forgive those we have withheld forgiveness from for years.

Consider Stephen. He forgave those stoning him as they stoned him. We should be very grateful for that, for one of those participating in the stoning was a man named Saul. Stephen never knew that this man would soon have an encounter with Jesus Christ on the road to Gethsemane. Stephen had no idea Christ would turn him from a great persecutor of Christians into one of the greatest ministers this world has ever known. Stephen did not know Saul would become Paul. He only ever knew him as a man who wanted him dead.

What if Stephen had not forgiven Saul? Would have that prevented Christ from appearing to Him? Would have Jesus chosen another man to do what Paul did? If Stephen had cursed Saul, and retained the sin the story of Saul may have been quite different. Paul may never have been. The gospel may not have been spread to Rome. There would be no book of Romans, Philippians, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, letters to Timothy, or much else. Those churches may not have been there for Paul to write the letters to. All of that could have been undone if one man had chosen to condemn and not forgive with his dying breath.

Consider all those you choose not to forgive. You have no idea what God has planned for them. You know nothing of their futures, or who they may become. Is it likely they’ll have the same impact on the faith as Paul? Are all things possible with Christ? If Stephen can forgive Saul for killing him you can forgive your coworker for taking your pencil off your desk. You can forgive that person who didn’t believe in you when you needed them to. You can forgive that person who lied to you. It is always better to forgive, for there’s no way to know who that person can become with your forgiveness.

Following Jesus

The previous entry is perhaps the easiest to shrug off because it’s about Jesus. Of course Jesus can forgive others while they sin against Him. He’s Jesus. He’s capable of doing things we could never do. No one else could ever live up to his standard. Jesus is God, and we are man. We never could forgive like Him.

Unfortunately for anyone who wanted to get away with that, Jesus is not the only one who ever forgave others as they persecuted him. If you doubt that you must forgive others as they sin against you because you are only a servant of Christ and not Christ Himself you should consider the actions of Stephen in Acts 7:59-60 as he was being stoned to death:

“And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, ‘Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.’ Then he knelt down and cried out with a loud voice, ‘Lord, do not charge them with this sin.”

Before he was stoned Stephen gave one of the most brilliant sermons recorded in the entire Bible. He traced the existence of Jesus through the entire scriptures before the Jewish leaders who refused to believe, and made a strong case for Jesus being the Messiah. He was guilty of nothing more than following the will of Christ. For doing this he was stoned to death.

I don’t think any of us would hold it against Stephen if the scriptures instead read that he called down hellfire on his persecutors, and they were all killed right then and there. We’d probably then refer to this set of scriptures as one of the greatest Christian victories against persecution. Instead, Stephen showed his worthiness and asked the Lord to forgive them seconds before death.

Anyone reading this has never been killed in service to the Lord, and sins committed against us cannot be as great as those committed against Stephen. He followed the example of Christ, and forgave those who persecuted him. Christ expects all of us to do the same.

Immediate Forgiveness

If any of us feel that there is some sin we cannot forgive someone for we are ignoring the words Christ spoke as He was being nailed to the cross. At that time in Luke 23:34, Christ cried out:

“Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do.”

Can we comprehend such forgiveness? He came to forgive His people, and they repaid Him by driving nails through His hands and feet, torturing, crucifying, and murdering Him. None of us have ever gone through such a horrible experience as Christ did on the day He was crucified. Yet in the midst of the torture He cried out to the Lord, and asked Him to forgive His torturers for their sins.

How many of us have asked the Lord to forgive our persecutors as we were still being persecuted? It’s hard to even consider doing so, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t. We need to forgive those who sin against us even as they commit their sin. If others slander us because of their sins we must forgive them as they try to. We can fight the slander, and oppose it, but we cannot hold the sin against those who commit it. One who persecutes the Lord’s followers does not know Him, and may still come to know Him with forgiveness.

We must forgive all of their sins in the midst of persecution just as Christ did on the cross. Christ proved on the cross that He expects nothing more out of us than what was expected of Him. If He could forgive in such a way so can those who follow Him.

Revenge

How is it that we, as people, naturally respond to someone sinning against us? When we are wronged by someone, or someone hurts us in some way how are we naturally inclined to respond? Sometimes with sadness, and by inflicting pain upon ourselves, but not always. Not usually. The most commonly accepted way to respond to someone hurting us is not granting forgiveness. It is seeking revenge.

I know this has been true in my own life. When I was in high school a classmate of mine took this coat I loved and kicked it across the floor. The coat was covered and dust, and pretty much ruined. I did not respond by turning my eyes to heaven, and crying out, “Father, forgive him this sin.” No. I got angry. I wanted revenge. I declared to others this desire for revenge. I didn’t see this classmate all day, and I spent that night plotting how I would get him back.

Fortunately, it didn’t turn out all that bad. I had cooled off about it by the next morning, and word had gotten to him. He was mature enough to apologize, and I got over it without inflicting the pain upon him I initially wanted to. I could have sought revenge, but I backed off. That’s good. The Bible warns us against this clearly. It’s written in 1 Thessalonians 5:15:

“See that no one renders evil for evil to anyone, but always pursue what is good both for yourselves and for all.”

The world teaches us to seek revenge. The Lord teaches us to be good to those who are evil to us. The world teaches us to harm whoever harms us. The Lord teaches us to always seek what is good for ourselves and for all. The world teaches us revenge is good. The Lord teaches us revenge is evil.

Seeking revenge is never acceptable under any circumstance. When many of us are wronged our main desire is to get back at the one who wronged us. We must turn against this foolish thinking, and never seek revenge. What kind of a massacre would there be if the Lord took revenge against all of those who have ever wronged him? He forgives and forgets, and we must do the same. We cannot seek revenge, but must respond to sin with immediate forgiveness. Under no circumstance is revenge considered acceptable.

A Need to Forgive

Christ later discusses the danger of not forgiving others, and what he teaches isn’t easy to hear, or to write about. He uses the analogy of a man who was forgiven an enormous debt by his master. This same man who was forgiven refused to forgive the small debts of another. Matthew 18:32-35 shows the results of his inability to forgive:

“Then his master, after he had called him, said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?’ And his master was angry, and delivered him to the torturers until he should pay all that was due to him. So my heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses.”

We are asked to forgive little, and show a lack of understanding of the forgiveness we’ve received when we refuse to forgive. We want God to forgive us for everything, but we can’t forgive our son-in-law for stealing our baby girl away. We beg His forgiveness when we fall, but think it’s okay when we hold a grudge forever because someone gossiped about us. We demand apologies, and expect people to bend over backwards to earn our forgiveness. Even if they do as we demand it is entirely up to us if we forgive. We can refuse, and feel justified in being angry forever.

This is not the behavior of someone who has been forgiven. Pay attention to the final warning again:

“And his master was angry, and delivered him to the torturers until he should pay all that was due to him. So my heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses.”

Heed this warning spoken by Christ, and forgive those you have been unable to forgive. It may be difficult, but the difficulty of forgiving another is nothing compared to being delivered to the torturers. When we are forgiven it means we will not receive the punishment we deserve. If we do not forgive we are condemned, and will receive that punishment. If we are condemned we can do nothing in His name. Swallow your pride, and forgive. Do so in your heart because the Lord can tell if you only speak forgiveness, for a refusal to forgive only destroys you. The Lord will give you nothing that you cannot give to others.

Endless forgiveness

Many of us are willing to forgive, but only so much. Sometimes a betrayal is too great, or a person just keeps sinning the same way too many times. Sometimes we’ve just had enough, and we’re tired of showing mercy. We’re tired of forgiving. Enough is enough. We stop forgiving, and shut whoever it is out of our lives. We punish them. We hold a grudge. We do not forgive.

We can try to justify this all we want, but the words of Jesus make it impossible. He had a conversation with Peter about this very subject in Matthew 18:21-22:

“Then Peter came to Him and said, ‘Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I do not say to you up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.”

We are supposed to forgive someone as many times as they sin. It doesn’t matter how difficult this is. It doesn’t matter what’s been done to us, or how we’ve been hurt. We must never stop forgiving because we will never stop being forgiven.

Jesus asks nothing of us He was not required to do. He had to forgive countless sins. We may need to forgive a lot in our lifetime, but not as many as Jesus. If not for His forgiveness we would not be forgiven. We cannot hold back the forgiveness that was so freely given to us. There is no number of times we have to forgive that is too many. This doesn’t mean being a pushover. This doesn’t mean we should never wage war, never put people in jail, or never stand against evil. I’ll get to that stuff more in later entries, and what it means. For this entry just understand there is one rule there are no exceptions to. We must always forgive.

Mercy

Often those most guilty of not forgiving are those within the church itself. Jesus struggled against the religious leaders in His time because they were eager to condemn. They would condemn those without sin, and did so famously when they worked furiously to ensure Jesus would die on the cross. Jesus knew what was coming in His life, and He had good reason for speaking these words in Matthew 12:7:

“But if you had known what this means, ‘I desire mercy and not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the guiltless.”

This verse speaks to many of those who call themselves saved today. We sometimes get twisted, and think being Christian means we have to give up certain things, and condemn those who do not. This is far from the truth. Christianity was formed by the astonishing forgiveness Jesus offered us on the cross, and we are to follow His way. We are not to condemn. Christ desires mercy.

Mercy is a refusal to condemn someone who deserves to be punished. It’s forgiving someone who doesn’t deserve forgiveness. That’s what Jesus did for us. He showed all of us mercy when it was His right, and the right of the Lord, to condemn us to eternal suffering for all our sins. The death of Jesus was the greatest act of mercy there’s ever been, and yet we think we can condemn someone because they didn’t buy any candy from our child’s fundraiser? We think we can condemn someone because they cheated on a test, had sex before marriage, drank some alcohol, told a lie about us, or read a Harry Potter book? Some things may be wrong, but all things are not our place to condemn. If those we condemn sinned the sin was against God. He will deal with it. We don’t have to. When we try we open ourselves up to many types of sin. Pride, gossip, wrath, being judgmental, and so many other sins can easily emerge from an eagerness to condemn. We condemn ourselves.

Remember who it is that had mercy on you. Remember Jesus, and walk in His ways. Show mercy.