Pure Heart of Forgiveness

The word "forgiveness" is common among Christians. Many of us are familiar enough to quote what the Bible says about it. However, it is still one of the hardest things for us all to do. When we offend or cause harm to others, we immediate quote the Bible and want to be forgiven right now! But when someone offends us, we hold on to the resentment to keep “one in the bank” for later. In other words, we use the offense as a sense of power over the offender to control the relationship for as long as possible. On the other hand, if we don’t hold on to the offense until we get “justice,” we will never forgive the offender.

The problem with the power struggle is pride. Pride and ego are at the center of almost every long-term quarrel. Think about it; If you take out the pride in every disagreement, and put love for the other person ahead of your pride, how much argument do you have left?

In Matthew 22:36-40 (NIV) we read,

“Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?” Jesus replied: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

WHOA! We understand the love God part, but love my neighbor as myself? What is Jesus saying? What is His point? I’m glad you asked!

Throughout Jesus’ ministry He showed love to the ones He “wasn’t supposed to.” From the woman at the well, to eating with tax collectors and sinners, to dying for you and me who by all accounts, are unworthy. In Bible times, it was unheard of to forgive debts and love your neighbor. In fact, the Jews and Samaritans hated one another just for who they were. The Pharisees held on to the law and even misinterpreted it by adding their own customs in order to remain in power and have the highest status over others. So, what did Jesus do, He told a parable of the Samaritan who became the hero by loving his neighbor, the Jew who was beaten, robbed and left for dead!

Over and over again, Jesus’ point was that relationships, not rules, regulations, and laws, but relationships, were the most important part of the commandments. Still not convinced? Let’s look at 1 Corinthians 13:3 which reads,

“If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.”

In other words, I can serve at the food pantry every week, but if I am hateful to those I am serving because they are different than me or they “have an attitude problem,” what do I gain? The only way to get people saved so that they can shine with the light of Jesus is to spend time with them in love, not in bitterness. In fact, I would argue that if you are serving anywhere and find yourself being hateful to those you are serving, even in your heart, you are doing a disservice to them, yourself, and the Christian body. However, if you respond in love, not knowing if they were molested as a child, beaten by their husband, starved by their parents, etc etc, you will be the one they remember when they are ready to come to Christ!

What does all this have to do with anger and resentment? Again, I’m glad you asked! Why is it we find it so easy to forgive and treat perfect strangers so well most of the time, but then we treat the ones we love like second class citizens? This is the reason for so much turmoil in the church today. We will go out of our way to reach people, but once we become familiar, the gloves come off.

Do we not know that we are all children of God in the church? Think about it; would you allow your son to treat your daughter as you treat your brother and sister in Christ? Regardless of what she has done to “deserve it?” Of course not! You would teach love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23). On that note, if these are the fruits of the Spirit, do you have the Spirit of God dwelling in you if you don’t have these fruits in your life? We can’t post about love and forgiveness and Jesus is my Lord and Savior one minute, then give someone the third degree the next. “But its my page I can say what I want!” You are right. However, if the great commission is to make disciples of all nations, who in the world would want to be discipled by someone who is so hateful and unbearable to be around? I digress. Back to the topic!

When it comes to forgiving those who have done us harm, we want justice! We want them to suffer the consequences of their behavior. “EYE FOR AN EYE” we scream! We want to toss out the forgive and you will be forgiven (Matthew 6:14) and go back to Old Testament principles. “Except in my sin, please don’t go back to Levitical Law for what I’ve done!” However, Jesus had something to say about getting justice in Luke 17:1-6 (NIV)

"Jesus said to his disciples: “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come. It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble. So watch yourselves."

In other words, Jesus is saying, “I got this. No one is going to do you harm and get away with it. And watch yourself so that you don’t do one of your brothers or sisters in Christ harm either.” He continues in verses 3-6 saying,

“If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them. Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.”

Notice Jesus did not say you must trust them? He said forgive them. The Bible only says to trust in the Lord with all of your heart (Proverbs 3), it never says to trust in people. In fact, it warns against trusting in those who do evil or being unequally yoked with non-believers. Christian does not mean doormat. It means I forgive you our of love for you, me, and Jesus and I will not hold on to a grudge. It does not mean trust. Mending damaged relationships is a whole other topic which I may write on later. Verses 5-6 says,

"The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” He replied, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it will obey you.”

In other words, the ones who had been walking with Jesus this whole time, knew how hard it was going to be to change their thoughts and hearts from revenge to forgiveness so they asked for more faith. However, Jesus responds saying you have enough faith already. Just change your thoughts to my ways and it will all change!

Matthew 5:8 says, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”

Notice that it says they were blessed before they see God. For they shall see God. And many of us have clogged arteries and our heart cannot get the cleansing it needs because we are holding on to something that hurt us when we were 8 years old or from a past relationship, or maybe from your spouse’s words just last week.

“But Pastor Mike, you have no idea what this person said to me.” Let us go back to Luke 17:1-3: “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come. It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble. so watch yourselves.”

That says don’t worry about it because even the least of you are protected and if anyone messes with Gods child they will be dealt with accordingly. So why are we so worried about getting back at everyone?  Now I see I don’t even have to defend myself because I got a loving father who says, I GOT THIS CHILD!

Listen, when we hold on to these offenses we are saying, “God, I got this, take a seat.” Then we wonder why things are not going as they should. Some of us were offended as a child and we are holding onto that offense and its blocking our hearts which is blocking our full blessings! If we can only handle offenses on a 6th grade level, we can’t expect to be blessed on a Graduate degree level! If you get offended at home by the small little things going on, God isn’t going to promote you in the church. Why? Because with “to those who much is given much is required (Luke 12:48)” and the higher you climb the higher the offenses will be.

No one is saying you have to be a push over and you can’t get angry. No one is saying you have to be some soft person who becomes a doormat and allows everyone to walk on you.  In fact, Ephesians 4:26 says, “Be angry, and do not sin.” You can use your anger as motivation and drive but you are not to use it as an excuse to “just be honest” while you’re really just being a jerk! I wouldn’t be where I am now if people hadn’t made me mad and motivated me to push harder and prove them wrong.

Here is the bottom line. When I hold onto what someone in the flesh is doing to me or has done to me, and I don’t believe that God is going to be the one handling it, I’m saying that I have more faith in your wrong doing than I do in GOD! When Jesus was on the Cross, he had been beaten, whipped, he was bleeding from his head, face, beard, back, and all over his body. He could barely breath because of the weight of His own body pulling down over his lungs. Some of the accounts say he had his guts spilling out from the belly. However, one of the last things He said was, “Father forgive them.” Now, as far as I can tell none of us have gone through anything like Jesus did, so why on earth can we not forgive as Jesus did. Until you have something worse than your guts hanging out, you don’t have any reason why you cannot forgive. Not trust, forgive!

One may ask, “why on earth would Jesus forgive these people at this time?” Because Jesus knew he was coming back in 3 days, then later he needed to return to the Father, and He wanted to be PURE IN HEART!