Sermon on the Mount
“The Lord’s Prayer”
Part 6
<A Terrible Freighting Request>
Matthew 6: 12; Luke 11: 4; Sirach 28: 3-5
Introduction
Here in Savannah General Oglethorpe was being his usual self, prideful & unbending, as was his trait. And in one of his moments his said, “I never forgive.” John Wesley a missionary, whom we all here in Savannah are very familiar with, responded to him saying, “Then I hope you sir, never sin.”
Charles Spurgeon stated that, “unless you have forgiven others, you read your own death-warrant when you repeat the Lord’s Prayer.
Transition
For a fractured spiritual life, for that matter, for a fractured life – a broken human relationship, the second instruction given by our Lord on how to pray for ourselves is on how to pray concerning forgiveness.
We are explicitly told to pray for forgiveness, & implicitly to pray for a forgiving spirit, (as we forgive those who sin against us).
Saint Augustune
Calles this request “the terrible petition” – this after realizing that if we petition God to “forgive us our sins, as we forgive others” we’re asking God, if we pray and have an unforgiving heart to not forgive us.
Jesus categorically, so as there is absolutely no misunderstanding what He just said, reiterates for clarity, “if you forgive]others for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you But if you do not forgive others, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions.” (14-15).
Now to the Jews at that time this was apparently common understanding. In the book of Sirach 28:3-5, (now this book is in the Apocrypha, non-canonical books), three questions are asked:
First- Does a man harbor anger against another, and yet seek for healing from the Lord?
Second- Does he have no mercy toward a man like himself, and yet pray for his own sins?
Third- If he himself, being flesh, maintains wrath, who will make expiation for his sins?
So we can see that Jesus’ words were in accordance with the understanding of God’s people.
In the New Testament, a merciless, unforgiving heart won’t receive mercy nor forgiveness – James 2:13 says that judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy.”
Jesus gives us the powerful parable of the man who was forgiven 10,000 talents by his lord but then turns around & refuses to forgive his own slave a debt of 100 denarii, it leaves us with a terrifying warning – Look at Luke 18: 32-35:
Then summoning him, his lord *said to him, ‘You wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave, in the same way that I had mercy on you?’ And his lord, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he should repay all that was owed him. My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart.”
There’s no doubt that Jesus meant exactly what He said – “If you don’t forgive others their trespass against you, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” (Matt. 6:15b).
Like John Wesley telling Gen. Oglethorpe that he hopes that Oglethorpe never sins when saying “I never forgive”; Or Charles Spurgeon saying that one is signing their death-warrant.
C. S. Lewis states in “Fern Seed & Elephants” – “No part of His teaching is clearer & there are no exceptions to it. He doesn’t say we are to forgive other people’s sins provided they are not too frightful, or provided there are extenuating circumstances, or anything of that sort. We are to forgive them all, however spiteful, however mean, however often they are repeated. If we don’t, we shall be forgiven none our own.”
When you go around with an unforgiving heart, our prays are DOA, Dead On Arrival, they die on site, at the lips. The Lord’s Prayer isn’t anything more than a self-inflicting curse – a prayer for your own doom if you have an unforgiving heart.
Let’s go one step further. If I will not forgive, if we do not forgive, I am not, we are not Christians! Now that is scary, but it is true – At one time in our lives we were outside of grace, we were unforgiven – When we were saved, grace come into our hearts, that there makes you forgiving – If one is outside of grace, then one is unfortunately unforgiven, and if outside of grace one is unforgiving.
To qualify what was said, one can & will find bitterness & hatred will recur even though one has forgiven the offender – But, that one forgives and continues to forgive is a sign of grace. The issue here is not one’s struggle with forgiveness. The issue is those who have no desire to forgive, they are the one’s who’s soul is in danger.
The petition helps us to understand whether or not we are believers, but if we are believers, what it does is help us to monitor our spiritual health.
Listen, I’m sure you know that we all have the tendency of being more conscious of things that are done against us then what we do against others. When others are hurting we say that they’re over reacting, overly sensitive.
But when we are wronged, it’s a whole different ball game; we tend to exaggerate our won hurt & the evil of the offender.
C.S. Lewis says on this issue that in our case we accept excuses too easily, and in other people’s cases we don’t accept them easily enough. As for my own sins it is a safe bet . . . that the excuses are really not as good as I think: as for other’s sins against me it is a safe bet the excuses are better than I think.”
segura. . . que las excusas realmente no son tan buenas como creo: en cuanto a los pecados de otros en mi contra, es una apuesta segura que las excusas son mejores de lo que creo ".
How fast we are to take offense and holding back to forgive strains even our best relationships.
An unforgiving spirit brings isolation & compounds the bitterness in us, & self-pity finds its roots here. Then comes depression as it turns inwards – We become fault-finding, we hurt, & unforgiving.
We become more depressed & emotionally unhealthy. Friendships turn sour & also our own healthy relationship with God.
Healthy Benefits
Of a forgiving spirit are a lot, to many to name – The chief is, we’re never closer to God than when we forgive, better said, maybe, we are more like Jesus, Christ like.
Jesus prayed, “Father forgive them, they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34); Stephen when being stoned cried out in a loud voice as he fell on his knees saying, “Lord. Do not hold this sin against them,” (Acts 7:60).
What’s the saying? “To err is human,” then you have the couplet, “To forgive is divine.”
So, as St. Augustine said, this petition is terrible, but it is a gracious prayer, it monitors our spiritual health. So, how is your spiritual health?
A prayer For Forgiveness
More than likely, the majority of people who repeat this prayer don’t see themselves as sinners – In fact, I would venture to say that they pray with an almost condescending tolerance as if to say ‘I’m praying this along with those who really need it, if they even think about what they are actually praying.
How many thousands who pray this prayer, any prayer for that matter, really, truly consider themselves guilty before God?
For them, the Lord’s Prayer, again any prayer, is merely an empty repetition by self-satisfied souls. Just look when at gatherings and meetings, the hundreds present bow their heads, and as hypocrites that they are quickly go back to what they were.
This prayer can only be properly prayed by those debtors, sinners – Are we debtors? Our sins have been paid for by the blood of Christ, If, and I say if, we truly are Christians, born-again of the Spirit, then saved by the shed blood of Christ.
This prayer teaches us that daily we should engage in on-going confession of sin. This is a sign of spiritual health.
“Forgive us our debts, as we have forgiven our debtors,” tell us:
That we are to ask God for forgiveness – this follows immediately our request for daily bread, our daily needs –
It also tells us to forgive those who have wronged us. You do it for the health of your soul; for the health of the church which is sick from the lack of forgiveness among God’s children – It’s like a dysfunctional family.
Do you have to forgive your spouse? Have you been unwilling to forgive your parents? Have you forgiven that employer? How about that neighbor or church member that wronged you? Any grudges against your last church, or pastor? Forgive, today!
A Gimmick?
This isn’t some psychological trick – It’s a miracle! God will help you do it. Do it most of all for God’s sake.
Ephesians 4:32 – “Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.”
The “terrible petition” can curse us or bless us. Do you dare pray it? Can we pray “Lord forgive us our sins, as, just as we have also forgiven those who sinned against us”?
Any one listening, if you haven’t asked God for forgiveness, today you, right now, can. Be saved by grace, come to Christ and accept salvation, eternal life. All who call on the name of the Lord will be saved . . . It is so written in Scripture.
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