Forgiving the Unforgivable

How do you forgive the unforgivable? Someone murders a family member. A drunk driver slams into your car, and you’re in a wheelchair the rest of your life. A trusted friend molests your child. A member of your church who works as an investment counselor persuades you to put your life savings in his hands, and he loses it all. One of your best friends spreads rumors (all untrue) about you that result in your being ostracized by all your other friends. 

You could pick any one of the above, and call it "unforgivable." And sadly most of have personal scenarios that are equally grievous. How could you possibly forgive a person who has done any of these? How can you forgive the unforgivable?

Forgiven

One of the best questions I’ve ever heard was asked by a father ashamed of his sons.

The father was the Old Testament judge Eli, and he was ashamed because his two grown sons were corrupt and ungodly men who misused their privilege as priests for their own gain and carnal pleasure. So Eli asked them this question:

“If someone sins against a man, God will mediate for him, but if someone sins against the Lord, who can intercede for him?” (1 Samuel 2:25a, my emphasis)

A Terrible Darkness

We only call this Good Friday because we know the world did not end on Friday. It would not have been a Good Friday at all if Sunday hadn’t been Resurrection Sunday.

If Sunday morning had dawned and that great solemn stone had still been there, guarded by soldiers, sealed by Rome, this would have been a terrible day, the worst of days.

Freed From A Curse

In fairy tales, evil witches put people under a curse. Think Sleeping Beauty or Snow White. But the Bible speaks plainly of a curse that cannot be undone by Prince Charming. 

Here’s the text in the Epistle to the Galatians: even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed (v. 8). And in the very next verse he said it again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed (v. 9, emphasis added)

The Greek word “accursed” is anathema - delivered over to divine wrath. Anyone who distorts the gospel of Christ is under a curse. From whom? From Almighty God.

Sounds a little harsh, doesn’t it?

Why Christians are the Happiest People

Mel Jenkins, one of our church's elders, is a veteran missionary, church planter, and pastor. Recently he shared a devotional about happiness, and it was such a blessing I wanted to pass it on to you. Thanks, Mel.

I recently watched a Netflix documentary called “Happy.” In the film researchers went around the world to answer the question: What really brings happiness to a person’s life?

In the slums of Kolkata, India, they met a rickshaw driver named Manis Singh. Manis transports people around the city pulling people with his one-seater rickshaw. He lives in a small shack with his wife and two children. Manis doesn’t have an easy life. During the summer the heat burns through his thinly-soled shoes as he pulls people around the city, and when the monsoons arrive, the rain blows into his shack through the blue tarps he uses as walls.

But though Manis has very little of this world’s material wealth, the filmmakers concluded he is basically a happy person, at least as happy as the average American. What brings him happiness is returning home to see his young son at the top of the hill waiting for him at the end of the day. His little boy, his loving wife, and his newborn baby bring him happiness.

At the end of the film the researchers suggested five things that make people happy:

• Taking time to play
• New experiences
• Close connections to friends and family
• Doing things that are meaningful
• Appreciating what we have

Watching the documentary reinforced my own conviction about happiness: Committed Christians are the happiest people in the world. Here are five reasons:

A Christian's Message to the Men Who Beheaded His Brothers

Last Sunday the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) released a video showing the simultaneous beheading of 21 Egyptian men who were kidnapped from Libya. As everybody knows (except, apparently, the U.S. President), the men were murdered because they were Christians. The video released by the terrorists was entitled “A Message Signed With Blood to the Nation of the Cross.”

I wrote about another beheading by the “Religion of Peace” here. This is just the latest in an extremely long line of brutal, indefensible acts of barbarism committed by followers of Islam. (Since the beheadings, ISIS burned 45 people to death in Western Iraq.)

This has always been the way. Those who follow the god of this world hate those who follow the true God.

But we don’t hate them back. At least weren’t not supposed to.

Why Forgiveness is Frightening

Did you ever think that being forgiven by God would or should induce fear? It seems more likely that being forgiven should make us feel joy, gratitude, humility, or peace.

But I was reading the Psalms the other night and I was surprised by Psalm 130:3-4 (with my emphasis) -

If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
O Lord, who could stand?
But with you there is forgiveness,
That you may be feared.

A Prayer for the Difficult Person in Your Life

All of us have people in our lives who challenge our civility, who make life harder for us, who rub us the wrong way, who push our buttons. And sometimes, more often than we would like to admit, we are the problem. Or at least we bear responsibility for a lot of it.

God’s word says "If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all" (Romans 12:18). Evidently it is not always possible, but we should try.

The Bible gives us guidelines about confronting when we think we've been wronged (Matthew 18:15-17), and speaking the truth in love (Ephesians 4: 15). It tells us to confess our own sins (James 5:16) and forgive one another (Colossians 3:13). 

So this prayer is not a substitute for any of that.

But years ago I wrote out a fairly lengthy prayer that I have prayed many times when I've had a "difficult person" in my life. I've found that praying for someone softens my heart toward them, and is part of God's plan to humble me and possibly (but not always) to heal the relationship.

This is a prayer specifically when the difficult person is (or claims to be) a member of the Christian family.

Maybe it will be helpful to you. 

The Broken Plant, Revisited

A few months ago I told you the tale of The Broken Plant,  which you can read again with much hilarity by clicking here.

Or I could summarize, with less hilarity: I sat on one of my wife's house plants and broke off a main stem. Since my wife inexplicably likes these things, sitting on one of them was not the smartest thing I have ever done. To be honest, it joins a very long list of "probably not the smartest things" I have been compiling over the course of our marriage. So I suppose she should be used to random acts of plant-breakage.

But I immediately took the coward's way out and stuck the broken branch back into the dirt. My granddaughter, who witnessed my horticultural mayhem, counseled me to come clean and tell Nana. "Just say you're sorry." This proved to be great advice. As King David said, "when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long." Of course he had committed adultery and murder, and all I had done was murder (so I thought) a peace lily. 

But the principle is the same. Fess up, throw yourself on the mercy of the court, tell your wife you busted a cap in her plant, so to speak. And I did, and Dionne wasn't mad at me. 

Actually she started watering my hastily buried branch, and now, five months later, the whole plant is doing great. Go figure. This picture, which I took with my dumbphone, shows the actual plant, with the actual branch, growing like a weed. Or a peace lily. (I added the arrow. We don't really have a literal red arrow floating above our hearth.)

Anyhow, I'm sure there are lessons to be learned here. For example, my wife did an internet search for "peace lily," and found out this plant has, and I quote,"resiliency and a forgiving nature." No kidding.

But, no, I mean spiritual type lessons. So here are three:

1. Don’t trust your instinct to cover up brokenness. Truth and humility are always a better way to go.

2. Listen to little kids, especially your grandchildren. They can be pretty smart.

3. Maybe what you think is irreparable might not be. If Christ can forgive people like you and me, busted plants can grow again. And who knows what else He might fix?

Why God Keeps Forgiving Me

Why does God keep forgiving me?

I’ve been a Christian a long time, and I’m more grateful for His forgiveness than when I first became a believer. I’m sure it’s because I’m more disgusted by my sin, more in love with Jesus, and more attracted to holiness.

But why does God keep forgiving me of my sins? After all, they tend to be the same ones I've been struggling with all my life. So why?

Here are some reasons I thought of:

1. I am really, really sorry for my sins. 
2. I promise Him I’ll try harder next time. 
3. He sees that I’ve made progress in my fight against sin.

Honestly, sometimes I feel that these are all factors in God’s constant willingness to forgive and cleanse me of the same sins. But actually the reason He keeps forgiving me is not because of anything in me at all.

His forgiveness is always based on His own free grace. My sins were paid for, not by my contrition or attempts to improve, but by Christ’s substitutionary death. His payment for me included even the sins that are yet in my future. His life, death, and resurrection are infinitely valuable and eternally effective.

That doesn't mean my contrition, determination to try harder, or actual progress are insignificant. But they are not reasons for God's forgiveness, but evidence of that forgiveness. 

As A.W. Pink put it, "It is not the absence of sin, but the grieving over it which distinguishes the child of God from empty professors" (Studies in the Scriptures, 1932-33, p. 161).

Thanks be to Jesus alone, who secured my forgiveness past, present, and future, and doesn't give up on me when I fail. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:9

(Another post on the same subject: How Many Times Will God Forgive Me?)

The Broken Plant

A couple nights ago I got to babysit our two grandchildren. My wife had to leave for part of the evening (how convenient!) so I had the two kids all to myself. My granddaughter is four and a half, and my grandson is a year and a half. And I was born during the Harding administration.

I got ready by chugging a five-hour energy drink and strapping on body armor. Just kidding.

Actually I got ready by childproofing our living room a little bit. I moved the big matches on the fireplace from the hearth to the mantle, put away a container of pens and pencils, and stored my wife’s cross-stitch project in the closet.

                                                                                                          

Then I dragged the coffee table out of the way, and slid the big leather chair in front of the loveseat. That way we could hurl ourselves from one to the other without being impaled on the corner of the table. And by “we” I mean, of course, the grandkids. I didn’t actually hurl myself, though I did lurch, stumble, and wobble a couple times.

We had a great time. We watched Thomas the Train on Netflix and sang the songs together. We all made loud, crazy noises and ran laps around the furniture. We played tag, with me holding my grandson on my shoulders while my granddaughter easily outran us. We dropped tennis balls in the dog’s water dish. Then we got our own water to drink and also to pour onto the loveseat. We hid under our blankees and snuck up on one another. It was pretty fun.

Reading My Mind

During a recent prayer time I asked the Lord to reveal any sins I had not yet confessed. I was instantly reminded of some displeasing and ugly thoughts. Nobody else would have known about them. They were buried deep, dark-winged shadows that had flitted through my mind but were never acted upon.  

I guess some people believe that thoughts have no moral weight. But Jesus taught that our thoughts can be evil even if their intent is never fully realized. He warned about anger and lust in this regard, for example (cf. Mt. 5:21ff). He said that from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, sensuality, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person (Mark 7:21-23).

Jesus knows my thoughts. Numerous times in Scripture the Lord Jesus reads the minds of people.

• But Jesus, knowing their thoughts…Matthew 9:4
• Knowing their thoughts… Matthew 12:25
• But He knew their thoughts…Luke 6:8
• But Jesus, knowing the reasoning of their hearts…Luke 9:47

Confessing my sinful thoughts gave me fresh appreciation and gratitude for my Savior. He died to atone for the wayward, carnal impulses of my mind, just as surely as He paid for my other sins. All of them were nailed to the cross (cf. Colossians 2:13).

How wonderful and unbelievably gracious is our Savior! His sacrificial kindness renews my desire to take every thought captive to obey Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5b).

The Alabaster Jar

When I heard that He was in town for a dinner party, I knew I had to get there. They let the common people sit on the sidelines at these events, and sometimes the poor can pick up a few scraps from the table to feed their families.

Me? I’m not poor, but I don’t want to think about how I used to make my money. That’s in my past now, since I met Him.

It happened only a few weeks ago. I was waiting on the street, hoping to snag a client or two. Suddenly He appeared, looking at me like no man has ever looked at me. His eyes were so kind and so pure that I shrunk back, ashamed of my whole life. But then He spoke, and I fell at His feet. He blessed me, and before I could look up, He was gone. I knew I would never be the same.

I thought I’d never see Him again. So when I heard about the dinner, I had to go.

I slipped in with a few others, hoping not to be recognized. I kept my eyes down. Many of the men knew me, and I didn’t want to attract attention. Sounds funny now, after what happened next.

You Have NOT Been Pardoned for Your Sins

What if I told you that you, as a Christian, were not pardoned for your sins?

Wait a minute! You might say. I know I’ve been forgiven of my sins. The Bible says so!

Right. But I’m not saying you’re not forgiven. If you have repented and trusted in Jesus, you are forgiven. What I am saying is that you have not been pardoned. A pardon is not the right word for your forgiveness. Christians are justified by God, but not pardoned by Him.

Here's how Jerry Bridges puts it in The Discipline of Grace:

Why We're Afraid to Pray

Many years ago while I was still in college I needed somebody to talk to. I was struggling with a problem and didn’t know how to solve it. I had run out of ideas and had just about given up.

I knew a Christian doctor, an older man well-respected in his church. A family physician, he had a reputation for wisdom and gentleness. Just the kind of man who could give me counsel, I hoped. While I was nervous about seeking advice, I was desperate enough that I made an appointment to see him.

A week or so later, I walked into his office, took a seat, and haltingly told him my troubles. He sat behind a big desk and leaned forward as I spoke. I was both embarrassed and relieved to be talking to someone about issues that seemed too heavy for me to carry. Once my voice broke, and I paused to get control of my emotions. The doctor smiled encouragingly.

Finally I had laid out the whole mess to him. I already felt a little bit better.

The doctor smiled at me again, and then said, “It’s obvious that you are being punished for your sins.” If he had slammed me in the face with a brick, I don’t think it could have hurt more. Even now, so many years later, I feel the sting of it.

How Many Times Will God Forgive Me?

Have you ever wondered how many times God will forgive you for the same stupid sin?

If you call yourself a Christian, a Christ follower, you know you’re supposed to live a holy life. Yet you still stumble. Even worse, you seem to trip over the same temptations time and again. How long will God put up with that?

None of us should ever take lightly the sin in our lives, or presume upon the grace of God, as if since we “prayed a prayer” or “walked an aisle,” the state of our soul doesn’t matter.

But God’s grace is revealed in part by our tenderness to our own sin, not our callousness to it. If you’re troubled, good. God is at work. Your sensitive soul is in good company with godly men and women of old who agonized over their sin. “Wretched man that I am!” said one of them.

But still the question: how many times will God forgive us for the same stupid sin? Won’t He eventually just run out of patience and give up on us?