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"For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins." (Matthew 6:14, 15)
The subject of Forgiveness is very vital in our Christian walk. Many believers have lost joy and excitement in their daily walk with the Lord Jesus Christ due to lack of forgiveness. Other people’s health has been attacked and affected by chronic stress, and this has caused on them other health challenges due to lack of forgiveness. Such people are struggling because they have failed to forgive people who have wronged and hurt them, though others have failed to forgive themselves.
Forgiveness, therefore, should be clearly understood as a conscious, voluntary decision to release feelings of resentment, bitterness, and/or vengeance towards someone who has caused harm.
The above two verses of scripture from Matthew 6:14, 15 are talking about conditional forgiveness, and they are linked with the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13) which Jesus teaches us as his followers when He is teaching us how we should pray. In the Lord’s Prayer itself, Jesus says, “And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors” (Matthew 6:12). Jesus links God's forgiveness of a person's sins directly to that person's willingness to extend forgiveness to other people. Just as we would vertically expect to receive forgiveness from our Father in heaven, we also should horizontally be ready to pass it on to our fellow men.
In our daily Christian walk, forgiveness is treated as essential fruit of a transformed heart. Before conversion, a sinner has a heart of stone. From such a heart you should expect hatred, bitterness, resentment, grudge, vengeance, retaliation, and/or condemnation. But when a sinner embraces Christ, God removes a heart of stone and gives him/her a heart of flesh. In doing this, God in His faithfulness fulfills what He promised through prophet Ezekiel when He said, “… I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26b). Such transformed heart is the one that can love and forgive genuinely.
Some of us want to be like the Apostle Peter when he wanted to justify himself by wanting to forgive only seven times. Peter mentioned seven times because in the Jewish tradition, number seven meant something complete. So if he can forgive up to the seventh time, then he will have forgiven enough. But according the Biblical standard of Christian living, Jesus said, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times” (Matthew 18:22). By saying this, Jesus was helping us His followers to understand that forgiveness should be continuous or a way of life. This is so because we are sinners and therefore we are prone to sin against our neighbors all the time.
Jesus did not only teach about love and forgiveness but also demonstrated it. During the Sermon on the Mount Jesus said, “… Love your enemies and pray for those who are persecuting you” (Matthew 5:44). At the cross Jesus loved and prayed for His enemies when He said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). Jesus knew that they were killing him out of hatred, but He never wanted to hold any sin against them. May the Living God teach us how we must forgive by loving our enemies and praying for those who are persecuting us.
Stephen, the Martyr, learned forgiveness from His Lord and Master Jesus Christ. Stephen demonstrated this when he was being stoned to death as we read in the book of Acts of the Apostles. Before he died, Stephen forgave his enemies when he said; “Lord, do not hold this sin against them” (Acts 7:60). How many times have we failed to forgive our enemies by loving and praying for our enemies?
In our Christian walk, we must know that in one way or the other people around us will sin against us, and this may hurt us. Other times we may hurt ourselves due to our failures and weakness. Still we are called upon to be ready to forgive all the time. Is the Spirit of God showing you someone around you whom you need to forgive? Or is there any way you have been angry at yourself because you have failed to hit the target?
May the living God give us grace to forgive so that we can leave in peace with God and with our fellow men. In the name of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
God bless you all.
Bishop Amos Magezi
Province of Uganda
