“But if you
do not forgive men, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions.” (Matthew
6:15)
“Judge not, and you will
not be judged; condemn not, and you will not be condemned; forgive, and you
will be forgiven; give, and it will be given to you. […] For with the measure you use it will be
measured back to you.” (Luke 6:37-38)
In response to being forgiven by God,
shouldn’t our hearts overflow in love and forgiveness towards others? Shouldn’t we be so in awe of the underserving
mercy God has shown us that our lives are characterized by an outpouring of
grace towards others? Why then, when we
are wronged, do we feel a driving need to call out the unjust? Why do we hold grudges, and why do we possess
the urge to defend ourselves and show others the offenders’ true colors? Why does anger and resentment eat away at our
souls, and is there a better way to respond when we feel unjustly aggrieved?
For myself, I am learning that the
gnawing I feel within to have vengeance and set things right stems mainly from
a heart of pride and unbelief. One of my
greatest idols is man’s approval. I’m a
people-pleaser, and as such much of my identity is wrapped up in how others
view me. While being a people-pleaser
may cause me to appear humble, the reality is that my people-pleasing behavior
actually stems from a twisted sense of pride—pride that demands others respect
me and hold me in high esteem. Any slight against my character or person is
thus a danger that threatens to destroy my world. How do I respond to such slights? Anger.
Bitterness. Resentment. Despair. I believe also that my failure to forgive
arises from a heart of unbelief which manifests itself in two ways— unbelief in
who I am and unbelief in Who God is.
What do I mean by unbelief in who I am?
I mean that I fail to recognize how sinful I really am—I write my sins
off as trivial compared to the sins of others, refusing to believe that I’m
really that bad. What a lie. And then there’s my unbelief in God which
doubts His sovereignty, goodness, and justice.
And what does this cause me to do?
I take matters into my own hands.
C.S. Lewis writes on the problem of
forgiveness in the following:
“. . . you must make every effort to kill every taste of
resentment in your own heart—every wish to humiliate or hurt him or to pay him
out. The difference between this situation and the one in such you are asking
God’s forgiveness is this. In our own case we accept excuses too easily; in
other people’s we do not accept them easily enough.
As regards my own sin it is a safe bet (though not a certainty)
that the excuses are not really so good as I think; as regards other men’s sins
against me it is a safe bet (though not a certainty) that the excuses are
better than I think. One must therefore begin by attending to everything which
may show that the other man was not so much to blame as we thought.
But even if he is absolutely fully to blame we still have to
forgive him; and even if ninety-nine percent of his apparent guilt can be
explained away by really good excuses, the problem of forgiveness begins with
the one percent guilt which is left over. To excuse what can really produce
good excuses is not Christian character; it is only fairness. To be a Christian
means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in
you.
This is hard.
It is perhaps not so hard to forgive a single great injury. But to forgive the
incessant provocations of daily life—to keep on forgiving the bossy
mother-in-law, the bullying husband, the nagging wife, the selfish daughter,
the deceitful son—how can we do it? Only, I think, by remembering where we
stand, by meaning our words when we say in our prayers each night ‘forgive our
trespasses as we forgive those that trespass against us.’ We are offered
forgiveness on no other terms. To refuse it is to refuse God’s mercy for
ourselves. There is no hint of exceptions and God means what He says.”
If I cherish and nurse a grudge against a
fellow man, how can I dare approach God and demand mercy? If I—a depraved and sin-soiled sinner—demand justice when
I am slighted, how much more should the holy and all-powerful God of the
universe demand justice when His name is scorned? Why should God have mercy on me if I fail to
render to Him that which I demand for myself from others? He shouldn’t.
In fact, the intensity with which I hold others guilty bears testimony
to the fact that God will hold me guilty for my sins against Him. It seems then that Christ’s command to “Forgive that you might be forgiven,” is not just a
suggestion—it’s a rule! I like
how John Piper states it when he writes:
“God
treats us in accordance with the belief of our heart: if we believe it is good
and beautiful to harbor resentments and tabulate wrongs done against us, then
God will recognize that our plea for forgiveness is sheer hypocrisy—for we will
be asking Him to do what we believe to be bad. It is a dreadful thing to try to make God your patsy by asking Him to
act in a way that you, as your action shows, esteem very lowly.”
And so, what can I take
away from this? If, in my pride, I hold
fast to an unforgiving spirit, I am proving that I do not trust Christ and His
way of life, for how could I withhold forgiveness for mild offenses when my
monstrous debt against the most high God has been paid in full? I know I can’t earn Heaven by forgiving
others, but my prayer is that I will cease to be like the unforgiving servant
Jesus spoke of in Matthew 18. Through the
power of the Holy Spirit, may I come to resist revenge against those who have
hurt me, grieve at their calamities, pray for their welfare, and seek
reconciliation so far as it depends on me.
“When he was
reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered he did not threaten; but
he trusted to him who judges justly.” (1 Peter
1:23)
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