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26th March 2024
TuesdayReflection
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'John Piper' asks
What Does Forgiveness Look Like?
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"And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition, as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words".
Matthew 6:7-15
The greatest risk we face as a church in these days is not that we may lose an organ, or that we may lose money, or that we may lose members, or that we may lose staff, or that we may lose reputation.
The greatest risk is that we may lose heaven.
Because one way to lose heaven is to hold fast to an unforgiving spirit and so prove that we have never been indwelt by the Spirit of Christ.
Jesus said,
"Pray like this: 'Our Father who art in heaven etc.
He explains why he taught us to pray this way:
"For if you forgive men for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions."
If we hold fast to an unforgiving spirit, we will not be forgiven by God.
If we continue on in that way, then we will not go to heaven, because heaven is the dwelling place of forgiven people.
Jesus told a parable of the Unforgiving Servant to illustrate this point.
The point is that if we hold fast to an unforgiving spirit, we will be handed over to the tormentors.
We will lose heaven, and gain hell.
The reason is not because we can earn heaven or merit heaven by forgiving others, but because holding fast to an unforgiving spirit proves that we do not trust Jesus.
If we trust him, we will not spurn his way of life.
Paul said in Ephesians 4, God's forgiveness is underneath ours and creates it and supports it.
So that if we don't give it to others - what we show is that God is not there in our lives.
We are not trusting him.
And not trusting him will keep us out of heaven.
I want to take that great resurrection teaching from Corinthians 15, that if Jesus has not been raised from the dead, we are still in our sins; but in fact He has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep, and the great unshakable vindication of our forgiveness from God.
Today the question is: what is forgiveness? What does it look like?
What isn't it?
We have heard from Jesus that it is essential.
It is not icing on the cake of Christianity.
If we don't experience it and offer it to others, we will perish in our sin.
So it is tremendously important to know what this is that is so essential to our eternal life.
When do we forgive others?
When we strive against all thoughts of revenge;
when we will not do our enemies mischief, but wish well to them, grieve at their calamities, pray for them, seek reconciliation with them, and show ourselves ready on all occasions to relieve them.
I think this is a very biblical definition of forgiveness.
Each of its parts comes from a passage of Scripture.
All these point to a forgiving heart.
And the heart is all important.
Jesus said in "unless you forgive your brother from your heart...."
But now notice what is not there in this definition.
Notice what forgiveness is not.
Forgiveness is not the absence of anger at sin.
It is not feeling good about what was bad.
You are not expected to feel good about what happened.
Anger against sin and its horrible consequences is fitting up to a point.
But you don't need to hold on to that in a vindictive way that desires harm.
Forgiveness is not the absence of serious consequences for sin.
In other words, sending a person to jail does not mean you are unforgiving to him.
One example, in the book of Hebrews.
On the one hand the book teaches that all Christians are forgiven for their sins; but on the other hand it teaches that our heavenly Father disciplines us, sometimes severely.
In Hebrews it says, "I will be merciful to their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more."
Then in it says,
Our earthly fathers disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us for our good, that we may share His holiness.
So our sins are forgiven and forgotten in the sense that they no longer bring down the wrath of a judge, but not in the sense that they no longer bring down the painful spanking of a father.
><(((°>
This is an extremely edited version.
The full article is avaiable on request
'John Piper'
is founder and teacher of desiringGod.org and chancellor of Bethlehem College & Seminary.
For 33 years, he served as pastor of 'Bethlehem Baptist Church', Minneapolis, Minnesota.
He is author of more than 50 books, including Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist and most recently Foundations for Lifelong Learning: Education in Serious Joy.
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