Gods Forgiveness Our Example
Recite John 15:12-23
God’s Forgiveness, My Example
Introduction – It all starts with God. Specifically, our understanding of forgiveness must always begin with God’s forgiveness of us. You remember last week, we found that Paul knew Philemon well enough to be able to say some pretty good things about his character. He was able to say such things because Philemon consistently lived them out but more importantly he lived in light of God’s forgiveness. Read the Letter to Philemon
Let’s look at God’s forgiveness for us.
I. Let’s define forgiveness – Two main words
a. Apheimi – to let go, give up a debt, forgive, to remit (from Thayer’s Greek Definitions). It often refers to a debt being cancelled or paid in full.
i. Matthew 6:12 - And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. Both occurrences of apheimi in this verse are translated with the idea of forgiving a debt.
ii. In the story of the master and his slave in Matthew 18, the slave is called to account for his astronomical debt, one that he could not repay. In vs. 27 we read, And the lord of that slave felt compassion and released him and forgave him the debt. Again we see the idea of forgiveness in relationship to a debt.
b. Chorizomai – to grant forgiveness or pardon in an unconditional manner. It has the sense of grace or unmerited favor.
i. Luke 7:40-43 40And Jesus answered him, “Simon, I have something to say to you.” And he replied, “Say it, Teacher.” 41“A moneylender had two debtors: one owed five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. 42“When they were unable to repay, he graciously forgave them both. So which of them will love him more?” 43Simon answered and said, “I suppose the one whom he forgave more.” And He said to him, “You have judged correctly.”
i. Colossians 3:12-13 12So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; 13bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you.
II. What God’s forgiveness is not
a. It is not forgetting – at least it is not the same as we use the word today.
i. When we say forget we mean we have failed to recall something or have failed to do something because of carelessness, neglect or it may have been unintentional.
ii. Now in Isaiah 43:25 God says this about himself… “I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, And I will not remember your sins.”
iii. Why doesn’t God say it this way? “I, even I, am the one who wipes out your transgressions for My own sake, And I will forget your sins”
1. For this reason. God doesn’t forget the way we forget. He does not momentarily get distracted by what is going on around him like we do.
iv. What he has done instead is purposely “not remember”.
1. It is an act of his will not to bring up your past sins.
a. Psalm 103:12 As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us.
b. He hasn’t forgotten our sins; he has made a conscious effort to remove our transgressions so that they will not be considered again.
b. It is not excusing – we may sometimes get the idea that forgiveness completely erases the effect of sin. If you have been a believer for any length of time, you know experientially that this is not true. The consequences of sin often remain. There are several examples that we might mention here, I will only mention two.
i. David’s adultery and murder. Listen to what the prophet Nathan says to David in 2 Samuel 12:9-14
1. 9‘Why have you despised the word of the LORD by doing evil in His sight? You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword, have taken his wife to be your wife, and have killed him with the sword of the sons of Ammon. 10‘Now therefore, the sword shall never depart from your house, because you have despised Me and have taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite to be your wife.’ 11“Thus says the LORD, ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you from your own household; I will even take your wives before your eyes and give them to your companion, and he will lie with your wives in broad daylight. 12‘Indeed you did it secretly, but I will do this thing before all Israel, and under the sun.’” 13Then David said to Nathan, “I have sinned against the LORD.” And Nathan said to David, “The LORD also has taken away your sin; you shall not die. 14“However, because by this deed you have given occasion to the enemies of the LORD to blaspheme, the child also that is born to you shall surely die.”
2. David repented of his sin but God did not spare him the result of those sins.
ii. Moses sin at Meribah
1. Numbers 20:8-12 8“Take the rod; and you and your brother Aaron assemble the congregation and speak to the rock before their eyes, that it may yield its water. You shall thus bring forth water for them out of the rock and let the congregation and their beasts drink.” 9So Moses took the rod from before the LORD, just as He had commanded him; 10and Moses and Aaron gathered the assembly before the rock. And he said to them, “Listen now, you rebels; shall we bring forth water for you out of this rock?” 11Then Moses lifted up his hand and struck the rock twice with his rod; and water came forth abundantly, and the congregation and their beasts drank. 12But the LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you have not believed Me, to treat Me as holy in the sight of the sons of Israel, therefore you shall not bring this assembly into the land which I have given them.”
2. God punished Moses for his sin by not letting him lead the people into the Promised Land. He was allowed to lead the people through the wilderness and was able to look into the Promised Land but not enter it.
3. God’s forgiveness is not does not necessarily eliminate the result of sin.
c. It is not free – it is in fact very costly.
i. Forgiveness always costs somebody something. As the one who is forgiven it appears to be free but it is not.
1. Consider the first word I spoke of this morning, apheimi. This word is used in financial matters. When a debt is forgiven the one who was supposed to pay receives a gift but the one who forgives is the one who ultimately pays the debt.
ii. We will observe the Lord’s Supper here in a little while. We will be remembering what Jesus did for us on the cross. Can we ever say that forgiveness is free? We cannot! What makes forgiveness so sweet is that someone else paid our debt for us. We could not pay it so Jesus did it in our stead. Forgiveness is not free!
III. God’s forgiveness for you was a conscious decision. God forgave you in spite of what he knew about you. And what did he know? Everything; past, present and future.
a. He knew you had no desire for Him. Paul reminds us in Ephesians 2:1 “…[we] were dead in our trespasses and sins” and that
b. He knew You could do nothing to save yourself. Even if we had the desire for God we could not make ourselves clean enough, pure enough, holy enough before God to even approach his presence.
i. Through the prophet Jeremiah, God tells his people “Although you wash yourself with lye And use much soap, The stain of your iniquity is before Me.”
c. He knew we needed help. This is where his conscious decision comes in.
i. He sent his only son to do what we could not do for ourselves.
1. John 3:16-17 16“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. 17“For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.
2. Notice how Jesus speaks to us of the heavenly father’s action. He uses words like “gave” and “send”. These are words that indicate a thoughtful decision.
3. Peter says in Acts 10:43, Of Him all the prophets bear witness that through His name everyone who believes in Him receives forgiveness of sins.”
4. This forgiveness of sins, given through Jesus death on the cross, received by faith, allows us to be seen by the heavenly father as clothed in the righteousness of Christ and declares us righteous in his sight.
a. Paul says “by one mans obedience many will be made righteous”.
b. Our debt was forgiven, paid for by Jesus though we did not deserve it and could do nothing to earn it. Such is God’s forgiveness for you and me.
Sing chorus “How Deep the Father’s Love For Us” as a confession of our love and faith in Christ Jesus our Lord.
IV. We must recognize the blessing of forgiveness
a. It has been said by many that Christians are the most forgiven of all people.
b. Psalm 32:1-2 1How blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, Whose sin is covered! 2 How blessed is the man to whom the LORD does not impute iniquity.”
c. Romans 4:7-8 7 “Blessed are those whose lawless deeds have been forgiven, And whose sins have been covered. “Blessed is the man whose sin the Lord will not take into account.”
Communion Service from Matthew 26