The Pardon of Prayer- Part I
Notes
Transcript
The Pardon of Prayer Part I
Text: Matthew 6:5–15 (KJV 1900)
5 And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are:
for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.
7 But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. 8 Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.
9 After this manner therefore pray ye:
Our Father which art in heaven,
Hallowed be thy name.
10 Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
11 Give us this day our daily bread.
12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
13 And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil:
For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen.
( For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: 15 But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.)
Introduction:
* This morning we will be dealing with the Phrase from what we call the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew chapter 6 and verse 12.
* Now, I want to remind you that we’ve already learned for the past several weeks, that that the true purpose for prayer is focused on God and not on ourselves.
* We have grown up believing that the purpose for praying is to get things from God, but Jesus, in the Lord’s Prayer is teaching His disciples that self-centered praying is how the scribes and the Pharasees prayed.
* Jesus called the self-centered praying of the scribes and Pharisees hypocritical in verse 5 of our text here in Matthew chapter 6.
5 And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are:
for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.
7 But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. 8 Be not ye therefore like unto them: for your Father knoweth what things ye have need of, before ye ask him.
* Each Sunday we have looked at The Lord’s Prayer phrase by phrase and we have seen that each prayer indicates to us that true prayer focuses on God and not on ourselves. When we pray right we are to focus on:
- God and his Fatherhood,
- God and His Holiness,
- God and His Kingdom,
- God and that His will being done on the earth,
- And this week we will focus on God’s Provision for our forgiveness as we look at the phrase “forgive us our debts.”
* When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, Jesus gave them a template, or a pattern, to guide their praying, that their, and our, praying might be according to the will of God.
* This pattern prayer is a prayer intent on glorifying God:
- Prayer that glorifies God begins with God’s paternity, “Our Father who art in heaven.”
- Prayer that glorifies God focuses on God’s priority, “hallowed be Thy name.”
- And then prayer that glorifies focuses on God God’s program, “Thy kingdom come.”
- And then prayer that glorifies God focuses on God’s purpose, “Thy will be done.”
- And then prayer that glorifies God focuses on God’s provision, “Give us this day our daily bread.”
- And now we are looking at how prayer that glorifies God focuses on God’s pardon, “Forgive us our debts.”
- Next we will look at how prayer that glorifies God focuses on God’s protection, “Lead us not.”
- And last of all, we will look at how prayer that glorifies God focuses on God’s preeminence, “For Thine is the kingdom, and the power and the glory”
* Everything about the Lord’s Prayer focuses on God, and not on us.
* We come now to the phrase “Forgive is our debts, as we forgive our debtors.”
* We now come to the part of praying that deals with sin.
* The very nature of prayer itself is that we are acknowledging a total dependence on God.
* Follow the logic, if you will, of what Jesus is saying here in the Lord’s Prayer:
- With God we have no daily bread
- Without God we will have no forgiveness of sin
- Without God, we will have no leading and directing in our lives
- Therefore, God is the preeminence, the power. and the glory in the kingdoms of Heaven and Earth. We’re focusing on God.
* We are still focusing on God in this prayer, when we come the petition “forgive us our debts”
* This petition focuses us on God, and acknowledges God as the only one who can pardon, or forgive Sin.
* Last Sunday we looked at the petition “Give us this day our daily bread.” We learned that this phrase was much more than just asking God to meet our needs, but more importantly, this was admitting, and acknowledging, that everything that we need in life comes from the hand of God.
* I like to say that “I live hand to mouth.” From God’s hand to my mouth!
* Most certainly, we need God, our Creator, to sustain us and keep us alive and to meet all of our physical needs, but now this morning we come to a need more serious, and a thousand times more important, than having food, and clothes, and shelter, and health!
* Still teaching about prayer, a few more verses down in this morning’s text, Jesus said:
Matthew 6:25 (KJV 1900)
25 Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on.
* Then Jesus reveals that there is a greater need of mankind than that of food, and clothes, and health, and shelter. Jesus says there is a greater need, and asks the question:
Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment?
* What could possibly be more important that what is necessary to keep us alive?
* The answer to that question is found in our text this morning in Matthew chapter 6 and verse 12- “Forgive us our debts.”
* We think that it is more important than anything to stay alive, and we fear anything that threatens our physical lives, but Jesus taught that saving our spiritual lives was much more needed that preserving our physical lives.
Luke 12:4–5 (KJV 1900)
4 And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. 5 But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell; yea, I say unto you, Fear him.
* Jesus also said in Matthew 16:26:
Matthew 16:26 (KJV 1900)
26 For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?
* If we were to have the best food, live in the best house that money could buy, have all the clothes that we would ever needed, and live in perfect health until we were 90 years old…
* It would all be a waste and in vain, if we do not have forgiveness of sin!
* Forgiveness of sin is the deepest need of every man, woman, boy or Girl this morning!
* I have told you before in this study of the Lord’s Prayer, that true praying has to do with the inside of a man and not the outside of a man.
* It is what is on the inside that is important to God. The spirit of a man is on the inside, and thus the spiritual things in life matter the most.
* The most basic, most needed request on the part of the inner man, is for the forgiveness of sins. That is man’s deepest spiritual need.
* That is where God and man must meet each other!- in the inside of a man- in His eternal soul.- the inside of a man.
* Before God can ever “lead us not into temptation,” before God can ever “deliver us from evil” as the next phrase in the Lord’s Prayer says, we must have a relationship to God on the inside!
* Any relationship to God is only possible after our sins are dealt with.
* For God is a holy God and His pure eyes cannot look upon the evilness of sin!
* The prophet Isaiah proclaimed “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God!” There is no way that an absolute holy God can possibly entertain a relationship with unholy, ungodly sinful men!
I. We see in the petition “forgive us your debts” the need to have our sins removed from us.
* So, because God is holy, the greatest need of mankind is to have his sin’s removed from Him.
* All throughout the study of the Beatitudes, and this study of the Lord’s Prayer, we have referred back to the key verse of the Sermon on the Mount in chapter 5 and verse 20:
Matthew 5:20 (KJV 1900)
20 For I say unto you, That except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.
* And then Jesus also said in chapter 5 and verse 48:
Matthew 5:48 (KJV 1900)
48 Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.
* How can we be perfect as God in Heaven is perfect?
* The answer to this dilemma is found in our very text this morning in the phrase “Forgive us our debts.”
* Sin is the problem. And the only way to be perfect is to have our sins removed from us!
* Sin is the problem of every man. Man is incurably sinful.
* Listen to Romans chapter 3 for a moment- this is very basic but very necessary.
* Romans 3 and verse 10 says, “As it is written there is none righteous, no not one.
* And the Lord put the last part there because as sure as you’re born, if it had just said “There is none righteous,” somebody would have added a comma, and said “except me.”
* And so the Lord says there is none righteous, no, not even you! Not one!
* Verse 12 says; “They are all gone out of the way,” that is they have all departed from the way of righteousness, “They are together become unprofitable,” the Greek word that is translated here for unprofitable, means to go sour like bad milk.
* Paul goes on to say “There is none that doeth good, no not you,” nobody.
* In verse 19; the apostle Paul says by the Holy Spirit
“Now we know that whatever things he law saith, it saith to them under the law that every mouth may be stopped,”
* In other words, there’s no defense, you have nothing to say to justify yourself.“
* The apostle Paul goes on to say “that all the world may become guilty before God.”
* And in Romans chapter 6, and Verse 23, the Bible says; “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”
* Chapter 4 goes on to say; “In Adam all have died and sin has passed upon them all.”
* The point that the Holy Spirit is trying to make here by the hand of the apostle Paul, is that everybody is confirmed in sin, everybody.
* Sin disturbs every relationship in the human realm!
* Sin stirred up cosmic chaos and resulted in Satan being cast out of Heaven to the earth!
* Sin waits to attack every baby born into the world. David said, “In sin did my mother conceive me.”
* And the Bible tells us that iniquity, sin, begins even from the moment when we are born!
* Sin is the monarch of the world that rules the heart of every man. Sin is the first lord of the soul!
* Sin’s virus has contaminated every living being. Sin is the degenerative power in the human race that makes man susceptible to disease and illness and death and hell!
* Sin is the culprit in every broken marriage, every disrupted home, every shattered friendship, every argument, every pain, every sorrow, every anguish and every death!
* In all the suffering and evil in this world in which we live, Sin is the common denominator!
* No wonder the Bible says in Joshua 7:13:, “Sin is that accursed thing!”
* In the Bible, sin is compared to the venom of a snake! It is compared to the stench of death!
* And tragically, from the viewpoint of human resources, absolutely nothing can be done about sin!
* The prophet Jeremiah said, “Can the Ethiopian change his color? Can the leopard change his spots?
* You have just about as much a chance to cleanse yourself from the guilt of your sin, than and Ethiopian can change the color of his skin!
* The Bible says you have just about as much a chance of riding yourself of the guilt of your sin, as a leopard does of cleaning off his spots! It’s hopeless! You can’t remove the guilt of your sin!
* Sin dominates the mind!
* Romans 1:21 says, “Men have a reprobate mind, a mind given over to evil and lust.”
* Sin dominates the will!
* Jeremiah 44 says; “Men will to do evil because their will is controlled by sin.”
* Sin dominates the emotions and the affections
* John 3 says “men love darkness rather than light.”
* The mind, the will, the affections, emotions, all dominated by sin!
* Sin brings men under the control of Satan.
* In Ephesians 2 it says, “Men are guided by the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the sons of disobedience.”
* According to Ephesians 2:3, sin brings people under divine wrath of God, they become children of wrath!
* Sin causes people to be the bulls eyes for the guns of God’s judgment!
* Job says that sin makes man’s life utterly miserable.
* Job says “Man is born unto trouble like the sparks fly upward.”
* Isaiah 57:21 says, “There is no peace to the wicked.”
* Romans 8:20 says, “The creature is subject to emptiness. Because of sin”
* Man’s entire existence is color stained with sin!
* And the fifty million or so people that die every year face the ultimate consequence of sin! Judgment!
Hebrews 9:26–27 (KJV 1900)
27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:
* So man has a deep, deep problem. Sin … its mankind’s worst problem, and it is your worst problem!
* And the forgiveness of sin is a deeper problem than your need for bread or anything else in life!
* Here in the phrase “forgive us our debts,” Jesus is teaching that your sin must be brought before God for it is your deepest need.
* It must be dealt with. You see? And so as we pray in our prayers there must be this element of recognition of our sinfulness. That’s what Jesus is teaching here in the phrase “forgive us our debts.”
II. From the phrase “forgive us our debts” we learn that Sin is a debt we owe to a Holy God.
* Let’s take a moment to look at the word debt in our text in Matthew chapter 6 and verse 12.
* We come to the word in verse 12, that’s the word debt, ophileema. You know, that’s a very, very interesting word. It’s only used here andI think in Romans 4.
* The only two times it’s ever used as a noun, its verb form is used many times. It’s a word that is not that familiar to us when we thing about sin.
* But, there is something very interesting about this word.
* This word for debt is used in the New Testament 5 times as a money debt, but 25 times it’s used when speaking of a moral debt.
* The idea is that sin is a debt. When you sin you owe to God a consequence for your sin. You owe that debt, you have violated His holiness and you owe Him a punishment for that violation of His holiness.
* It’s kind of like, when you tell your kids … you do that and you’ll get one whack. You do it again you’ll get two whacks. And they keep doing it and doing it and pretty soon, they’ve stacked up quite a few whacks, and so they have a debt of punishment that needs to be paid.
* In a sense that’s what God is saying, He is saying that your sin is a debt that you owe to Him. Our sins have becomes a debt we owe a punishment to God for.
* When you violate God’s holiness a record is kept of that debt.
* The Bible tells us in the book of Revelation, at the great White Throne Judgment, God will judge the ungodly out of the books that are opened before the throne of God on judgment day.
* What books? These books are the books that contain the all the records of the debts these people owe to God for sin, debts that are unpaid, and they are judged out of these books and sentenced to an eternal hell to continuously pay the debt that they can never repay.
* You see? Sin is a debt. You might be interested to know that among the Jewish rabbis, and the Jews of Matthews day, the most common word used for sin was the word “koba.”
* The rabbis spoke Aramaic in their common day language, not the Greek which in which our text is written.
* And so the word “koba” was the most common Jewish term for sin.
* “Koba” means a debt, because to a Jew the primary responsibility in life was to obey God, and when you disobeyed God you owed Him a debt for your disobedience. This was the Jewish understanding of Sin.
* And so the Jew thought in terms of sin as a debt.
* Now when you go to Luke and you read about the disciple’s prayer, Luke doesn’t say, forgive us our debts, but he says, forgive us our trespasses or our sins, because he writes in a more classical manner than Matthew wrote.
* But here in our text, Matthew, with his Jewish background, zeros in on this concept of debt, because he knows his Jewish audience will really pick up on that.
* We owe a debt. Sin, then, is a debt to God.
* We have incurred a debt of punishment, and it is for this that we pray for a divine pardon.”
* In other words, we owe such a massive debt to God because of our unrelenting sin that we could never pay that debt. Do you know that?
* You could never pay that debt.
* Like the unfaithful servant in one of Jesus stories, who owed so much it never could be paid in his whole lifetime, we can’t pay the debt we owe God over our Sin!
* We can’t pay it. And that is precisely our problem. We are sinners who owe a debt that is so monstrous, it’s inconceivable that we could ever pay it!
* And Jesus, when He taught His disciples to pray “forgive us our debts,” was teaching us when we pray to God on the terms of the recognition of that debt.
* Jesus was teaching us to pray with the attitude that we are eternal debtors to God because of our sin!
* Even the apostle Peter said when he says Jesus, “Depart from me for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” Even Paul said, “I am the chief of sinners.”
* Listen, Jesus taught all men everywhere to pray this prayer, “Forgive us our debts,” and in so doing He laid out the for us the fact that every man has the need for forgiveness of sin.
* If all men are to pray it then all men are to admit that sin is their problem.
* And that’s why the Holy Spirit came into the world in John chapter 16 to convict the world of sin. Because we are all sinners.
John 16:7–8 (KJV 1900)
7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.
8 And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment:
* Any man who honestly faces the reality of his character cannot deny his debt to God and his need to have his sins forgiven.
* We are all sinners. Because of our sin, we owe a debt to God that we cannot pay.
III. Forgiveness for sin was not possible until the debt for our sin was paid.
Galatians 4:3–5 (KJV 1900)
3 Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world:
* This is speaking of being under the bondage of sin in the world…
4 But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, 5 To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.
* Because of the sentence of God’s judgment upon sin, it was not possible for God to forgive our sins until Jesus made the full payment for our sins.
* God had already said in Ezekeil 18:20 “the soul that sinneth, it shall die!”
* Jesus made that full payment on the cross, when he died in our place, and paid the payment owed for your sins.
* And when He was done paying for our sins he said “it is finished!” The debt for sin has been paid in full!
* The forgiveness of sin is not possible while the debt for sin is still owed.
* This is why Jesus had to come from Heaven, and be born as a man, so that he would be able, as a man, to pay the debt of sin.
* The Bible says that “the soul that sinneth, it shall die”, and it also says in Romans chapter 6 and verse 23: “for the wages of sin is death.”
* Jesus came to die that death, and pay off the debt of sin that you owed to God.
* Forgiveness for sin is offered by God on the legal grounds of Christ’s death.
* God is a holy God and God is aware that man is fallen in sin, incurable, and unable to help himself!
Romans 5:12 (KJV 1900)
12 Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
* But God is merciful, loving and forgiving so God has offered forgiveness of sins to all mankind.
* Even though every man is guilty, and stands ready to be judged and condemned for his sins, God is a forgiving God.
* The Bible says He will remember our sin no more, He will pass by our iniquities, He will bury them in the depths of the sea, He will remove them as far as the east is from the west, all throughout the prophets and the apostles of the Scriptures there is this unceasing promise that God is a God of forgiveness!
* God wants to forgive us our sins.
* Now God didn’t just write our debt off. The debt that we owed for the penalty of our sins, had to be paid in full, or God would not be a righteous judge!
* A just and a righteous and a holy God cannot forgive sin, unless sin’s penalty is paid!
* Jesus took our place, died our death, and paid for all of our sin.
* Forgiveness to us then is now offered to us by God on the legal grounds of Christ’s death as payment for our sin.
* When we accept the payment that Jesus paid on the cross for our sin, we can never be charged for our sin, past, present, or future, ever again!
Romans 8:1–2 (KJV 1900)
There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
Colossians 2:13–14 (KJV 1900)
13 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;
14 Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us,
and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross;
IV. From the phrase “forgive us our debts” we learn that confession of sin to God is necessary to receive forgiveness from God.
* Now, here in the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray “forgive us our debts.”
* By giving us this example, Jesus is teaching us that confession of sin, is necessary to receive forgiveness from God.
* When John the Baptist came preaching that Jesus the messiah, the coming savior, was here, he preached that to prepare the way for the savior, men must first repent of their sin!
Matthew 3:1–3 (KJV 1900)
In those days came John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judaea, 2 And saying, Repent ye:
for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. 3 For this is he that was spoken of by the prophet Esaias, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness,
Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make his paths straight.
* One day when John the Baptist was preaching there were some men that came to be baptized that did not come to confess their sin, and John set them straight!
Matthew 3:5–8 (KJV 1900)
5 Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judaea, and all the region round about Jordan,
6 And were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins.
7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation of vipers, who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?
8 Bring forth therefore fruits meet for repentance:
* When Jesus came preaching he preached that repentance of sin is necessary before we can be saved!
Luke 13:3–5 (KJV 1900)
3 I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. 4 Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem?
5 I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.
* When the apostle Peter preached the sermon on the day of Pentecost, it was a sermon on repentance of sin! And repentance was necessary before they could be saved and receive the Holy Spirit into their hearts for salvation!
Acts 2:37–38 (KJV 1900)
37 Now when they heard this, they were pricked in their heart, and said unto Peter and to the rest of the apostles, Men and brethren, what shall we do?
38 Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Acts 17:30–31 (KJV 1900)
30 And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men every where to repent:
31 Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.
* The forgiveness of sin is available. The penalty has been paid for. The propitiation, or the covering for sin has been made by the precious blood of Jesus. The payment for sin’s debt has been satisfied! The wages of sin have been paid in full!
* Forgiveness of sin now is only a matter of receiving the gift.
Romans 6:23 (KJV 1900)
23 For the wages of sin is death; but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
* And now only one thing stands between mankind and the forgiveness of sin- before receiving forgiveness must come the confession of sin!
* As the apostle Paul puts it in Acts 20, “Repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ results in salvation.”
* No man ever receives salvation that is not repentant for sin!
* There are plenty of people in this world that believe that believe the Bible is true. The Bible even says the devils believe that Jesus is the Son of God, but they are not forgiven!
* You may agree with everything that I have said up to this point this morning, but if you will not confess your sin before God, you will not be saved!
* If you remember our study of the beatitudes our Lord said, if you want to enter My kingdom you enter My kingdom like this:
- first of all you acknowledge that you are a beggar in your spirit,
- you are abject and destitute and no resources are available to you- you have no way to help yourself!
- and in the midst of your beggarly sinfulness with your vile robes of wretchedness, you cry out, it says, mourning over your sin,
- meek before a holy God and hunger and thirst for righteousness, plead for His mercy and on that basis God will receive you!
* In Luke 18 it tells us that the Pharisee went into the temple and said I thank thee that I am not as other men, even as this publican over here, tax collector, but that I fast twice a week and give tithes of all that I possess, etc. etc. and over in the corner was the tax collector and he wouldn’t so much as lift up his eyes to heaven but he smote upon his breast, and he cried out … God, be merciful to me a sinner.
* And Jesus said, “That man went home justified rather than the other.”
* Why? Because one refused to acknowledge his sinfulness and the other acknowledged his sinfulness!
* To receive the available forgiveness of sin, the confession of sin is required!
* God is eager and anxious to forgive anyone who confesses his guilt of sin!
* The Bible says in I John 1:7 If we confess our sin, God is faithful and righteous to keep on cleansing us from all sin.
1 John 1:7–10 (KJV 1900)
7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.
8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
* This morning, sin is mankind’s worst problem, and when Jesus taught us to pray “forgive us our debts,” He was teaching us that repentance was necessary for forgiveness of sin.
* Forgiveness is taking away our sin, covering our sin, blotting out our sin and forgetting our sin.
* Forgiveness is God taking away our sin. Isaiah 53:6 says; “God has taken the iniquity of us all and laid it on Him.”- that Him is Jesus. Forgiveness means that God has taken away our sin.
* And then forgiveness means He’s covered our sin. Psalm 85:2 says;
“Thou hast covered all their sin.”
* And forgiveness means that God has blotted out our sin. Isaiah 43:25 says, “I am He that blotteth out thy transgressions.”
* And forgiveness means that God has forgotten all our sins. He remembers our sins no more.
* Forgiveness means that God literally eliminates our sin!
* Oh how thankful we should be for such a forgiveness! And, listen, it’s only possible because of Christ.
* God couldn’t just pass by your sin unless He placed the punishment for your sin on someone else and that is exactly why Christ Jesus died. He died for your sin.
V. From the phrase “forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors” we learn that that are aspects, or facets, or kinds of God’s forgiveness.
* We come now to the second half of our phrase “as we forgive our debtors.”
* Now here is where many people get confused.
* The full phrase says, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors” and then in verse 14 Jesus gives us a little footnote on this phrase:
* Jesus says,
“And if you forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will forgive you and if you forgive not men their trespasses neither will your Father forgive your trespasses,”
* Now all of a sudden we say, wait a minute! Let’s back the truck up a minute here!
* If all my sins are already all forgiven in Christ, if all my sins were paid for by Jesus already, why do I need to ask forgiveness again?
* And what’s more, when I ask for forgiveness, why won’t I get forgiveness from God, it unless I give forgiveness to somebody else?
* What’s up with that! I’m all confused now!
* These are the questions that have confused a lot of people.
* If I’m already a Christian, and all my sins are forgiven, past, present and future, then what am I doing saying “Forgive us our debts” and what is God doing saying, “And if you don’t forgive somebody else I’m not going to forgive you?”
* If you want to know the answer to that, be here next week at 11:00- I’m all out of time!
* I’ll give you a little hint for now- you need understand the difference between God’s “judicial forgiveness” and His “relational forgiveness.”
* Judicial forgiveness deals with your position before God forever, relational forgiveness deals with the fellowship you have with the father, day by day.
* We will go into great detail with this, next Sunday, the Lord willing, and I will give several examples that nail this difference down from the Scriptures.
* Let’s pray together.
Conclusion:
* You may be here this morning, and for the first time the Holy Spirit of God has revealed to you that you have a debt that you owe to God because of your sin- a debt that you could never pay!
* The debt is the wages sin, and Romans chapter 6 says that the wages you owe God is death. Death to the body, and spiritual death where you will spend eternity separated from the forgiveness of God in the flames and torments of Hell.
* Jesus has already paid your debt, God is now able to forgive your sin debt, but one thing stands in your way for forgiveness of sin and Heaven- confession of your sin to God- repentance!
* Will you repent to God of your sins this morning and believe on Jesus for forgiveness of sin?
* The ball is in your court now, God has done everything He can do for you- It’s your move- Will you come, repent of your sins and be saved right now?
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Notes for next Sunday…
Judicial Forgiveness.
Now, there are two kinds of forgiveness. Now watch this, this is really interesting. Two kinds, number one is judicial forgiveness, number two … let’s call it parental forgiveness; judicial and parental. Now let’s start with the first one. Judicial forgiveness, and I think this is all we’ll talk about this morning. Judicial forgiveness. What is that? It views God as a judge. God looks down and says, you’re guilty, you’ve broken the law, you’re under judgment, condemnation, there’s got to be punishment. But then that same judge says, on the basis of Christ’s death, He bore your punishment, He took your guilt; He paid for: your sin, the price is accomplished, I declare you to be forgiven. That is a judicial act. Full, complete, positional, I like to use that word because it relates to things we’ve studied in the past, positional forgiveness granted by God as the moral judge of the universe. And by that act of judicial forgiveness, listen to this, all your sins, past, present, future, committed, being committed, and uncommitted are totally, completely and forever forgiven and you are justified from all things forever.
You say … wow! When does that happen? It happens the moment you invite Jesus Christ into your life. The moment you are redeemed. The moment you place your faith in Christ, your sin is put on Him, His righteousness is put on you and God judicially declares you to be justified. That’s Romans 3. Declared righteous. Positionally and forever all sin covered, passed over, blotted out and forgotten. Oh, what a thought. Isn’t that great? And He just keeps on doing it. This is because of Christ, beloved; this is what He did on the cross. In Matthew 26:28 He said as beheld the cup, “This is My blood of the New Testament which is for the forgiveness of sin.” You see? In Ephesians 1:7 Paul said, “In Christ we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.” In 1 John 2:12; “I write unto you little children because your sins are forgiven for His name sake.” Ephesians 4:32, “Even as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you.” In other words, because Christ took all our sins and paid the penalty when we believe in Christ and accept His sacrifice, God appropriates it on our behalf, judicially we are declared righteous and just forever and forgiven. For sins past, present and future. You say, is that just New Testament? Now watch this, I don’t believe that, I believe that is Old Testament too. Now some people think that in the Old Testament you were saved until you sinned the next time and then when you made another sacrifice you were saved again. I don’t think so. I think you were saved in the Old Testament just like people are in the New Testament by believing God. By submitting yourself to God. I think redemption in the Old Testament was just as momentary and just as instantaneous and just as exact as in the New. For example, you take Abraham in James 2:23, and it says, “Abraham believed God.” In other words, Abraham came to a point in his life when he had faith in God and he exercised that faith toward God and believed all that God had revealed to that time and accepted God as his Lord and his Savior and at that point, though he never sawthe cross or perceived all that Christ would be, he believed God and James 2:23 says that, “At that moment it was imputed unto him for righteousness and from then on he was called a friend,” of whom? “Of God.” He was saved in a moment. In Romans 4 again it says, “Abraham believed God and it was counted to him for righteousness.” And to him that believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly his faith is counted for righteousness. He believed and it was counted to him for righteousness and from then on it says in that same chapter, “Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, whose sins are covered, blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.” From the moment that Abraham believed, from then on throughout his life God never imputed sin to him again because his sins were placed on Christ just as much as yours are. We’re post-Christ he was pre-Christ but all the sins of all the saints of all those ages at the moment they believed were put on Christ. Christ is the apex of history. Whether you lived on the front side or the back side, He still bore their sins. And by an act of faith at that point, Christ’s redemption, the value of Christ’s redemption as applied to them. Psalm 103:3 says, that God is the one who forgive: all our iniquities and heals all our diseases.
I believe they knew judicial redemption in the Old Testament and I believe their sins were nailed to the cross just as much as ours when they believed God. Listen to this, Colossians 2:13, oh it’s a fabulous, fabulous illustration. It’s the picture that God has kept these books I told you about. And all through our lives He writes down the record of our sins. And the debt gets worse and worse and worse and worse and worse and worse. And there is no capacity in our lives to pay the debt at all. And all of this debt is on the sheet. Then all of a sudden Christ goes to the cross and you read in Colossians 2:13, “And you being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh,” that’s you, dead, you couldn’t do anything about your sins, you’re hopeless, you have been made alive with Him. Now watch, “Having forgiven you all trespasses,” and then this fabulous imagery, “blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against you.” Listen, “And nailing it to His cross He took it out of the way.” You know, when they crucified a criminal they crucified him with at the top of the cross the record of his crimes, nailed there for the world to see why he was being crucified. The apostle Paul is saying this, great truth, when Jesus died on the cross God pulled all the pages out of the books that belonged to all that would believe throughout history, stacked them all together, nailed them to the cross as if they were the crimes of Jesus and when Jesus died He paid the penalty for every crime that was nailed to His cross and God blotted them out.
Richard III
Shakespeare, he says, “My conscience has a thousand several tongues and every tongue its several tale and every tale condemns me.” If you’re a Christian you don’t have to say that, do you? You can say with Paul in Romans 8, “Who is he that condemneth?” Where is he? Who condemns me? Shall God the justified? In other words, if God is the highest court in the universe and He declares me just who’s going to condemn me? Nobody. Therefore, nothing shall separate me from the love of Christ. Nothing at all.
I want to close by showing you one other text. Hebrews 10, one of my favorite passages. I hope it’s one of yours. In Hebrews 10 the writer is comparing the sacrificial system of Israel with the sacrifice of Christ. And I want you to notice verse 10 of Hebrews 10. He says, “We are sanctified,” fourth word there, “We are sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” Stop right there a minute. Sanctified means to be made pure, be made pure, made holy, set apart, separated. We are made holy, we are set apart by the one sacrifice of Christ. Oh, listen, people, you don’t have to repeat it. When He died and we believed, His sacrifice was sufficient. He said on the cross, “It is finished.” We are sanctified, set apart unto God which is a perfect participle in the Greek with a finite verb and it is the strongest possible way the Greek language knows to show the permanent, continuous, state of salvation that issues from one great event. And so Christ dies on the cross, the moment we believe that is imputed to us and there is a continuous forgiveness based on that one offering.
In contrast to that in verse 11 the priests of the Old Testament were daily ministering and they were standing, see the word standeth, standing and offering the same sacrifices again and again and again, always standing up because the job was never done. Verse 12, “But this man after He offered one sacrifice for sin forever, sat down.” Why? It was over. Priests may be stading walking around doing it over and over again but Christ did it once and sat down. It can’t be repeated, it doesn’t need to be. Why? Verse 14, “For by one offering He hath perfected forever and ever them that are sanctified.” And if Jesus says in Matthew 5:48, “Be ye perfect” and Christ goes to the cross and perfects us then Christ is the solution to the problem. Right? We’re to be perfect and He perfects us, in His one offering. That, beloved, is judicial forgiveness and the result of it is in verse 17, “Their sins and iniquities will I,” what? “Remember no more.” Oh, what a great thought. Listen beloved, all your sins are forgiven because of Christ if you believe. That is judicial positional forgiveness.
Relational Forgiveness
Now, go back to Matthew 6 and I’m going to close by introducing one thought. It says, “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors” and verse 14 says, “And if you forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Fatherwill forgive you and if you forgive not men their trespasses neither will your Father forgive your trespasses,” and all of a sudden we say, wait a minute. If all my sins are already all forgive in Christ, if all my sins were dealt with in the cross of Christ w y do I need to ask forgiveness and why won’t I get it unless I give it to somebody else? That is the question that has confused a lot of people. Some people say, well, this is a prayer for an unbeliever. No, no, it’s not a prayer for an unbeliever. Because an unbeliever does not begin his prayer “Our Father”, does he? This is a believer’s prayer. A disciple’s prayer. You’re already a Christian before you get to verse 12, folks. You say, well, if I’m already a Christian and all my sins are forgiven what am I doing saying “Forgive us our debts” and what is God doing saying, “And if you don’t forgive somebody else I’m not going to forgive you?” If you want to know the answer to that be here next week. And if you don’t want to know the answer to that, God have mercy on your sin-sick shriveled up soul. Because that’s one of the greatest truths in all the Bible and the basis of it is this, you must understand, I’ll give you a hint now, you must understand the difference between judicial forgiveness and parental forgiveness. One deals with your position before God forever, the other deals with the joy of your fellowship day by day. And we’ll see that, Lord willing, next week.
If we are to have any relationship with God, if there is any spiritual thing to be gained it begins with a petition for forgiveness
Principle number one, these are the four principles that I see germane to he thrust of this text. Number one … sin makes man guilty and brings judgment.
Second principle, very simple but I want you to understand it, forgiveness is offered by God on the ground of Christ’s death. Forgiveness is offered by God on the ground of Christ’s death.
A third principle, confession of sin is necessary to receive that forgiveness from God. Confession of sin is necessary to receive that forgiveness from God. The forgiveness is available. The penalty has been paid for. The propitiation or the covering has been made. The satisfaction has been accomplished. It is only a matter of receiving the gift. And basic to that reception is a confession of sin.
Now, I gave you fourprinciples, didn’t I? And I hope you remembered them. Principle number one … sin makes men guilty and brings judgment. Number two … forgiveness is offered by God on the ground of Christ’s death. Number three … confessing sin is necessary to receive the available forgiveness from God. And number four … forgiving one another is essential if we are to be forgiven.