Scripture referenced 8 passages
The passage this message was preached from, in full, with every other passage it reached for.
-
Matthew 6:9-13 The Lord's Prayer, prayed together and then read aloud as the basis for the sermon on forgiveness
9 Pray like this: ‘Our Father in heaven, may your name be kept holy.
10 Let your Kingdom come. Let your will be done, as in heaven, so on earth.
11 Give us today our daily bread.
12 Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.
13 Bring us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the Kingdom, the power, and the glory forever. Amen.’
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Keep this verse
Matthew 6:14-15
Read to show the link between forgiving others and being forgiven by the heavenly Father
14 “For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
15 But if you don’t forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Matthew 22:34-40
Referenced as the greatest commandment, loving God and neighbor, used to show how unforgiveness hinders loving others
34 But the Pharisees, when they heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, gathered themselves together.
35 One of them, a lawyer, asked him a question, testing him.
36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?”
37 Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’
38 This is the first and great commandment.
39 A second likewise is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’
40 The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.”
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Genesis 3:22
Quoted to establish that humans know good and evil, providing the framework for understanding wrong and the need for forgiveness
22 Yahweh God said, “Behold, the man has become like one of us, knowing good and evil. Now, lest he reach out his hand, and also take of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever—”
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
James 4:1
Quoted to explain how conflict arises from competing desires, which creates the opportunity for forgiveness
1 Where do wars and fightings among you come from? Don’t they come from your pleasures that war in your members?
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Matthew 7:2
Quoted to show that the measure we use to judge others will be used against us
2 For with whatever judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with whatever measure you measure, it will be measured to you.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Matthew 18:21-35
The parable of the unmerciful servant, read in full to illustrate how much we have been forgiven and why we must forgive others
21 Then Peter came and said to him, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Until seven times?”
22 Jesus said to him, “I don’t tell you until seven times, but, until seventy times seven.
23 Therefore the Kingdom of Heaven is like a certain king, who wanted to reconcile accounts with his servants.
24 When he had begun to reconcile, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents.
25 But because he couldn’t pay, his lord commanded him to be sold, with his wife, his children, and all that he had, and payment to be made.
26 The servant therefore fell down and knelt before him, saying, ‘Lord, have patience with me, and I will repay you all!’
27 The lord of that servant, being moved with compassion, released him, and forgave him the debt.
28 “But that servant went out, and found one of his fellow servants, who owed him one hundred denarii, and he grabbed him, and took him by the throat, saying, ‘Pay me what you owe!’
29 “So his fellow servant fell down at his feet and begged him, saying, ‘Have patience with me, and I will repay you!’
30 He would not, but went and cast him into prison, until he should pay back that which was due.
31 So when his fellow servants saw what was done, they were exceedingly sorry, and came and told their lord all that was done.
32 Then his lord called him in, and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt, because you begged me.
33 Shouldn’t you also have had mercy on your fellow servant, even as I had mercy on you?’
34 His lord was angry, and delivered him to the tormentors, until he should pay all that was due to him.
35 So my heavenly Father will also do to you, if you don’t each forgive your brother from your hearts for his misdeeds.”
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
James 1:5
Quoted at the close as a benediction about asking God for wisdom
5 But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach; and it will be given to him.
World English Bible · Read it in another translation
Recap
The message in order, in a few minutes of reading.
Michael Demetrius, the youth director at First B Jackson, brought the message on February 10, 2019, preaching on forgiveness. He opened by leading the congregation through the Lord's Prayer from Matthew 6 and then walked through what forgiveness is, what it is not, and why God calls believers to it without exception.
What was said
Michael started in Matthew 6:9-13, where Jesus teaches the disciples to pray "forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors." He said that when he first came to faith he understood forgiveness as a settled gift, past, present, and future sins covered. But reading verses 14 and 15 changed that: "if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins." He said he could no longer read forgiveness as optional, and that there is a clear link between how we forgive others and how God forgives us.
From there he laid out what unforgiveness actually does to a person. It stunts spiritual growth, damages a person's relationship with God, pulls them off the path God has for them, and creates a prison of the mind. He borrowed the phrase that unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. Bitterness and resentment, he said, will crowd out the capacity to love a neighbor, which Jesus names in Matthew 22 as the second greatest commandment.
Before talking about what forgiveness is, Michael said it was necessary to establish that right and wrong are real. He pointed to Genesis 3:22, where God says the man "has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil," and argued that God has written that awareness on every human heart. He connected this to James 4:1, which he read as explaining how conflict begins when one person's desires collide with another person's desires, creating the wound that then requires forgiveness.
He then named several things forgiveness is not. It is not forgetting; you know the difference the moment the person walks back into the room. It is not approval; forgiving someone does not mean saying what they did was acceptable. It is not trust, which is earned separately. And it is not fair by definition, because the scales are already off when forgiveness is even needed. He said boundaries and forgiveness are different things, and that anyone afraid to forgive because they fear being hurt again should come talk with him after the service.
What forgiveness is, he said, is the pathway to freedom, and it is God's will, full stop. He said he would be glad to pray with anyone about healing and restoration, but he would not pray about whether it is God's will to forgive a particular person, because that question is already answered. He also said an apology from the other party is not a required ingredient, noting that some people in the room have received an apology and it still was not enough.
Michael then read the parable of the unforgiving servant from Matthew 18, where a king cancels a servant's enormous debt and that same servant immediately has a fellow servant thrown into prison over a small one. The master hands the unforgiving servant over to be tortured, and Jesus closes with: "This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart." Michael said the parable convicted him because he remembers his own ten thousand bags of gold that were forgiven.
He closed by walking through a practical order: look clearly at what was done, grieve it honestly, bring it to God, and then make a choice not to hold it against the person anymore. If the feeling returns the next time you see them, you make that choice again. He said the power to forgive and to receive forgiveness both come through the person of Jesus Christ, and that for anyone in the room who had never received that forgiveness, that was where it was available.
Doing a Bible study?
Here is a guide we have prepared for you: the passages in order, questions for the group, and room to write.
- Michael said that unforgiveness will stop our spiritual growth, hinder our relationship with God, and take us off the path God has for us. Have you seen any of those effects show up in your own life, and if so, which one hit you hardest?
- Michael described a range where his own forgiveness actually works, saying things that are too small he just forgets, and things that feel too big he boxes up and holds indefinitely. Where do you find your own range, and what tends to land outside it?
and 3 more questions in the guide
Read the full transcript 7,491 words
0:01
Speaker 2Turn up and let's worship God this morning. Amen? This morning, we're gonna do something a little bit different. We channel I love changes, honestly. When pastor Ray texted me, he said, Florin, you'll be in charge of worship.
0:14
I my eyes got big in a second. I said, okay. I think we're gonna do something different. And as as always, it's a privilege to sing with mister Bob. Now Jake is gonna sing with us, and I promise you, his voice is just so awesome.
0:27
But this morning is not about that. This morning, it's about worshiping God. Amen? Amen. Amen.
2:53
It's great and beautiful to be here in God's house. Amen? It's wonderful to to feel his presence in this place and that's why I'm here. Honestly, every morning when I and I my family, we we drive towards church, we always pray. We pray for Blake that his hands do a miracle on the sound.
3:10
We pray for pastor Ray. We pray for pastor Carl. We pray for every single soul that comes in this place that God would speak to us. Amen? And not only that God will speak to us, but as soon as we leave these walls, we represent the church.
3:25
Amen? Because we are we are we work with him in in this world. Amen to that. I promise you if I would speak English super well, would be bored of me because I talk a lot. My mom used to tell me a lot, okay, it's enough now.
3:45
Can you take a It's it's in the it's it's in the blood. Stop. This song it's a very very beautiful song. I love to tell the story of I'm seeing things above. When we understand God's love, when we understand what he did for us, the salvation that he provides to Jesus Christ, we owe.
4:04
We want to share it with our coworkers, with our family member. And you know sometimes it's not that easy, but through the Holy Spirit we can do that. I love to tell the story. Amen.
8:26
Michael DemetriusAlright. Well, you guys for being here. We got a few announcements. You guys can have a seat. So for our announcements, we have tomorrow night we have a wanna which will be right here in this room from 05:45 to 07:30 where we raise up the young people right down the hall from six to 07:30.
8:43
We'll have Monday nights. And Carl is not gonna be preaching this week. We'll have someone else speaking because Carl is in Africa. Carl and Ray and Tanya and Pascal got a couple pictures here are sharing the good news of God's love and mercy over in Kenya right now. So be praying for them.
9:03
Here's a few more pictures that they've sent in. Look at that little baby. So please keep them in your prayers. Also I want to tell you we've got another team the Largies are going to be going to Ghana and they're going to have a fundraiser for their trip where they will actually do oil changes for donations. So I believe you buy the oil you bring it by and they will change the oil in your car and then they're just asking for some donations.
9:36
They're willing to work to build up some support to send them on their trip. So there's a sign up in the back. Drea is the person to contract. Andrea Andrea will be back there to schedule and then Richard will do the work. So we've also got the community Bible study that's gonna go on on Wednesdays in the morning from 09:30 to 11:30 and then in the evening from 06:30 to eight.
10:01
Don't believe that that says nine because it's really eight And there'll be child care provided in the for the morning part of that. So you pick one or the other. You don't go to both. But that's going on on Wednesdays. Then we've started the baby bottle campaign for Turning Point again where we collect spare change and make donations to Turning Point which is the Pregnancy Resource Center here in Jackson.
10:23
So grab the baby bottles there in the back left hand side of the foyer grab those and fill them up. We've got connect hour which already happened. I hope that you guys enjoyed connect hour today and that's all the announcement for everything else and for the details on the oil change fundraiser all that is in your bulletin. So if you guys wanna stand up and greet one another, we'll bring you back together with a little music.
10:51
Speaker 2Jesus. Jesus. How I trust him. How I prove him more and more. Jesus.
10:55
Jesus. Precious Jesus. All for grace to trust him more. Amen. Amen.
14:08
The church seems beautiful. This one I learned this song from pastor Carl's, have patience with me at the rhythm. I sing in and play it slightly little bit different. Thank you. You can blame pastor Carl.
17:21
Amen. Amen.
17:28
Michael DemetriusAlright. I just want to bless this offering. We're gonna enter in the worship of giving. Let me just, full bow our heads. I'll just pray for this offering.
17:39
God, thank you for all that you're doing both here and just around the world, God. God, as we take up this offering today, God, God, we just wanna surrender it to you. God, thank you for all that you're doing. Would you take each one of these gifts, each one of these tithes, God? And would you use it to advance your kingdom?
17:59
God, would you take it? Would you increase it? God, that it might bear much fruit. So take everything that's offered here, God, use it for your kingdom. We pray that you'll bless it in Jesus' name.
18:10
Amen.
18:15
Speaker 2I hadn't planned to play something, at the piano, but then Blake suggested that I should play something at the guitar. And then I said, why not put a little bit of gypsy flavor? So here I am. Thank you. Alright,
20:43
Michael Demetriusguys. Well, for those of you that don't know me, my name is Michael Demetrius. I'm the youth director here at First Bee. And I just wanna pray and open us up and invite God to to do his work here. Father God, thank you for this opportunity to speak.
20:57
God, I pray that you will bless and work on each and every heart that's here in this room. God, would you take your word? God, Would you illuminate it? God, reveal to us what you'll have us do. Holy Spirit, we invite you into this place.
21:11
Would you fill it? You are welcome here. Come and fill it and move in. Do the work that only you can do. We ask this in Jesus' name.
21:18
Amen. I'm up here. I have just some pretty big shoes to fill. We are gonna be if you wanna open up your bibles to Matthew six, that's where we're gonna start. We'll be in verse nine through 13 to begin with.
21:34
But as I was talking to Ray a little bit about what we're gonna be talking about, me and him, we were texting back and forth. And and he said, know, Mike, have you picked a topic yet? And I said, yeah, Ray, I think I'm gonna I'd like to talk about forgiveness. And he text back and he said, then I'm sure God will give you plenty of opportunities between now and then for forgiveness. And I was like, oh no.
21:59
You know? And so I got to thinking about it and I text him back and I said Ray I think I'd like to preach on prosperity instead. And so we're gonna stick with with forgiveness and I believe that God has something to say to us today. And if you look on your bulletin on the very back of your bulletin there is a just a blank sheet for notes. If you believe that God is speaking to you, if there's anything you wanna write down, please do it there.
22:24
We just don't want it to go in one ear and out the other. I know that God's word will not return void, and we're gonna be just reading through that. But could we do something a little bit different today? If I could have everybody stand up and just bear with me as we do this, if you could just stand up for me, please. What I wanna do is before we get started is I just wanna pray the our father with you guys.
22:49
And notice I said that I wanna pray it. I just wanna throw off any religious spirit. I don't want us just to say these words, that this prayer is meant to be communication between us and God. So whether you say transgressions, trespasses, sins, you just pray it to God however you know, and, we're gonna do this together. So join me.
23:09
Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever and ever. Amen. You guys can be seated.
23:42
So whether you know it or not, what we just prayed was, in Matthew six verses nine through 13. And he says, and I'm just gonna read it for us. Jesus says this, this then is how you should pray. Our father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
24:06
Give us today our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one. And the reason that I believe this scripture is important is because he says forgive us our debts as as like there's a correlation between the way God's gonna forgive us and the way that we've been forgiven. And initially when I came to know the Lord, I thought it was grace, we are saved by faith, forgiven for our sins once for all past, present, future sins. That was my understanding. But as I read through about forgiveness, I'm kind of convicted a little bit and I don't think that forgiveness is is a suggestion or recommendation.
24:57
I believe that it's something that God is is calling us to. That as a believer, this is not an optional thing. And I say that this finishes in verse 13 and as I go into verse 14, just follow with me here. He says, 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 when they sin, if you do not forgive others their sins, your father will not forgive your sins.
25:31
And I hadn't read it that way honestly. I thought that, you know, I've got my forgiveness over here and my inheritance and then, you know, that covers everything I do here on earth. And and then when I read that it's like well there's this link between the way I forgive people and the way I'll be forgiven by my heavenly father. So forgiveness is is really important to God. So and today, I believe that forgiveness is an important part of our walk, is our life as believers.
26:08
And today, there's people in this room that know far more about forgiveness. I'm 35 years old, and I don't claim to know it all. But I've looked into it a little bit and I just wanna share some of the stuff that I've learned to pull out some truths and kind of expose some lies about forgiveness for what they are too. It's a broad topic. We won't cover it all today, but we can scratch the surface and hopefully my prayers that God will give us eyes to be able to see it and then we'll be able to see it more and more as we go through life.
26:40
Unforgiveness, it hurts us. It hurts us and it hurts others. There's a couple other things I think that it will do is unforgiveness since God is calling us to it, unforgiveness will stop our spiritual growth. It'll hinder our relationship with God. It will also take us off course off the path that God has for us.
27:04
God has a plan and a path that he is calling us to walk down and it will take us off of that. In Matthew 22 verse 34, the pharisees come to Jesus and they ask him, what is the greatest commandment? And he tells them, the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. And the second is like it. It's to love your neighbor as yourself.
27:26
But if we hold and we harbor unforgiveness, it's gonna birth bitterness and and resentment which will hinder us from loving our neighbor. Does this make sense? So it will stop us from fulfilling what God is calling us to. Third thing, it's gonna do it. Unforgiveness will steal our joy and our peace, and it will create a prison for us.
27:50
We'll be held in prison by our mind. Prison doesn't have to be bars. We'll be imprisoned by our own thoughts. Our thoughts will never be how we can bless people or how we can love people, but rather how we can get even with people or what they did was wrong. We'll just stew on it over and over and it will birth bitterness and resentment.
28:08
So forgiveness is huge. It's a big deal to God. It should be a big deal to us. Pastor or doctor Alan Holmes, he would say that unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. So it's not good for us.
28:25
It's not good for anyone else. I've prayed a lot over this message and what God wants to say and and I believe that if you're here today God has something that he wants to say to you. So I wanna just encourage you that this message is not for someone else. This message is for you. I looked up the definition of forgiveness in the Webster dictionary because that's what they told me to do in school.
28:57
So I looked it up and what I came up what it says is to pardon, to cease to feel resentment against or an offender, To give up resentment of or a claim to requital. To grant relief from a payment of. Another thing that unforgiveness does is it will bind us to that transgression or that person. So if you hold unforgiveness it will tie you to that person and that person to you whereas unforgiveness will bring will bring freedom. So before we can talk about forgiveness, I really believe that we've got to paint some framework over in order to have forgiveness, we need a wrong.
29:42
And in order to have a wrong, we need to establish some type of fairness or or right and wrong in the world. And I know that we live in a day and a time where the world wants to say, what's right for you is right for you and what's right for me is right for me. Just don't tell me how to live and I won't tell you how to live. Anything goes. Whatever you want is right for you.
30:04
And that sounds well and good and it almost sounds respectful. The only problem is is that we're with that whole Genesis dilemma where Adam and Eve were in the garden and they ate from the tree. And does anybody remember what that tree was? The tree of the knowledge of good and evil. So as I was reading through this, I really believe that God brought me back to that and it was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
30:32
That God has written eternity on our hearts. That there is there is a knowledge. There is a right and wrong and we are aware of it. Now, don't get me wrong. People can sear their conscience and we can grieve the Holy Spirit, but from the outset people know right from wrong.
30:51
Genesis three twenty two says this, and the Lord God said, this is after Adam and Eve have eaten of the tree. They've eaten the fruit. He says, and the Lord God said, the man has now become like one of us knowing good and evil. Now, not only do we know right and wrong, but we are excellent at picking out when the scales get off balance. If we were to sit down together and we'd watch a movie and I said, who's the bad guy?
31:24
Who's wrong? We could point and say, that person. They did this and that and that's wrong. Okay? The problem is is that when we become one of the parties in the equation, that's when our viewpoint will get skewed.
31:39
We don't we don't, judge correctly especially if we're involved. The scale is gonna balance pretty much for for one reason. In James four one he says this, what causes fights and quarrels among you? Do they, don't they come from your desires that battle within you? You desire to have.
32:04
You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet, but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. See, conflict will arise when our want and our desire meets up with someone else's want and desire. And there's only one outcome. And if we with the short end of the stick, we've just entered into an opportunity where we're gonna be hurt, bitter, sore about it.
32:31
So that's how conflict arises, and opportunity for forgiveness is birthed. So we we love we know when things are balanced, we know when things are fair, we know when they get off and we long to see them restored. We like to see justice restored. If we have I mean, you know, Hollywood is filled with movies and for a reason of stories of, you know, you've got some innocent person and then somebody does something really bad to them. You know, this is gonna be like don't know if anybody's seen like Taken or Equalizer or anything like that, where where you've got like a guy who does something really bad.
33:12
Then we're gonna spend the rest of the movie with this good guy that's gonna go and track him down and make it right. And they're gonna get that bad guy and they're gonna make them pay. They're gonna restore justice. And this is something that it sells because it's inside us. We wanna if the wrong happens, we wanna see that made right again.
33:32
Okay? But I I just want us to have as Christians, I want us to have patience in this because God says, vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. Like, leave some room for God to work. God has a job and we have a job. He calls us to love and forgive and then he's gonna keep the world spinning on axis just the right distance from the sun, keeping us at just the right temperature and everything else so vital for life to take place.
34:00
He's gonna keep doing all the this really big stuff and we're gonna be responsible for giving and loving people. Does this make sense? So we have a role to play. God has a role to play. Let's let God stay God and we'll stay humans.
34:17
Matthew seven two says this. He tells us, this is Jesus speaking, do not judge or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. When I was when I was growing up, my daddy come pick me up from school every other Friday and he he'd always have bubblelicious gum in his car. And when me and my brother would get in his car, he'd open up that pack and he'd give us one piece.
34:50
He'd hand a piece to me or my brother whoever sit in the front seat and he'd say split that, share it with your brother. And when he would do this, you know, I'd be in the front and like if I was gonna split, you know, like say for example, this the piece of gum. Right? You you'd want me to split it about half. Right?
35:07
But I'd always take a little more, you know, maybe I'm gonna get my brother about like that and then me like this, you know, That'd be the way. But my dad, this was really cool. He would say he'd say, alright. Split that gum in half, and he'd split it, and he'd be like, alright. Now he picks.
35:24
So you split and he picks. And it was just this little way of of keeping things fair. And when when Jesus was here, he'd give us these little hints and he'd say stuff like like treat others the way you wanna be treated. You know, some of us here in this room today, you've been wrong. There's no doubt about it.
35:46
If we sat down and we listened to your story, we would be on your side. There's no doubt about it. What someone did to you was wrong and they had no right to do it. But to hold that against them is gonna be harmful to you and to them. And you see, the reason I bring up that gum is because we got to be able to look at forgiveness from both sides of the equation.
36:14
You know when you're wronged you probably want an apology. You want someone to acknowledge that they've been wrong. And when you've done the wrong, you might need to step up and say, hey, listen. I'm sorry. I did that.
36:27
That was wrong. I believe that God is gonna call us to both of these. But either way, forgiveness is our path forward. So we've established that there's fairness. There's right from wrong.
36:40
Our culture is full of vengeance, but God is not calling us to to vengeance. He's calling us to forgive. And as I started looking into this and researching it I realized that I feel like I'm good at forgiving but it's a very specific range that I'm good at forgiving. Okay? So anything too little you know like I you're ten minutes late coming to lunch don't worry about it.
37:03
Yeah, that person cut me off. Oh, well, no big deal. You didn't do what? Oh, okay. Any of these little things, they're small, I just forget them.
37:11
Okay? Anything that's too big, then it's unforgivable. I'm gonna I'm gonna box this up and I'm gonna hide it and I'm gonna hold this against you indefinitely because there's nothing you can do to make this right. You've wronged me. I'll never forget it or forgive it.
37:29
So we've got things that are too big and things that are too small. Then I've got this weird place right in the middle, which is where my forgiveness takes place. And it's where it's it's too big to just forget about. It keeps coming up. It keeps bothering me.
37:51
And I'm too good of friends with you just to write you off. So something's gotta happen. I have to bring forgiveness into that place so that the relationship can be restored. I feel like I'm okay at doing that. I'm not great but if I'm honest that's kind of where I'm at right now.
38:09
But I don't when I read scripture, I don't see where God says, you know, pick something you're comfortable with and then just whatever you can kinda muster up, that'll be good enough. That's not what he calls us to. So it's been a convicting week. I've definitely had to make apologies this week. Forgiveness, I want to tell you a couple things that forgiveness is not.
38:35
Forgiveness is not forgetting. It's not the same as forgetting. You know if I lend fluorine $20. Fluorine has $20. Can I borrow it?
38:45
Yeah. I give them $20. And I just go on about my day and you know and then I go on and I don't see Florine for a while and I forget about it. Now if you look at these two things it might forgiveness and forgetting almost look the same because I'm not worried about it but they're not the same thing. And I'll know the difference between forgetting and forgiving the moment I see him again.
39:13
If I see him again and I go, my $20 that guy. I can't believe it. It would be a 100. Okay. But forgiveness and forgetting are not the same thing.
39:28
Just the fact that you can throw it from your mind and not go on for forgiveness and forgetting are not the same thing. Another thing that some some of us in here, we need to hear this, forgiveness is not approval. By forgiving someone, you're not saying what you did was right and it's welcome anytime. That's not what forgiveness is. Forgiveness can be what you did was wrong on all accounts, unexcusable.
40:00
And I'm gonna choose from this moment forward not to hold that against you. You see what I'm saying? It's not saying that in order to forgive someone you have to agree with them a 100% or say that what they're doing is right. That is not what forgiveness is. Second, forgive or third, forgiveness is not trust.
40:21
Forgiveness and trust are two different things. Forgiveness is free. It's freely given. Trust is earned. And while I'm on that topic, forgiveness look if you're scared to forgive someone because you're scared they're gonna harm you again, please come talk to me.
40:41
This is a boundaries issue. Let forgiveness bring freedom and then let's set up some boundaries that keep you safe. Okay? Forgiveness is not the same as trust. It's not the same as boundaries.
40:57
By its definition forgiveness is not fair. In order for forgiveness to enter the equation, the scales have to be off. Someone has to be wronged or perceived wrong. So let's not expect it to be fair. Let's not expect it to be.
41:13
Let's not be surprised when it's not. In order for it to enter the equation, the scales need to be off. A couple of things that forgiveness is. First and foremost first and foremost, forgiveness is the pathway to freedom. If you wanna be set free, if you don't want this hanging over your head forever, forgiveness is the doorway out.
41:51
It is the pathway to freedom. You don't get me wrong. You can hold on to it forever. Don't be surprised when you don't have any room to pick anything else up. Don't be surprised when it is eating you alive.
42:07
Unforgiveness is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. If we hold on to this, it holds on to us. It's a it seems like it's not while it's a very natural action, unforgiveness, it is a very active action too and it requires action to do. You're gonna have to let it go. You're gonna have to forgive, make the choice to forgive whether it's unforgivable or not.
42:43
It's helpful to think of this, forgiveness and forgiveness we have to acknowledge that the other person is more than their mistake, that there's more to them than the incident, than the fault, than the sin transgression. Whatever they did that was wrong, their failings, their shortcoming, They're more than that. The same way that you're more than the mistakes that you've made. None of us in this room today have finished or done life perfectly to this point. We've all made mistakes.
43:13
Our selfishness has trampled people before. If you're anything like me and you back up and you go, gosh, I need forgiveness. And it is free and it is available. Praise God. The last thing forgiveness is.
43:36
Forgiveness is God's will. It's God's will. If someone has wronged you, I'm here. I'll be here after the service. You can come up and we can talk about it.
43:47
I'd love to to think to talk through with you and pray. One thing we won't do is we won't pray about whether or not it's God's will to forgive that person. I already know it is. It is God's will to forgive. So I will pray that God will restore you and restore them.
44:05
We will pray over all that. But as far as if it's God's will or not, we know that. We know that it is God's will. But what if I don't have an apology? What if I don't have an apology from that person?
44:22
That person wronged me and I don't have an apology. I don't think apology is an essential ingredient. And if we're honest, there's probably someone in this room today you've got an apology and it's still not good enough. It's not essential. These scales are unequal when we walk in.
44:41
There's only one way to get things right again. There's only one way and it's through forgiveness and forgiveness is made available. As I've been studying for this I went around and I asked different people you know hey what do you think a component of forgiveness is that people overlook? What do you think a component is that people don't see? As I was going around I asked Diane who works in the office here and, she said, what God's been showing me is that in order to forgive I have to give up my right to be right.
45:25
And I think that's so true. So true. We gotta give up our right to be right. We gotta be set free, guys. And if we want it, it comes through forgiveness.
45:43
I was in Denver, my way back from North Carolina last weekend and, we missed our flight. They canceled it because of the weather and everything, and I figured the only thing that would make me feel better is going over to Chick fil A to get some breakfast. So I go over there and the stars were aligned and I walk up and you know they got this big long maze of like you have to walk through to get up there and there was only one lady in line. There was a couple people at the counter but only one lady in line. Normally it's like jam packed out the back of that thing and I was like yeah this is awesome and I walk up and she's kind of a business lady you know she's got her stuff all together.
46:23
And I noticed as I'm walking through the maze, know, kinda going up to her that she's like this. And I'm I'm looking, I'm going, oh, she is really worked up about something. So I stopped and I'm watching her. And what had happened was another lady didn't go through the maze. She just walked up from the side and got in front of her.
46:48
Okay? And so I'm watching this scenario play out and I look and the lady that went up there, she didn't look like she was mean or mad about anything. She didn't look like she was in a big hurry. I think she just honestly didn't know. So she's standing there thinking about, you know, maybe getting a refill on some sweet tea or something and this lady over here is about to have a bad day over the whole situation.
47:17
I mean she's just all upset, all the pieces about how could this lady prefer herself to me. She has cut, she has broken the rules, the scales are off, this is unforgivable. And she was doing everything she could to let people know that this is an outrage. And in that moment I thought, God help us because that's me. Oh, man.
47:46
I can get mad about something so little. You know, God's blessed us with these days. How many of them are we gonna choose to let be ruined by unforgiveness, by somebody just pulling out in front of us, or whatever it may be? Let's expand our scale a little bit guys. Let's forgive that.
48:08
I think if we can get good at forgiving that small stuff, it just seems to be only like natural to me. If we can get really good at this small stuff and trust God with that, maybe we'll get better at the big stuff. So if somebody cuts you off, man, let's bring forgiveness into that place. Not forgetfulness, not mindlessness, not just not think about it anymore. You know, to give someone shit.
48:32
You know, they got in front of me. I'm gonna choose not to hold it against them. Some of us in here today, you feel like something so big that you could never forgive anyone for it. And I want you to know you're probably right, and you are determined you could probably hold on to it forever. I hope and pray that you won't.
48:59
But you're probably right. You could hold on to it. But you don't need to. You don't have to. And if it's too big for you, man, we live for these opportunities where we can invite God into something.
49:13
In our weakness, he shows himself strong. When you don't have it, praise God. He's got you. He's got you. He can help you with whatever you need to forgive someone for.
49:24
No matter how unforgivable it is, Surrender it to God and allow God to change you. I wanna look here at Matthew 18. And you can you can follow along with the words on the screen, you can read it in your book, or you can just close your eyes and listen as I read. Matthew 18 verse 21. Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me?
49:56
Up to seven times? Jesus answered, I tell you not seven times but 77 times. Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him 10,000 bags of gold was brought to him. Since he was not able to pay, he ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
50:22
So he's about to lose. He's about to be sold. His wives, his kids, they're all gonna get sold to repay the debt. At this, his servant fell on his knees before him. Be patient with me, he begged, and I will pay back everything.
50:35
The servant's master took pity on him, canceled the debt, and let him go. But when the servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a 100 silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. Pay back what you owe me, he demanded. His fellow servant fell on his knees and begged him, be patient with me and I will pay it back.
50:58
But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and they went and told their master everything that had happened. Then the master called the servant in, you wicked servant, he said, I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?
51:25
In anger, his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured until he should pay back all he owed. Verse 35, this is how my heavenly father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart. Amen. Convicting for me mostly because I remember my 10,000 bags of gold that got forgiven. So forgiveness is important.
52:19
Obviously, it's important. I mean, he says here, this is how my heavenly father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brothers or sisters from your heart. I mean, Jesus came to Earth to die on a cross for our sins, and he forgives any who would come to him. He forgives freely. We've been forgiven, And it's important that we forgive other people.
52:44
And if we've been forgiven so much You know what one of the hardest things is for me in my Christian walk? Is that when I first got saved, I was so fired up because I didn't have that burden on me anymore. I remembered what it was like to carry that, to have all this sin, all this regret, all this shame and guilt in my life. I remembered it. It was so familiar.
53:13
And when I knew where to put my burden, when I knew that it went away, was so excited. But if I'm honest right now, sometimes I have to think back in order to remember what that burden was like. What the burden is like for those that live around us that don't know forgiveness that lies in Christ, that haven't heard God's message of love and forgiveness. It changed my life and that's why I'm here today. Forgiveness, it's important, but how do we do it?
53:49
How do we do it? Well, to start we have to have a wrong that was done. Big, small, wrong or a perceived wrong. I say perceived wrong because I believe that we'll respond the same way whether it's a perceived wrong or a real wrong. I think our bodies will respond the same way.
54:05
So I think there's perceived wrong we can still forgive that. So we have a wrong. In order to forgive, one of the first things we have to do is we have to really look at it. We have to look at the transgression or the wrong that was done. We have to take a full account of the wrongs that were done.
54:23
Okay? So that's why it's not forgetting. This is a mindful saying, this person hurt me. It made me feel like this. This is what is going on.
54:32
Then you have to take a little bit of time to grieve that. Let your emotions get involved. Actually feel what's going on. Take some time to process it. After you've gotten real with yourself, you've been mad, you've been upset, then it's time to confess it to God.
54:51
Take it before God, talk to it talk through it with him. Ask God to help you in forgiving this person. And then the last step is we make a choice after that to not hold it against them anymore, to not hold that transgression against them. We have to know exactly which contract we're ripping up. So we gotta look clearly at it and say, this is what I'm forgiving and I'm not gonna hold it against that person anymore.
55:19
And you know what? If we do that and then when we see that person, it comes back up. What do we do? We do it again and again if we need to, and again if we need to. Because we are called to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.
55:34
Some of this stuff is not gonna be easy, and some people are gonna do wrong things. You wanna know something I've learned in life? Hurt people hurt people. And life is rough sometimes. I don't have to tell you guys, you guys know it.
55:48
Life gets hard. Some of us get beat up, bruised, scarred, cut along the way. Other people do too and they come in hurting and hurt people hurt people. You can perpetuate the cycle. Let somebody hurt you.
56:08
You can hurt somebody else. You can pass it on. We can grow this thing but that's not the kingdom of God. It's natural but it's not the kingdom of God. Kingdom of God says it stops with us.
56:21
That forgiveness dies here. We know where to take it and it goes away. Amen? As Christians, we need words as a daily part, a very regular part of our vocabulary words like, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I hurt you.
56:44
I'm sorry for being selfish. Please forgive me. I'm sorry I got angry. We need these as a regular part of our vocabulary. Practice on the small stuff.
57:00
Forgiveness is an outlet where we can dump the mess of life and let it go away. Yes. God is high and mighty and worthy to be praised, but I take him a lot of my junk too and it goes away. I wanna encourage you guys, forgive. We don't have to carry it.
57:25
I'll invite the band up. Are you guys gonna sing another song? And and while they do I just wanna say that that forgiveness is available through one way and one way only and that's through the person of Jesus Christ. When he came to earth, he came with a mission and with a purpose and that was to forgive the sins of mankind. That was his purpose.
57:49
That is why God sent him. He lived a sinless life and died on a cross for our sins that we might be redeemed and we might be in right standing with God again. Now I'm reading through the Old Testament right now and it goes over and over about, you know, how much stuff had to get sacrificed in order to just be right with God for a short period of time. But Jesus was atonement, the at onement for us. So if you're here today and you need forgiveness, I wanna encourage you.
58:19
It is in the person of Jesus Christ. And if you need to forgive someone else, it is in the person of Jesus Christ. That is where your power lies. These are resources available to us as Christians. So let me just pray on this and I'll let the band do their thing.
58:34
Father God, thank you for today. Thank you for what you're showing us about forgiveness. God, I pray for each person in here, God, that you've placed a person, a name, an incident, a transgression on their heart, God. God, pray that you'll equip them. You'll you'll strengthen them and empower them to bring forgiveness into that area, God.
58:56
God, I pray freedom over this room. I claim that the blood of Christ is enough. It is enough for all the sins, God. I thank you for the freedom that lies in it, God, and I pray that that we can all walk in deeper freedom. Thank you for your word that you've given us, God.
59:13
Thank you that you've forgiven us 10,000 bags, God, of gold, and I pray that you'll help us to forgive others. In Jesus' name, amen.
59:24
Speaker 2Thank you, Mike. This is a very, very difficult hard topic, but it's needed in our walk with Christ. Amen? Amen. Yes.
59:33
Now if we do understand God's mercy for us, it becomes natural to give. I passed away something that I really really like. He said sometimes we want justice for others and mercy for us. I think I'm stuck with this phrase. It's part of my everyday life.
59:53
When we choose to forgive, not only that we it's as you said, it's good for our own heart, but also we get to focus more on the kingdom of God. And this song is gonna talk about is is talking about the kingdom of God. That place that Christ is preparing for us. I promise you, would you please stand up and worship with the with this song? And let's put aside let's put aside all that is not good, all that is not necessary in our lives, and focus on the kingdom of God.
1:00:24
Amen? Amen. Amen. May God bless you, and have a beautiful Sunday afternoon with our savior. Amen.
1:02:54
Michael DemetriusAnd I'll just send this off with this. And if any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. James one five. You guys are dismissed.
Share this message
Every word on these came out of the message. Download one and post it anywhere.
