Undone: forgiveness doing whatever it takes.
Reinbeck UMC
February 13, 2011
Seventy- seven? My Bible says 70 x 7! But 77 is kind of like good news/ bad news. The good news is I don’t have to count as high. The bad news is, as I look through my little tally book here, a few of you are running right up there in the 50’s and 60’s, so you had better watch your step cause I’m keeping track!
I’m glad your laughing because that’s just exactly the opposite of what Jesus is trying to tell us. The Greek could be either 77 of 70x7, but either way Jesus’ point is that we’re not supposed to keep track.
Before we get any further into that, let’s review just a little bit. This is sermon # 4 in the series on forgiveness.
o In the first sermon I talked about forgiveness unleashing divine love. Forgiveness is contrary to every natural instinct we have, and it has to be a choice for God and a gift from God.
o In the second sermon I talked about forgiveness undoing what we’ve become; the fact that we need forgiveness as much as we need to give it.
o Last week I talked about forgiveness unlocking the prison: not denying that something bad has happened, but freeing the person we forgive from their past and freeing us for a future with God.
Now we are going to get into some nuts and bolts of forgiveness. This week we’ll cover how much to forgive. In the next weeks we will cover
· forgive and forget, and
· forgiveness and justice, and
· Getting revenge/or giving a blessing.
In this week’s scripture Jesus gives some great instructions about conflict resolution. Peter, always being practical, says “but what if it doesn’t work? What if they keep sinning against us? How many times do I have to forgive them?” Now, he did think this through. He knew that the rabbi’s taught to forgive three times. So he took the three doubled it, and just because he knew Jesus was such a nice guy he added one more to get 7. He also knew that seven was traditionally the number of completion. So he says, “Should I forgive them as many as seven times?”
Jesus says, 7 times? Heaven’s no, not seven times 70x7 times.
Peter probably had to pick his jaw up off the ground. That was unthinkable! Who could forgive that many times… in fact who could keep track of that many times. But don’t you think that was Jesus point?
Paul Says “Love does not keep track of wrongs but rejoices in the right. “
Jesus says if someone takes your coat; give him your cloak too. If someone slaps you on the right cheek, give him your left. And if we had 490 cheeks I think Jesus would have kept going.
Jesus point is that:
o There is no end to forgiveness, either God’s or ours.
o There is no limit on the amount of forgiveness we can receive, and there should be none on the amount we are willing to offer.
Many of you are probably thinking about someone or a particular situation right now and saying in your heart, does that mean. . . Well stop right there, because the answer is probably “yes.”
Does that mean…
o That if I forgive someone and after a while they do it again, I am supposed to forgive them again? Jesus says, “Yes”
o Does that mean that if they outright plan to do it again I have to forgive them? Jesus says, “Yes”
o Does that mean no matter how bad someone hurts me I am supposed to forgive them? Jesus says, “Yes”
o Does that mean if they deny they did anything wrong I have to forgive them? Jesus says, “Yes”
o Does that mean that even though I have forgiven them, if anger starts to boil up inside of me I have to forgive them again? Jesus says, “Yes”
o Does that mean that if they. . . Jesus says, “Yes.” How many ways can I say …
§ There is no circumstance in which Jesus gives us permission to be unforgiving.
§ There is no situation in which Jesus allows us to hold a grudge.
§ There is not point at which Jesus says, “You have done enough.”
Is that clear?
Let me come at it a different direction.
Forgiveness is not limited in degree. No matter how unimaginably terrible the offence, we must forgive. Think about the stories I have been telling the last few weeks; forgiving Nazis, forgiving someone who killed someone we love, forgiving under the hardest circumstances.
Forgiveness is not limited in quantity. Think about marriage. How many times have I needed to crawl back to Robyn and ask for forgiveness? How about you? Where would you be if your spouse stopped forgiving you?
What about our children? How many times does a parent put up with a lying 4 year old before they throw them out on the street? There is no end.
At what point do we stop loving someone who suffers with a serious addiction. After one attempt at rehab one jail sentence? 2? 5? 10? After the first time they steal from us, the 15th time? After they have promised to get clean and failed- how many times before we stop hoping?
3? 7? 77? 490? Of course not. Forgiveness is not limited in quantity.
Forgiveness is not limited by the other’s cooperation. Can we forgive someone who doesn’t ask for forgiveness? On the other hand can we live the rest of our lives locked in the prison of anger and bitterness just because THEY choose denial? Of course not.
Research shows that anger reduces the capacity of heart to pump blood damaging heart muscles. Anger will cause digestion problems like indigestion and irritable bowel syndrome. Anger may affect the skin, lead to depression, addiction and sleeping problems. Are you willing to let someone lock you in that prison because they either refuse to face the hurt they cause or simply don’t care?
No, there are no requirements, loopholes, catches, roadblocks, or excuses for not forgiving. Forgiveness does not depend on the other person.
Forgiveness is not limited by time. Something may have happened last week and you thought you forgave. Or maybe it was last year, or 20 years ago; and for whatever reason suddenly you realize you are angry about it again. We might associate this with victims of physical or sexual abuse, but it can and does happen to all of us. Forgiveness is not limited by time in that you might have to forgive someone now and then 10 minutes later you feel angry again, and an hour later you find yourself fantasizing about revenge, and then a year later you realize you are avoiding them. Over and over again we have to forgive, not just for additional offenses, but for the same offenses. You see we can forgive. We can choose not to hold an offense against someone, but that doesn’t mean we have forgotten.
Like an onion we have to keep peeling off layer after layer off of our hurt. We may cry with every layer we remove. We may think we are done and set it aside, but occasionally, even without our realizing it, that onion will show up under our noses again. And we have to go back to peeling off layers- forgiving, until we can set it aside again; knowing very well that it may come back and we may have to forgive all over again.
Finally, forgiveness is not limited by space. What do you feel when I say 9-11. What do you feel when I say Abu-grab. What do you feel when I say Vietnam.
At least one of those words probably stirred up some strong feelings in you. Why? Maybe in a few cases you were there, or knew someone who was, but for most of us we neither knew the victims nor the perpetrators. So why the angry, hurt feelings? Because the need for forgiveness is not limited by space. Sometimes we have to forgive people we have never met and never will meet.
· Some, who cannot forgive for 911, are trapped in a hatred and fear of everything Arab. That is no way to live.
· Some who cannot forgive for Abu grab or Vietnam are imprisoned in a chronic mistrust of our government or foreigners. They live constantly looking over their shoulders. Is that any way to live? No, forgiveness is a much better answer. And forgiveness is not limited by anything, not degree, not quantity, not cooperation, not time, not space.
Forgiveness does whatever it takes. There are no numbers either 3 or 7 or 77 or 70x7 that either limit our ability to forgive, or let us off the hook for being forgiving.
Not even a billion. Jesus said, “There was a man who owed the king a billion Dollars. The king forgave the man his huge debt.
On his way out of the palace the man saw someone who owed him $50.75. He grabbed the man by the throat and shook his brains out and had him thrown in to prison until he could pay.
32-35"The king summoned the man and said, 'You evil servant! I forgave your entire debt when you begged me for mercy. Shouldn’t be merciful to your fellow servant who asked for mercy?' The king was furious and threw the man in prison until he paid back his entire debt. (Which if you hadn’t figured it out would be never) And that's exactly what my Father in heaven is going to do to each one of you who doesn't forgive unconditionally anyone who asks for mercy. Not 3 times, not 7 times, not 77 times, not even 70x7, but 70 billion x 7 billion" Forgiveness does whatever it takes.
AMEN
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