Understanding holiness: Christlikeness

Exeter Temple Message notes: Sunday 19^th April 2015
Bible Readings: Romans 8:29/Philippians 2:5-13/ 2 Corinthians 3:17-18



Christlikeness is something that we should be attaining to, something we deliberately set out to be developed in our lives.  When we say we want to be like Jesus we are not setting out to become a god, but we do hope to be godly in our character – sharing Christ’s values; learning to think the way he thinks, and act the way he acts.
1.  Conformed                       

 “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.”  Romans 8:29 (NIV)

  “God knew what he was doing from the very beginning. He decided from the outset to shape the lives of those who love him along the same lines as the life of his Son. The Son stands first in the line of humanity he restored. We see the original and intended shape of our lives there in him.”   
(Romans 8:29 The Message)
God has the goal that we become like his son, to take us from wherever we are, and bring us through a lifelong process of change that will result in our becoming more and more like Jesus Christ.
In our individualistic culture, we are very much influenced by the idea that we shouldn’t try to be like anyone else, but we should be ourselves.  We are told that conformity lowers self-esteem and self-worth. We are all wired differently and we want to worship, pray and serve in different ways.  To people who get fired up with words like innovation, inspiration and variation, the word conform is difficult.. 
However becoming like Jesus isn’t about smothering personality but it is about freeing us from the damage sin and healing us of the wounds we have experienced that have disrupted the way we are wired.   So for example, the imaginative person is much more likely to be a worrier because they can imagine all the things that can go wrong and that person starts to believe, “I am a natural worrier. 
Becoming like Jesus won’t rob the imaginative person of their creativity but it will release them from paralysing worry.  The passionate person who can feel strongly about things could so easily say, “I am naturally hot tempered.”  Becoming like Jesus won’t rob them of their passion, but it will fire their desire to not accept the status quo, to use their energy to win the lost and stand up against evil.
Conformed to Christ’s image, doubters and cynics are released to be explorers of truth as passionate as Jesus about the word of God.  Conformed to the image of Jesus the compulsive can become faithful, the impulsive, giants of faith, willing to risk their lives for the kingdom.   
To what image of Christ are we conforming?  Some people quite frankly might say I don't want to be like Christ because they have an image of him that is influenced by the wrong message about him or because they interpret him through their culture.  We need to read the gospels and meet Jesus there.  The Bible is like no other book and that if we ask the Holy Spirit to open our eyes we will see what Jesus is really like. 
 a) He had a servant heart 
We live in a world that worships success. Jesus by His humility showed everyone else’s pretensions to greatness as overdressing. There was a beauty in the simplicity and humility with which He lived His life.
Someone has said, “When we forget greatness and bend with Christ we rise”.    
b) A serene heart
Jesus knew inward peace because His life was centred on things above not on things on earth. He invested  in character and concentrated on making sure He was within the will of God rather than pleasing people.
c) A steadfast heart
He remained loyal to one aim and to one purpose.  He would let nothing clash with that.  He allowed nothing else to clash with this. When there is a division in our thoughts it is not long before there is a division in our actions.

2.  Transformed

It takes more than our willingness to transform our selfish, deceitful and weak hearts and make them like Jesus.
There are certain ideals which I cherish which only mock me because they are so far beyond me. I may greatly admire some world famous singer but remain a crow. I am lost in wonder at the sill of the concert hall pianist who makes light of the most complicated passages but my finders remain thumbs. I see on a television programme the expertise of a blind man who make a model of Concorde an aeroplane he has never seen out of match sticks but it takes me all my time to drive a nail in straight, These achievements only make me despair even while I admire them but the uniqueness of holy living as exemplified in Jesus is that in him we are give both pattern and power.”
(General Frederick Coutts)
We are not seeking to honour a dead hero by emulating His life. We glorify Him by allowing His living presence to transform and change our ordinary lives.
One of the supreme yet unrealized promises of God is simply this: If we have given our lives to Jesus, Jesus has given himself to us.  He has made our heart his home. 
“Christ lives in me.’ Galatians 2:20

 “Christ-likeness is not produced by imitation but by inhabitation. (Robert Warren)

 “For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.  (Philippians 2:13 NLT)

If your desire is to worship, to obey Him, to please Him, and you are worshipping Him, obeying Him
and living to please Him, then give thanks to God because God is at work in you. If you have a hunger for God’s word. If you have a growing resolve to be not just a hearer of the Word but also a doer of the word give thanks to God for God is at work in you.
Yet “The person that has a heart for God will always be experiencing the hand of God.”   (Anon)
God has to do a work of correction and conforming. There are things in our life that need correcting; there are things that need removing. He works in the following ways:
a) Through testing and trials                       
“Not only so be we also rejoice in our sufferings because we know that suffering produces perseverance, perseverance character and character hope.”  (Romans 5:3)

b) Through looking 

“And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.”  (2 Corinthians 3:18)

c) Through the body of Christ

Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. ¹² Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ.¹³ This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ. (Ephesians 4:11-13 NLT)

It is the combination of these things by which we are changed and become like him. For example testing and trials won’t necessarily make us better by themselves. In fact someone has said they either make us better or bitter.  But if at the same time we are keeping our hearts and minds exposed to the light of Christ and experiencing authentic Christian community then suffering can help our development.

It is God’s plan and purpose to make you like Christ. Our part is to co-operate with him and no hinder his work.

God bless

Carol 

The Holy Arm

Exeter Temple Message notes:  Easter Sunday 5^th April 2015
Bible Reading:  Isaiah 52: 10-15

“The Lord will bare his holy arm in the sight of all the nations and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation of our God.”  (v 10)

In Bible times, it was commonplace for kings to be present and to even fight in the battles. The robes of kings in the Bible times were long garments with long sleeves.  In times of battle, the king would remove his robe.  The sleeves would then be tied together in a knot.  The knotted robe would then be put over his head so that his robe would now be behind him, held by the knotted portion which was now around his neck.  This indicated to all those present, as well as to the enemy, that the king was not hindered in any way.  His arms were free and unobstructed.  He was now prepared to fight, with nothing to obstruct him.

Arms are a symbol of strength.  So when we read in Isaiah 52:10 about God baring his holy arm it is a promise that he is ready and willing to fight for us.
God gives this promise to Isaiah in the context of the group of prophecies known as the Servant Songs. These songs are all about a Servant that God would send to redeem his people. It is therefore safe to assume that when God promises to bare his holy arm he will do this through his chosen Servant, through his Messiah.

1.  Astonishment

However Isaiah warned that the possibility of the Servant winning through would be a cause of astonishment.  People would mostly be appalled at his appearance which would be altogether different from what you would expect.  Unless someone tells people that this is Christ, it is hard to believe it.  No-one expected the Servant to come a life of poverty where He has no place to call home. No extras in His life, no luxuries. He comes, not with might or power, but teaching—using words. He gathers a band of followers who are mostly uneducated and he lives a life on the edge of society—despised and rejected of men.
He ends up on trial badly beaten and wounded.  All His friends and disciples forsake Him. He is falsely accused. He is led away and crucified with two thieves and murderers. He is abused. His appearance is so marred that it is barely possible to tell that He is a man, let alone that this man is the Son of God?
He looks weak, not powerful.
“At first everyone was appalled. He didn’t even look human— a ruined face, disfigured past recognition. Nations all over the world will be in awe, taken aback, kings shocked into silence when they see him. For what was unheard of they’ll see with their own eyes, what was unthinkable they’ll have right before them.” (v15 The Message)
Yes, God through his Servant is baring his holy arm, going into battle against the forces of evil in the world, but the servants arm is stretched out on a cross.  This does not look like victory. It looks like the arm of God was willing to fight but it was not strong enough to win.

2.  Almighty Power

But Isaiah assures us that God has got it right.
“See my servant will act wisely, he will be raised and lifted up and highly exalted,” v 13

a) He will act wisely

The temptation that Jesus faced all through his life was to take the path that looked sensible, turn stones into bread, use force to build a kingdom, make a deal with the devil.  In Gethsemene it was the seeming foolishness of staying in Jerusalem that would make a painful death inevitable that was the battle.
But Jesus chose the cross, not because he was a fool but because as Paul puts it in 1 Corinthians 2 “the foolishness of God if wiser than man’s wisdom and the weakness of God is stronger than man’s strength.”
The cross is not foolishness if it has the power to show that this Servant, the Son of God himself is able to accept the worst evil could do and continued to love and forgive.  It is not foolishness if this one act of supreme sacrifice can act as a bridge between man and God for all time.
 
b) Raised and highly exalted
Isaiah says there will come a day when the whole world will be silenced in astonishment again. It will be when this beaten, crucified man, rises again from the dead and is exalted.
Paul prayed that Christian people might grasp “the incomparably great power for us who believe. That power is like the working of his mighty strength which he exerted in Christ when he raised him from the dead and seated him at his right hand in the heavenly realms” (Ephesians 2:18-19)  
Tom Wright says that Ephesus was seen as a place of power both politically and religiously.  The Romans saw it as a place to display their might and many cults existed which proclaimed to provide the greatest power to bring wealth, health, influence or the downfall of your enemies.  Paul said the greatest display of power the world has ever seen took place when God raised Jesus from the dead. 
How much power did that take? It was immense. Jesus’ resurrection was very different from when Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead – Lazarus’ resurrection was temporary, he still would have died a second time. In the resurrection of Jesus, we have an eternal life, a resurrected body, a deliverance from the permanence and hopelessness of death!

3. Accomplished

Isaiah shows us there was purpose in in God baring his holy arm. It was so that all the ends of the earth will see the salvation of our God.”
Was this accomplished?
It is obvious from Jesus’ last words that He didn’t die thinking that all was lost or that His mission was all washed up.
We read that, “With a loud cry, Jesus breathed His last.”
When Jesus died He didn’t whimper or whisper. The phrase “loud cry” can be translated, “a big or exceedingly great voice.” 
His final words were a roar of victory.
John 19:30 tells us that this shout contained the words, “It is finished.”
It is finished.  It is accomplished.
And the Resurrection confirms for us that all Jesus said and claimed for himself is true; it assures us that goodness and love are indestructible; it assures us that our faith in Christ is vindicated and safe. In short it says finally and gloriously that - in the words of the first Christian creed - JESUS IS LORD!
We looked on the internet to see of anyone had come up with a comprehensive list of Jesus’ accomplishments through his death and resurrection.  One site had a list of 40, one of each day of lent, another 20.  No list can fully sum up the depth, height or breadth of what has done but just be reminded for a moment from this list of just 10. 

1. Jesus was punished that we might be forgiven

2. Jesus was wounded that we might be healed

3. Jesus was made sin with our sinfulness, that we might be made righteous with His righteousness

4. Jesus tasted death for us that we might share His life

5. Jesus was made a curse that we might receive God’s blessing

6. Jesus endured our poverty that we might share God’s riches abundance

7. Jesus bore our shame that we might share His glory

8. Jesus endured my rejection that I might have His acceptance with the Father

9. He was separated from God so that we might be joined to the Lord

10.   In his our selfish nature was put to death, that we might be reborn as children of God.

Remember what Isaiah said would happen.  The world would look on Jesus with astonishment that this broken, disfigured man could be the Saviour of the world. But we are told in Scripture that there will be a day when all men will have to recognise him as such.

Famous words from Philippians 2 say this, “He humbled himself and became obedient to death, even death on a cross!  Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the father.”

 God bless

Alan

A face like flint

Exeter Temple Message notes: Palm Sunday 29^th March 2015
Bible Reading: Isaiah 50:4-9  

The Servant Songs of Isaiah are poems or songs that speak about the coming Messiah and particularly refer to him as a Suffering Servant. Isaiah 50 particularly with the disgrace, mocking and humiliation of the Messiah.  This Servant Song foretells a Saviour who does not save face but faced unspeakable suffering head on. 

 “There were many who were appalled at him. His appearance was so disfigured beyond that of any man and his form marred beyond human likeness.”  Isaiah 52:14

 1. An instructed tongue 

“The Sovereign Lord has given me an instructed tongue, to know the word that sustains the weary.”  v 4
In view here is the teaching, preaching and speaking ministry of the Messiah.  This aspect to his work was foretold long before in  “I will raise up for them a prophet like you Moses from among their brothers; I will put my words in his mouth, and he will tell them everything I command him. If anyone does not listen to my words that the prophet speaks in my name, I myself will call him to account” Deuteronomy 18:17-19 
Jesus was a master at having just the right word for the given moment, even as a boy in the temple instructing the religious teachers. The crowds were amazed at his teaching because he taught as one who had authority and not as the teachers of the law.”  

Yet it wasn’t just in dazzling teaching and in intellectual spats with the religious elite where Jesus used words well.  His words of comfort and healing were also always appropriate and life giving. It is tempting to think that Jesus was simply gifted in this way, a clever man who had the ability to read people well. But in addition to this there is the intimate knowledge of the mind of God through personal relationship. Jesus spoke with authority about God because he knew him. In Isaiah the Messia

“He wakens me morning by morning wakens my ear to list like one being taught.” (v4) 

Jesus helped countless hurting people through the power of his words and at the end of his life one of things that his enemies sought to do was to discredit the things he had said. 

Along with the beatings, the soldiers demanded that he prophesy. When he was on the cross passers-by threw his own words back at him, “You who are going to destroy the temple in three days, come down from the cross.” “Let God rescue him now, if he wants him for he said “I am the Son of God”

Jesus didn’t waste words on them, or use words to plead his case or beg for mercy.  Before his accusers he didn’t utter a word. 

On the cross, his words truly gave hope to the weary as he assured the desperate dying thief on the cross besides his, “Today you will be with me in paradise.”  How amazing is it to remember when we have fallen yet again and we are weary with our failures to remember Jesus’ words from the cross, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”

2. Open ears  4b-5

 “The Lord has opened my ears and I have not been rebellious. I have not drawn back”

Many of God’s servants have at first refused the task that God was calling them into including Moses, Jeremiah and Jonah.
Jesus models perfect obedience. He said yes to the mission revealed to him, knowing that his obedience would result in his suffering. He said yes to his saying the message the Lord placed in his heart and mind, knowing that the majority would reject his teachings.
We need to a people who say “yes Lord”. To be a servant of the Lord means to be obedient to the Lord. It means saying what God tells us to say. It means doing what he tells us to do.

 

3. A Face like flint v 6-7

 “I offered my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who pulled out my beard. I did not hide my face from mocking and spitting.”

This reveals the clear prophecy of the Lord through Isaiah concerning the suffering of Jesus.

a) Back

Our back and shoulders are capable of carrying a great load. The load we can carry is probably why we refer to bearing stress and duty as “carrying the weight of the world on our shoulders.”

Imagine doing that when your back has already been beaten and injured.  Peter wrote this of Jesus, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.”  (1 Peter 2:24)

 

b) Beards

In first century Jewish culture, men took pride in their long beards. It was a symbol of their manhood. And when we read of people tearing out the beard of the Messiah, the prophet is referring to an attempt to tear away his dignity and his manhood. And not only that, it hurts.

 c) Spitting 

Is there anything more humiliating and Is there anything more disrespectful than someone spitting at you?

 

In response to this we see the determination of the servant.

"I have set my face like flint! I know I will not be put to shame!"   (v7)

 “As the time approached for him to be taking up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem.” Luke 9:51

 

Jesus set His face like flint to do the will of God. That's what we must learn.

In Luke 13, Jesus had been preaching powerful messages in all the towns and villages. And in verse 31, the Pharisees tried to intimidate him by saying, "You’d better get out of here! Herod wants to kill you!" Jesus’ reply  was “I must keep going and tomorrow and the next day for surely no prophet can die outside Jerusalem!”

So often we are drawn away from obedience because we fall into reactionary emotions that draw us away from obedience to God when people press our buttons.   We become swayed by others or the devil, or even your own desires and reasoning.

We have the capacity to rise above reaction and consciously choose God and learn His ways.
What kind of Christian will we be?  Will we be people who have made up their minds to be faithful no matter what? 

 “And the four living creatures said, “Amen!” and the elders fell down and worshipped. Revelation 5:14  

Eugene Peterson says that Amen is a very emphatic Hebrew word. When Gentile Christians tried to translate it into Greek the nearest word they could find was one that meant, “that which is not false” or “would that it would be so.”  It turned Amen into a wistful “I wish”   They soon abandoned the idea and soon everybody just used the word Amen.  What does it mean then?

 “For no matter how many promises God has made they are Yes in Christ. And so through him the “Amen “is spoken by us to the glory of God.”            2 Corinthians 1:20

Do you remember the man from Del Monte?  What did he like to do?  He liked to say YES.  Well Paul is saying that God too, likes to say yes.  It’s as if Jesus says to the Father, Can I fulfil your promises and the Father says, “Yes, Yes!” 

Jesus’ action of setting his face like flint was an Amen to the call of God, trusting him that as verse 7 says, “Because the sovereign Lord helps me I will not be disgraced.”

We need to be careful how we use the word Amen. Hopefully it will ever be on our lips because it reflects an inner assent to all that God has promised us and calls us to be.

God Bless

Carol

 

 

 

 

What Jesus said about....Forgiveness

Exeter Temple Bible Message notes: Sunday 15th March 2015
Bible Reading: Matthew 6: 9-15
Our minds and hearts are very susceptible to clogging up by wrong attitudes towards God, to others and ourselves. Jesus words in the Sermon on the Mount shows us the cleansing agent of forgiveness is key to a process by which our relationship with God others and our own self can work properly. 
1. Step One - Identifying Guilt
NIV = “Forgive us our debts.”   
In Aramaic one word is used for both debt and trespass. Taken literally Jesus words could be referring to financial matters.  In Greek, Matthew the word used  means, “What is owed” and is used interchangeably with sins.  V 14 expounds v 12 and the word used there means sin.
“We are in the land of debts; we are up to our ears in sin.” (Martin Luther)
Guilt is a powerful force in the personality. It occurs when a person fails to meet the standards they feel are expected. A person becomes disappointed and sorrowful about what they have done. They may feel that God and others are angry with them which in turn may make them fearful.  
Freud maintained that the guilt itself is evil and its removal is good.  One view is that if you feel guilty that you can`t keep a moral standard, change the moral standard.  Christianity teaches that guilt is a proper human emotion which like pain is a sign that something is wrong.  Breaking God`s laws makes a person guilty before him.
Some people do carry false guilt which may come from their own perceptions of right and wrong, or maybe wrongly imposed by other people. However many feel guilty because they are guilty.  Real guilt isn`t something we can choose to have or not.  It is a consequence that needs dealing with.
Praying forgive us debts” is to recognise that we have something to own up to. 

 

 Step 2     Understanding the offer

To forgive comes from a Greek word which means to “let be or “to send away”.  In relation to sin “to let be” would mean that God will let you stay as you are. To send away just means that God dismisses what we owe him.  The Jewish concept of sin was not just deliberate acts of rebellion against God for which we deserve punishment but the sense of failure to fulfil an obligation to God.  When we are forgiven God just lets that accumulated past debt go.

The word Jesus used for “forgive them” on the cross was the same word that he used when he invited Lazarus friends to “loose” him from the grave clothes that still clung to him.  On the cross Jesus was asking God to liberate people from their sin, to release them from the tyranny of evil in their lives so that they could be free to become the people God intended them to be.

Forgiveness is not God sayings sin doesn’t matter. The cross shows how seriously God treats sin and how far he was prepared to go to show us his love.

 3. Step 3     Be forgiven

Jesus show us that the answer to real guilt is not denial but in asking a merciful God for forgiveness. Christianity is more than a moralistic message calling people to obey a list of rules but a message of grace that gives us freedom despite our guilt.

Jesus leads us down a part of confession and repentance not so he can make us grovel in the dirt but so he can relieve us of the burden of guilt and provide the needed forgiveness.

God`s forgiveness isn`t God saying “Forget it” and leaving us in exactly the same condition as before.  God acknowledges our sin, hears our confession, offers forgiveness but also the means by which the stain of sin can be removed.

 4. Step 4  Be forgiving

We live in a world where we are sinned against and where our own actions and attitudes wrong others.  Our sense of justice says that something needs to happen to put the wrong right, to clear the matter up.  Our human instinct is to punish, to seek recompense or perhaps revenge but that instinct will destroy us if we allow it full rein. Forgiving is important for our present wellbeing. 

"He that cannot forgive others breaks the bridge over which he himself must pass if he would ever reach heaven."  George Herbert  

According to the latest medical and psychological research, forgiving is good for our soul and our bodies.

God commands forgiving because to refuse to forgive means we allow the one who hurt us to keep us chained in a prison of bitterness. No human beings are more miserable than the unforgiving. 
Resentment uses up emotional energy which leaves people with nothing left to give. And that affects our ability to serve God and others.

We accept people based on what they are but we have to forgive people for the bad things that they do.  The fact that we need to forgive someone is because we have not excused them.  We have held them accountable for what they’ve done, and refused to excuse them. If you can excuse something, it doesn’t need forgiveness. To excuse something is to say that there’s no blame.

When we forgive we are not excusing anything but what we are doing is giving up our right to retaliate. This is an act of trust in the justice of God. You can hand it over to him who judges justly.

"When they hurled insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered he made not threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly." 1 Peter 2:23 

Jesus made it clear that there is a connection between being forgiven and forgiving.

Gerard Kelly says that just as breathing implies both inhaling and exhaling so forgiveness implies both giving and receiving. to breathe is to be alive, to be forgiven is to forgive.

It is when we see the reality that we have been forgiven much that we can forgive much.

“Be gentle with one another, sensitive. Forgive one another as quickly and thoroughly as God in Christ forgave you.”   Ephesians 4:32

The only thing harder than forgiveness is the alternative.

We cannot see forgiveness as an option.  “For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their sins you Father will not forgive your sins.”

When we forgive we come one step closer to Jesus.

We are most like beasts when we kill
We are most like men when we judge
And we are most like God when we forgive
(Anon)

 

                                                                       Forgiveness facts

1)  Forgiveness is a choice

It is a crisis of will. Since God requires us to forgive it is something we can do.  He would never require us to do something we cannot do.  Forgiveness is hard for us because it pulls against our sense of justice. We want revenge of offences suffered but we are told never to take our own revenge (Romans 1:19) 

2. Forgiveness and feelings

If we wait until we feel like forgiving.  We will never get there. However, just because forgiveness is a choice doesn’t mean that forgiveness isn’t an emotional business. If forgiveness doesn’t visit the emotional core of the past it will be incomplete. We must forgive from our heart. This means that we get to the emotional root of the pain, how the event made us feel as well as what happened.   This is essential for true healing to take place. 

 3. Forgiveness is not excusing

We may think that it would be easier to forgive if we can rationalize someone’s behaviour or we know that they didn’t mean to hurt us but whether we understand the reasons for another person’s behaviour or not, we still need to deal with the pain cause by their actions Forgiveness comes when there is no good rationale to explain away why someone   did what they did.  When an action is excusable, it doesn’t require forgiveness.

4. Forgiveness and forgetting

Many people say, I can forgive but not forget. People who try to forget find they cannot, the more they try to forget the more they remember. 

When God says he will “remember our sins no more” it does not mean that he literally erases them from his memory. God is omniscient, he cannot forget.  Rather it means that God will never use the past against us and when we truly forgiveness that is what we do as well.   Forgiveness surrenders the right to get even.  It means that the past sin becomes irrelevant to our present attitude towards the person.

5. Forgiveness is not just negative

We not only surrender the right to take revenge, but we also desire good things to happen to or for the people we are forgiving.  We bless them.
 
6. Forgiveness does not have to wait for an apology
It is sometimes said, "I’ll forgive them when they come and say they are sorry." This is not God’s way God says "I forgive you, now will you accept my offer of forgiveness by confessing and repenting?" If we wait for a confession before we forgive, most often we will be waiting a long time.

7.  Forgiveness is an act of faith

"At last I understood. In the final analysis, forgiveness is an act of faith. By forgiving another I am trusting that God is a better justice-maker than I am. By forgiving, I release my own right to get even and leave all issues of fairness for God to work out. I leave in God’s hands the scales that must balance justice and mercy.
- from "What’s So Amazing About Grace?"  Philip Yancey
 
8. Forgiving God
Technically we can’t forgive God because he cannot commit any sin but we do need to deal with any angry feeling we have against God.
 
9. Forgiving is not the same thing as reconciling. 
Forgiving is not tolerating sin or allowing abuse to continue unchallenged.  People sometimes think that forgiving someone means we must reunite with them no matter what- that a wife must move back in with a man who cheated on her, or a businessman must take back a dishonest partner as many times as requested. Forgiveness and reconciliation are two separate things. 
Forgiveness takes place within the heart of one human being. It can be granted even if the other person does not ask for it or deserve it. Reconciliation requires that the offender be sincerely repentant for the wrong he or she committed. Reconciliation requires the rebuilding of trust, and that means good faith on the part of both parties.

10.  Forgiveness is not weakness.
Being a forgiving person is not being a weak martyr. It is being strong enough to be Christ-like. 

Recommended reading
What’s so amazing about grace         Philip Yancey
Tales of total forgiveness                   RT Kendall

Additional Bible verses
Matthew 7:2
Matthew 11:25
Matthew 18:21-35
Ephesians 4:32
Colossians 3:13
James 2:13

God bless 
 Alan 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Forgiveness facts

1)  Forgiveness is a choice

It is a crisis of will. Since God requires us to forgive it is something we can do.  He would never require us to do something we cannot do.  Forgiveness is hard for us because it pulls against our sense of justice. We want revenge of offences suffered but we are told never to take our own revenge (Romans 1:19) 

 

2. Forgiveness and feelings

If we wait until we feel like forgiving.  We will never get there. However, just because forgiveness is a choice doesn’t mean that forgiveness isn’t an emotional business. If forgiveness doesn’t visit the emotional core of the past it will be incomplete. We must forgive from our heart. This means that we get to the emotional root of the pain, how the event made us feel as well as what happened.   This is essential for true healing to take place. 

 

3. Forgiveness is not excusing

We may think that it would be easier to forgive if we can rationalize someone’s behaviour or we know that they didn’t mean to hurt us but whether we understand the reasons for another person’s behaviour or not, we still need to deal with the pain cause by their actions Forgiveness comes when there is no good rationale to explain away why someone   did what they did.  When an action is excusable, it doesn’t require forgiveness.

 

4. Forgiveness and forgetting

Many people say, I can forgive but not forget. People who try to forget find they cannot, the more they try to forget the more they remember. 

When God says he will “remember our sins no more” it does not mean that he literally erases them from his memory. God is omniscient, he cannot forget.  Rather it means that God will never use the past against us and when we truly forgiveness that is what we do as well.   Forgiveness surrenders the right to get even.  It means that the past sin becomes irrelevant to our present attitude towards the person.