Look inside this book.Where the Bush is Burning: A Daily Devotional by [Thomas Tice]
If You Forgive

If You Forgive

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For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.  

Matthew 6:14-15 

How important is it to God that we forgive others? It is important enough that Christ refers to it in the Lord’s Prayer. That prayer immediately precedes our text. Christ thought it so important that He commented upon it. Our text is that comment. He states that if we forgive others, then God will forgive us. The one relates to the other. Christ had many other things to say upon this subject, therefore it is not a stand-alone statement unrelated to anything else He taught. We should reason after the entirety of what He says regarding forgiveness, giving due weight to the various other remarks He makes. Because He continually stresses that God forgives predicated on repentance, we cannot pass over it, as if it does not matter. If we are to be imitators of Christ, then we learn to forgive as He does. He forgives the repentant, and stands always ready to forgive again and again. If we are to be like Christ then this is what we learn from Him. As we forgive others, so God forgives us.  

Our God of grace and glory, 
we rejoice that You teach us Your ways through Christ. 
We praise You that Your Holy Spirit 
leads us to imitate Him.  

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

Father, Forgive Them

Father, Forgive Them

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Then Jesus said, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they do. And they divided His garments and cast lots. 

Luke 23:34

How did Christ approach the practical outworking of forgiveness? The context of our text is critical to our understanding. He was hanging on the cross between two thieves. Roman soldiers were at the foot of the cross. For them, the crucifixion of three people was just another day at work. They attached no special significance to executing these people. They did it all the time. They were so hardened to the event that they gambled for the clothing of Christ. It was to these men Christ referred when He said, ‘Father forgive them, for they do not know what they do.’ That He refers to them specifically is clear by the last remark of the verse, ‘And they divided His garments and cast lots.’ Christ was appealing to His Father to forgive these who were sinning in ignorance. Unpleasantly, some have seized upon this text to attempt to turn it into a statement of general amnesty that somehow refers to anyone who had anything to do with His death. Christ took special care to intercede for those who, by virtue of their circumstance, sinned against Him in complete ignorance.

Our Gracious and Kind Savior, 
we rejoice that You intercede for those who sin against You. 
We praise You that your grace is wide. 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning

Because You Begged Me

Because You Begged Me

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Then his master, after he had called him, said to him, You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you? 

Matthew 18:32-33 

Christ clearly illustrates how the process of forgiveness works. In the parable from which our text derives, He tells the story of a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. One servant comes before him who owes a large sum, ten thousand talents. For our purpose this could be ten thousand dollars or ten million, if that helps us get the idea. He pleads with the king who is about to sell his family into slavery and liquidate all his assets. He says, ‘Master, have patience with me, and I will pay you all.’ Christ relates, ‘Then the master of that servant was moved with compassion, released him, and forgave him the debt.’ That servant went out and found another servant who owed him a hundred denarii, let’s say, a hundred dollars. That man pleads as well, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you all.’ The first servant refuses to hear, and throws the second servant into prison. Others go and tell the king. He recalls the first servant and our text is his reasoning. Thus we see that God, who is the King, forgives on the predication of repentance. We dare not ignore this if we are going to discuss forgiving as God forgives. This is how Christ illustrates forgiveness for us to understand.  

Our God of Grace and Glory, 
we rejoice that there is forgiveness with You. 
We praise You that You teach us how to forgive others.

 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning
 

If He Repents

If He Repents

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Take heed to yourselves. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day returns to you, saying, I repent, you shall forgive him.  

Luke 17: 3-4 

What did Christ teach on the subject of forgiveness?  Our text is critical to our understanding of the subject. The parallel text to it, which lies in Matthew 18, is less detailed. That is a text upon which many have seized and use to pervert biblical forgiveness into an amnesty which places the responsibility for forgiveness upon the individual who was wronged without reference to the repentance of the one who has done the wrong. The real question is, does God forgive without repentance? The answer to that question is, no, He does not. He is always disposed to forgive. He is ready to forgive anyone who repents, as many times as they repent. Christ explains in our text how this translates into our own imitation of Him. If someone wrongs us 490 times in a day, and 490 times repents, we are to grant them forgiveness. This is that disposition to forgive that is most Christlike. What is not like Christ is to separate repentance from forgiveness and pervert it into an amnesty that denies the wronged individual the justice of the wrongdoer owning their wrong. If we are going to discuss forgiveness, we must discuss it in the terms of what Christ said and what the Scripture articulates upon the whole subject. 

Our Gracious God and our Father, 
we rejoice that You teach us Your ways. 
We praise You that in these last days, 
You have spoken to us by Your Son. 

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burner

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