Who in your life, in the world, or in history do you most admire? (Besides Jesus.) Why? Who in the Bible (besides Jesus) do you most admire, relate to, or find intriguing?
Open With Prayer
Read Lesson and Bible
Verses:
Okay, so we looked at
our relationship with the Lord and how our past and our fears affect it. Now let’s turn our attention outward, to
other people. As humans, we all hurt others
and are hurt by others. And the world’s
way to deal with this is to hold grudges or to punish others. But God has a lot to say about forgiveness –
His forgiveness of us and our forgiveness of others. And these have major impacts on our
relationship with Him and our standing before Him. Mark 11:25: “And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive him, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.”
Matthew 6:14-15: “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, your Father will not forgive your sins.”
Psalm 66:18: “. . . If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened”
If I had cherished sin in my heart,
the Lord would not have listened! By
holding onto our sins, we are blocking God from hearing our prayers and
answering them. And if God requires that
we forgive others, then “unforgiveness” is a sin. A sin that ends up hurting our relationship
with the Lord. This is a very hard
teaching to absorb – that I will not be forgiven based on my unforgiveness
towards others.
Now, I don’t believe that these
verses are saying that we will lose our salvation. I believe there are two levels of
forgiveness. One relates to the moment
we chose Jesus as our Savior and we were forgiven of our sins, as a whole, so
that we could attain salvation. This is
a permanent forgiveness. And we can’t
lose that by any sin we commit. Because
if we could lose it by our sins then Jesus’ death was not enough. (Although not all Christians see it this
way.) Now, the other level of forgiveness, though, relates to the condition of our relationship with the Lord and our daily walk with Him. When we sin, we break fellowship with Him and we prevent ourselves from attaining the abundant, God-glorifying life that we should have. Like in any relationship, a sin doesn’t necessarily mean that you dump the friendship, but it does interfere with the condition of your relationship, with the level of closeness you feel with the other person.
We need to take it seriously when God says that He forgives our sins as we forgive others. But how many of us just consider this poetic? But it’s not just poetry. Being unforgiving to others - holding grudges and being bitter - puts up a wall between us and the Lord. And we cannot have the kind of relationship with Him that we were meant to have if we have unforgiveness in our hearts. Being unforgiving doesn’t just hurt the other person; it hurts us and our health (stress hurts our body) and, most importantly, it destroys our fellowship with the Lord. And we need to confess these sins as we become aware of them in order to restore proper fellowship.
Psalm 139:23-24: “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me
and know my anxious thoughts. See if
there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.”
We should regularly be asking for
God’s help in searching our hearts for anything that gets in the way of our
fellowship with Him, anything that grieves the Spirit, because we need that
intimate fellowship in order to have the best, most rewarding, most
God-glorifying life possible. (And if we
need it, we should ask for His help in forgiving others. He will help us do what we cannot do on our
own.)
Obviously bitterness can sneak in
when someone deliberately wrongs us or hurts us. But I think one rather sneaky area where
bitterness can set in is when someone fails to do something for us. And this happens a lot between spouses, where
one spouse feels that the other spouse is not meeting their “needs.”
I have a bit of a problem with how
we define “needs.” I think many of our
“needs” are simply great, big wants.
Real, desperate, good wants. But
not needs. Financial security, appreciation, more
friends, a more significant role, fulfillment in earthly things, more influence
or power or attention, a spouse who listens better or pampers us more, a better
job, health, a bigger home, a fancier phone, freedom to pursue selfish
pursuits, etc. The problem is that when we call them “needs,” we turn them into something that we are entitled to, that we passionately pursue, and that we are unfulfilled without. These needs can become idols. But we are not entitled to any certain blessing, and everything we already have is a gift from God. And God should be what we passionately pursue. He should be where we find our fulfillment. And we have to get to the point where we can learn to praise Him, be content in Him, and glorify Him, even when those “needs” are unmet.
When I defined my desire to be appreciated at home as a “need,” I was miserable because I wasn’t getting something I thought I had to have to be joyful and content. But when I redefined it as a “want,” I was able to hold it loosely, to give it over to God so He could do what He wanted with it, and to allow God to be enough for me, regardless of if I was appreciated at home or not.
We have to start calling our “needs” what they are: great, big wants that we need to put into God’s hands if we want to be truly fulfilled in the best way possible.
We think we “need” more attention or appreciation or help around the house or our spouse to listen to us more or our spouse to change for the better. But God knows we need to honor our vow to our spouse even when things are not going the way we want, to learn to love them as He loves us, to focus on changing ourselves instead of trying to change them, to let go of bitterness, to pray for them, and to let God be our all and meet the “needs” that our spouse doesn’t.
We think we need to fight for our “needs” to be met, to dish out justice when those needs are unmet, or to seek revenge. But God knows we need to let go of unforgiveness and learn to fully and completely forgive as we have been forgiven, to trust that He is a righteous judge who will avenge all wrongs and make all things right again in the end, to be more concerned with our standing before Him than other people’s standing before us, and to be more concerned with the plank in our own eye than the speck in someone else’s.
A theory
I have a theory. All of us who decide to passionately pursue
God (and not everyone chooses to do this, many just coast in their relationship
with Him) will eventually find ourselves in a painful struggle with our deepest
fears and “needs.” We may be struggling
with an illness, a wayward child, a difficult or drifting spouse, an
unfulfilling role. Or maybe it’s our
fears about being insignificant, unappreciated, unloved, alone, about pain,
about loss, about death. Somewhere along the path to a whole, humble, genuine, trusting relationship with Him, all serious God-seekers will be forced to face and struggle with “our issue” until we make a decision: hold onto the fear/”need”/desire/resentment/difficult situation (etc.) and try to maintain control over it, or place it fully into God’s hands and grab onto Him instead.
He will not allow us to hold onto both. We cannot hold onto control, fear, “our right to have our needs met,” resentment, selfish desires, etc., and yet still hold onto Him, too. He knows that it’s not best for us to carry those burdens ourselves.
These “decision times” are usually incredibly hard and painful because they often hit upon the scars and wounds and broken parts of our hearts that we have tried to keep wrapped up, hidden, and safe for so long. And they often involve learning to be vulnerable and to trust God, whereas we prefer self-preservation and having control.
But God is after complete healing and growth and wholeness for us. And so we are asked to eventually face, work through, and let go of the self-reliant, self-protective, self-focused thoughts and behaviors that hinder our relationship with Him, with ourselves, and with others.
And to correct a common misconception: You don’t have to be happy about being obedient, handing things over to God, giving up “needs,” forgiving someone else, letting go of bitterness, or living with heartache and longing in order to do it. You don’t have to “feel like it.” Even if you are still heart-sick and sad, you can still humbly submit your life to the Lord and forgive from your heart. Because He has forgiven us. Because we know He will right all wrongs in the end and that He alone has the right to avenge all wrongs.
Forgiveness and Other People
Not too long ago, I was bothered for
days because someone was sharing something about me with others that was a
misrepresentation, and they were delighting in this misrepresentation. But they would not listen to me when I tried
to correct them. I was really bothered by this, but I had no recourse. So I complained in my head about it for days. And it was eating me up inside, making me bitter and miserable.
But what finally put a stop to it is when I realized that, in God’s eyes, my thoughts and critical attitude were probably “more” sinful than what this person was guilty of. And I found myself saying, “Yes, Lord, what they did wasn’t right, but I am guilty of pride, unforgiveness, and a harsh, critical attitude. And this is a sin against You. Forgive me!”
It helps us keep a soft, forgiving, repentant heart when we look at ourselves instead of at others. Of course, it is a great thing when we move from saying, “Look at the wrongs they have done to me” to saying, “Lord, forgive them for they don’t know what they’ve been doing.” But it is an equally great thing to move from “Lord, forgive them for they don’t know what they’ve been doing” to “Lord, forgive me for I don’t know what I have been doing.”
God will deal with the sins of others. He is the one who will avenge wrongs. We just need to be concerned with the plank in our eye and with our sins. And all sins, whether they are actions or thoughts or attitudes, are really sins against God. He alone really has the right to avenge them. And He will right all wrongs in the end. If we keep this in mind, it will help us to put bitterness, criticalness, and indignation aside. (These things just kill us slowly on the inside anyway.)
Not only do we have the
responsibility to forgive others and to seek forgiveness from God, but we are
to ask for forgiveness from others for any offenses we have made against them.
Matthew
5:23-24: “Therefore, if you are offering your gift at
the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave
your gift there in front of the altar.
First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your
gift.” Being reconciled to others is so important to God that we are not even supposed to offer our gifts at the altar until we do. But how many of us sing God’s praises at church while we have unfinished business in a relationship with someone else? How many of us won’t seek reconciliation because we don’t think that we should have to? (After all, we didn’t do anything wrong, did we? It was all them! Besides, it’s history now!)
And how many of us harbor bitterness towards others for some offense? How many can’t let it go because it seems so justified? (After all, they deserve it, right!?!)
Or how about the things that we get upset or bitter about that were never attacks on us to begin with? How about holding grudges against people who aren’t even aware of it? Like misreading someone’s tone of voice or body language? Making assumptions about what someone is thinking? Or how about “road rage,” when we take it personally that someone is driving too fast or that they passed us in a “no passing” zone?
I used to struggle with road rage, with being offended by other people’s driving. But one day, after someone erratically passed me in a crazy hurry, I heard myself say, “Someone better be bleeding to death in the back of that car or on their way to hospital if they are passing me like that!” And I stopped for a moment and listened to what I said. I was saying that I preferred that someone was in the middle of a crisis than that they were just driving irresponsibly. (Of course, I wouldn’t really prefer that, but I responded like I did.) I decided that day to always hope that crazy drivers were just being irresponsible, but to assume that they could be on their way to the hospital. And I virtually never took it personally again.
I think that some of us are just so used to being upset or indignant that we will make up things to be bitter about. And this is not a healthy, godly way to live. We need to be willing to especially forgive the things that are not really personal attacks on us anyway. To let go of our “right” to be angry at the world.
Forgiveness is not so much about the
other person; it’s about our relationship with God. And even worse than just blocking God from
hearing our prayers, unforgiveness towards others (or any resistance to
confessing any sin in our lives, for that matter) shows hard-heartedness, which
is diametrically opposed to a healthy, open relationship with God. And we will further block ourselves off from
being sensitive to the Holy Spirit. And
the longer we resist, the more we will entrench ourselves behind the wall that
we have put up between us and the Lord.
And the more numb and desensitized - and self-justified - we will
feel.
It’s all about our heart and if we
humble ourselves before a holy God. But
how many of our prayers go unheard because of our heart’s condition and our
attitude towards others? Pride,
bitterness, envy, gossip, idol worship, unforgiveness, ungodly speech, getting
drunk, cheating, giving into temptations, lust, affairs, sex outside of
marriage, acting out in anger, worry, etc., are all sins that need to be
confessed and repented of, if we want God to hear our prayers, to be close to
Him, and to have the most effective life for Christ.Forgiveness is never easy, because it makes us feel like we are letting people get away with something. But we all need to remember that not only has God forgiven us all our sins – to the point that we can have eternal life – but that He alone has the right to avenge all wrongs. Any sin is really a sin against God, because He is the Creator of all and we are all His creations. So any sin against us is a sin against God, and He alone has the right to dish out justice and punishment.
Same thing for any sin we commit against others. When we sin against someone else, we are ultimately sinning against God. This is why David could say in 2 Samuel 12:13 that he sinned against God, even though he obviously sinned against Uriah, too.
This should give us pause when we want to condemn others for hurting us or let ourselves off the hook for hurting others.
Forgiving Ourselves and Forgiving God
There
is another aspect to forgiveness that we might struggle with. And that is forgiving ourselves and
“forgiving” God. Sometimes it is easier
to forgive others than it is to forgive ourselves for the wrongs we have
done. Some of us live our whole lives
punishing ourselves or keeping our distance from God and others because we feel
too guilty for things we have done. We
do not feel that we deserve to be forgiven, and so we do not accept the
forgiveness that God is so ready to give us.
Like knowing and accepting that His love is a free gift, we have a hard
time knowing and accepting His free gift of forgiveness. And for some people, His free gift of
salvation. Maybe we have never experienced true mercy and grace from other people in our lives? Maybe we have never been given anything and we are used to earning everything we have?
But we cannot earn forgiveness and grace and mercy. The only way to truly be forgiven is to accept it with a grateful, humble heart. And when this happens, we find God’s love and healing. And we begin to want to live a life that honors Him, out of thankfulness for the unearnable gifts that He gives us. If we are still trying to earn anything from God then we don’t have a correct understanding of Him.
I want to look for a moment at the woman caught in adultery in John 8. The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought to Jesus a woman who was caught in the act of adultery. (I wonder how they knew it would be happening at that exact time? And why did they not bring the man who was just as guilty? Sounds like a set-up to me. Just speculating.)
They are trying to trap Jesus, “in order to have a basis for accusing him.” And instead of answering their question about if she should be stoned, Jesus writes on the ground. We don’t know what he wrote, but we do know that it is enough to make them all leave after He says, “If any one of you is without sin, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.” (Verse 7) (I think it’s interesting to note that the older ones left first. I think as we age, we lose some of that dogmatic, self-righteousness that we might have had when we were young, and we begin to see that we are just as human as the next person.)
What I want to specifically note here are two things.
1. Jesus was more disturbed by the unforgiving, self-righteous attitudes of the “spiritual elite” than He was by the humiliated, shamed, guilty woman. And this should be sobering to those of us who are more bothered by what everyone else is doing wrong than by what we are doing wrong and to those of us who are so eager to accept forgiveness that we don’t deserve but who are unwilling to give it to others.
2. And Jesus wasn’t nearly as concerned with where the woman was coming from. He was much more concerned with where she was going. “‘Then neither do I condemn you,’ Jesus declared. ‘Go now and leave your life of sin.’” (John 8:11)
I point this out because I think too many people do not realize how ready and willing God is to forgive them. They hold onto their guilt as a sort of punishment, too full of shame to accept God’s forgiveness and love and healing. But God is much more concerned with where you are going than where you’ve been. Accept His forgiveness, let it make you free. And forgive yourself and “Go now and leave your life of sin.”
And then there are those of us who struggle
with “forgiving” God. Maybe our own sins
and shortcomings don’t bother us, but God’s “shortcomings” or the ways He lets
us down bother us immensely. This is a
whole different kind of heart attitude.
This is one where we feel like life should be the way we expect it to
be, and it really upsets us when God doesn’t make it so.
Some of us have lost health, loved
ones, jobs, homes, etc. And we struggle
with wondering how a good, loving God could allow this to happen to us. And we become unforgiving toward Him, living
as though He failed us or owes us some explanation. But at some point, we have to decide if we will still trust God even when things don’t go the way we want or if we will harden our hearts toward Him because He isn’t the kind of God we thought He should be.
If this is where we are at in life right now, I believe that we need to look at our expectations of God. Because I’m going to guess that we do not truly see Him the way that He is, the way the Bible says He is. When we try to smoosh Him up into a little box that we made or to define Him according to our faulty or unreasonable expectations, it is easy to lose hope and faith and trust when things go wrong. He isn’t the God we thought He was.
But it isn’t God who is failing us; it is our own ideas of God and life that are the problems to begin with. And we need to sort these out if we are going to be able to see the situation clearly, to “forgive” Him, and to humbly trust Him and seek His comfort when things go wrong. Life is hard enough without holding grudges against God. Or against others or ourselves, too.
Forgiveness (of others and ourselves)
becomes easier when we remember that we all wear a construction sign on our
souls that says: “Work in progress.
Please be patient and pardon my dust.”
1. Does this topic trigger any thoughts or questions you want to share?
2.
What are your thoughts on these Bible verses? Any other ones you want to share?
3. What is your view of forgiveness and
salvation? Do you believe salvation is
secure or are you concerned that maybe we can lose our salvation by our sins? Explain.
Can you find Bible verses relating to this?
4. What does “forgiveness” mean? Does it mean “forgive and forget”? Is this what God expects from us?
5. Are there things we should not forget? In those cases, what does forgiveness look
like?
6. Define “bitterness.” What are some things that might look like
bitterness but that aren’t?
7. Can you think of any situations when it is
okay to remain bitter or to withhold forgiveness? To punish the offender yourself? (I’m not talking about having them face appropriate
legal or social consequences of their sin, but about dishing out your own kind
of justice.)
8. What are some appropriate legal or social
consequences that someone might have to face, even if they sought and received
forgiveness?
9. What are some ways that people might use the
idea of forgiveness to manipulate others?
10. What are some misconceptions that people have
about forgiveness? How do these
misconceptions affect people?
11. What are some ways that we create things to
be bitter about, things that we take as personal insults or injuries that were
never meant to be attacks on us? Why do
some of us feel like we have a “right to be angry at the world”? What effect does living like this have on us
and our relationships? And how could we
handle these things better?
12. When and why is it hard to forgive
others? And what are some ways that we
avoid doing it? Any examples from your own
life? Do you think Christians in general
do a good job of forgiving others?
13. Does a person have to be deserving of forgiveness
in order to be forgiven, by God and by others?
Do they have to ask for it and be sorry before we can forgive them?
14. Can we forgive someone even if we never get
the chance to tell them? What about if
they are not around anymore? If so, how
can we do this?
15. How might we act toward someone if we say
that we forgave them but really didn’t?
16. What kinds of things do we do when we are
bitter? What effect does unforgiveness
have on us, our relationships, and our faith?
What does it reveal about the condition of our heart and our view of our
own fallenness and need for grace and mercy?
17. Earlier I wrote this:
“I have a bit of a problem with how
we define “needs.” I think many of our
“needs” are simply great, big wants.
Real, desperate, good wants. But
not needs. . . . The problem is that
when we call them “needs,” we turn them into something that we are entitled to,
that we passionately pursue, and that we are unfulfilled without. These needs can become idols. . . . And we
have to get to the point where we can learn to praise Him, be content in Him,
and glorify Him, even when those “needs” are unmet. . . . We have to start
calling our “needs” what they are: great, big wants that we need to put into
God’s hands if we want to be truly fulfilled in the best way possible.” What do you think about this? What kinds of “needs” do we demand that others meet? (How about you personally?) Which are fair and which are not fair? And how does our view of our “needs” affect our lives, our attitudes towards others and God, and our relationships with others and with God?
18. For the record, in an ideal world and in
ideal relationships, our “needs” would get met and we would not be left
wanting. But we do not live in an ideal
world or have ideal relationships. So
how can we best manage when our “needs” are not met? What should we do when we don’t get what we
want?
19. When and why is it hard to seek forgiveness
from others (and from God) for our own offenses? And instead of just asking for it and
accepting it, what are some ways that we might try to earn it? Any examples from your own life? Do you think Christians in general are doing
a good job of seeking and accepting forgiveness?
20. What other kinds of things might we do
instead of just seeking forgiveness? How
might we behave when we try to ignore our responsibility to say sorry and ask
forgiveness?
21. How does failing to seek forgiveness affect
us and our relationship with God? With
others? With ourselves? What if the person we need to seek
forgiveness from isn’t around anymore?
What can we do in this situation?
22. What do you think about the following
idea?
“It helps us keep a soft, forgiving,
repentant heart when we look at ourselves instead of others. Of course, it is a great thing when we move
from saying, ‘Look at the wrongs they have done to me’ to saying, ‘Lord,
forgive them for they don’t know what they’ve been doing.’ But it is an equally great thing to move from
‘Lord, forgive them for they don’t know what they’ve been doing’ to ‘Lord,
forgive me for I don’t know what I
have been doing.’”
23. What things are hard for us to forgive
ourselves for? What are some reasons we
might have a hard time accepting forgiveness or forgiving ourselves? What effect might this have on our lives and
our relationship with God? Have you ever
felt this way? (And what are some
biblical truths that might help us forgive ourselves?)
24.
What are some faulty expectations/assumptions that we have about God,
about ourselves, about others, and about life?
How might these lead to problems?
How might they hurt our relationship with God? (Expectations such as “God said that if I had
faith, I would always get what I asked for in prayer” and “God just wants us to
be happy” and “We can’t really forgive others or obey God unless we ‘feel like
it.’”)
25. What or who do we blame for the problems in
our lives? What are the consequences of
doing this?
26. Can you personally think of anyone that you
might be blaming for problems in your life?
Or any grudges that you are holding?
What effect has this had on your life?
And how might you actually be responsible for the problems that you
blame others for or for the lingering aftereffects?
27.
I said that “all sins, whether they
are actions or thoughts or attitudes, are really sins against God. He alone really has the right to avenge
them. And He will right all wrongs in
the end. If we keep this in mind, it
will help us to put bitterness, criticalness, and indignation aside.” What do you think of this idea? What does it mean for our lives?
28.
Is there anyone that you need to forgive? What effect has unforgiveness and bitterness
had on your life?
29.
Is there anyone you need to ask for forgiveness from? What has your relationship been like because
of your resistance to doing it? How can
you make amends? (What if they are not
around anymore?)
30.
Is there any unconfessed sin that you need to ask God’s forgiveness
for? Or any sin that you know you know
you are forgiven for but that you need to forgive yourself for? How might finally doing this change your life
and your relationship with God? (If it’s
too personal, keep it between yourself and God.)
31.
Do you think that we are required to remember and confess all sins in
order to have the best relationship possible with God? Does sin that we have forgotten about still
negatively affect our relationship with God?
Is it still “held against us” or is it covered by God’s grace? Can we take the idea of sin and asking for
forgiveness to extremes?
32.
What do you think of my theory?
Have you experienced this?
“All of us who decide to passionately pursue
God . . . will eventually find
ourselves in a painful struggle with our deepest fears and “needs.”. . .
Somewhere along the path to a whole, humble, genuine, trusting relationship
with Him, all serious God-seekers will be forced to face and struggle with “our
issue” until we make a decision: hold onto the fear/”need”/desire/resentment/difficult
situation (etc.) and try to maintain control over it, or place it fully into
God’s hands and grab onto Him instead.
He will not allow us to hold onto both.”
33.
What do you think about the idea of needing to “forgive God”? What are some things that we might have a
hard time “forgiving” God for? What
might help cause this unforgiving attitude?
34.
Is there anything that you need to “forgive” God for? Anything that you have been holding against
Him, that has been interfering with your relationship with Him? How can you go about doing this and finally
letting it go?
35.
How can we bear with the tragedies of life without becoming bitter: the
lost loved ones, the loss of health, the accidents, etc.?
36.
“Forgiveness (of others
and ourselves) becomes easier when we remember that we all wear a construction
sign on our souls that says: ‘Work in progress.
Please be patient and pardon my dust.’”
Discuss this sentence.
37. Are there any other thoughts or questions that you want to add?
