Those who forgive are forgiven. Jesus said, “If you forgive men for their transgressions, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive men, then your Father will not forgive your transgressions.” Matt 6:14
A man says to his wife, “I forgive you,” and he then proceeds to cut her out of his life. Unless he repents, he will likewise be cut off. Whatever law he measures against her, God measures the same against him.
Do not suppose that divorce is a secondary issue for Christians. If you make your wife earn your acceptance, you deny the gospel. If you deny the gospel, you go to hell. Again, what is forgiveness? We want to know, if we intend to live.
Forgiveness longs for reconciliation. Forgiveness means refusing to hold people’s sins against them. It means that anything you did to me, I do not hold it against you. It means that as I relate to you as a person, I see nothing between us. Regarding our relationship, your sins are nothing to me.
There is a distinction but not a separation between forgiveness and reconciliation. One longs for the other. Forgiveness does not grant reconciliation, but it certainly offers it. A man who claims to forgive his wife but doesn’t want to see her anymore has not forgiven her.
I realize that some Christians will read this and fear that they could lose their salvation. I want to see a fear that wakes people up, not a fear that drags them down into despair. When Paul tells Christians to work out their salvation with fear and trembling, it is the former kind of fear, not the latter. Philippians 2:12
Forgiveness can be a process. When you forgive a small sin, it is over and done. When you forgive a big sin, one that hurts deeply, it will likely surface again. That’s okay. As many times as you think of it, you choose to forgive and get your mind on other things. It might take years or the rest of your life. It was a deep hurt. It doesn’t heal easily.
It is not my efforts to forgive that saves me. It is God’s grace that enables me to forgive. Let me make this clear. Every sinner struggles with forgiveness. Forgiveness is an ideal that the human heart cannot even seek. Apart from God’s grace I can neither forgive, nor be forgiven. Apart from grace I will make people earn my “forgiveness,” and then it’s not really forgiveness, because I made them pay for it.
Either forgive people, or make them pay. Either forgive them because God commands you to do so, or make them earn back your favor. Mortal man cannot obey this on his own. Only the grace of God enables a sinner to obey.
We want to make “forgiveness” easy by redefining it as something that a sinner can do by his own efforts. Those who seek the real thing will be shaken. They will tremble at the impossibility of salvation apart from grace.
