Forgiving As We Are Forgiven, Pt. 3 — A ‘Time With God’ Devotion

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Transcript

Good morning. Each weekday morning at this time, we just open the Bible and listen to God. That’s what the Bible is. It’s God’s communication to us, His love letter to us, and His invitation for us to love Him back.

The fact that God would come to us in that way is staggering when you consider how often we have offended Him, broken His laws, neglected Him, done what we knew he didn’t want in our lives, yet He comes to us with His letter of love, the Bible.

Well, each weekday morning we apply what God has to say to our lives, and this week we’re talking about forgiveness. One of the biggest issues in our lives, isn’t it? People offend us all the time. What are we going to do with that? How are we going to react? And sometimes we react very strongly, angrily in the moment, but there’s still a time after that when things settle down and we have a choice.

How are we going to act in this situation and in this relationship? Forgiveness. We saw Monday that forgiveness isn’t about what the person deserves. It’s about what’s in your own heart as the person who forgives. We saw yesterday that there’s no excuse not to forgive others when we consider how much God has forgiven us, not because we deserve it, but just out of the grace in His heart. Today I want to look at this principle.

The willful choice to forgive

Offering forgiveness costs you something, but it also rewards you. It costs you something, but it also rewards you. And isn’t it true that that’s the case with every decision we make in life? You gain something and you lose something by every decision. Are you going to brush your teeth today? Well, you gain something and you lose something, whether you do or you don’t, and you make the choice of what’s more important to you. Well, offering forgiveness is the same way, though far more important.

Here’s what Peter says in 1 Peter chapter one of the Bible.

He says:

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And if you call on him as Father (talking about God), if you call on Him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, then conduct yourselves with fear during your time of exile, knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ.

When you look at God’s forgiveness of you, it cost God to forgive you, didn’t it?

You were ransomed not with perishable things such as silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ. You’re coming to God the Father, and look at the price that He paid to forgive you. In Hebrews chapter 12, verse 2, it talks about Jesus Himself bringing us forgiveness, and it says, for the joy set before Him, He endured the cross, scorning its shame.

There was joy set before Him. There was a reward, but there was an incredible cost too, and that was the cross for Jesus. Well, in your own life, as people offend you, it costs you to forgive them, doesn’t it, because everything in you just wants to pound on them emotionally and establish your own rights. Your pride rises up.

And you may explode, you may say quiet words that put a person down, but it’s the natural response, isn’t it? And it costs you. You have to give up your sense of your right to act that way.

A giver always pays the price for a gift, don’t they? And a forgiver always pays a price to forgive.

But the reward is greater than the cost.

The reward in your own heart when you forgive, think about it when you’ve forgiven people, don’t you find just this sense of peace and rightness in your heart? The reward is also in the relationship when you forgive, when there’s been a distance, a barrier created.

And you might be waiting and waiting for the person to come to you to make things right, but if you take the first step of forgiveness and bring it up and offer forgiveness, you will find that relationship is restored and often is even better than before. What’s more, forgiving others is also crucial to your own walk with God, as Jesus tells us to pray – Father forgive us as we forgive those who have sinned against us.

I’m John North.

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