Forgiving like Jesus

Bible passage: Luke 23:32-43

Series on being like Jesus - have to include forgiveness. One thing that has to set apart from Christian relationships from non-Christian ones is the willingness to forgive. Forgiveness is at the heart of our faith.

Christian faith starts with an admission of guilt. The press – and Radio Merseyside are part of this – the media love to report on people who are professed Christians who fail. Only this week a local minister was suspended for falling short of the Christian ideal – thankfully this time the press went easy on him. But really it's not that remarkable that Christians go wrong. We aim to be good and to do what's right – follow Jesus in his example. But what sets Christians apart from others is not that we're better than anyone else – it's quite the reverse – it’s that we know we are sinners and have asked God for forgiveness. Christians are not perfect we're just forgiven.

Spirit in the Sky song "I've never been a sinner..."

And Jesus says just as your Father has forgiven you, so you must forgive. He even says that God will forgive us when we forgive others. Not much that can prevent our salvation – but unforgiveness can do that.

That's why forgiveness is at the very centre of our faith.

Towards the end of Luke's gospel, Jesus tells his disciples what will happen in his crucifixion and resurrection and how he is sending them out to do his work in the world – and he says (24:46-7)
 "I will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, 47and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in my name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem."

What is the message? Repentance and forgiveness of sins. That's what our faith is about.

Look at the example of Jesus.

John 8 a woman caught in the act of adultery was brought to Jesus. Jesus averted his eyes and caused her accusers to be ashamed of their own sins. Then he looked at the woman and forgave her – and told her not to go on sinning.

When Peter let Jesus down by denying he even knew his Lord, Jesus made a point of seeking him out to forgive him.

Even when people were committing the most the most significant miscarriage of justice in the world – crucifying the Son of God, Jesus looked at them and prayed for their forgiveness. He said "Father forgive them – they don't know what they're doing".

Jesus asked God to forgive the people who were putting him to death - Jewish leaders, Roman politicians and soldiers, bystanders - and God answered that prayer by opening up the way of salvation even to Jesus’ murderers. The Roman centurion and soldiers who witnessed the crucifixion said, “Surely he was the Son of God”  Soon many priests were converted to the Christian faith – Acts 6.

And even as he was dying the man on the cross next to him said "remember me when you come into your kingdom" and Jesus said that the man would be with him in paradise.

Forgiveness is a key to understanding Jesus. It's the way that he forgave others that help us to know that Jesus as God as well as human.

The OT says that only God could forgive sins and yet Jesus looked at people and told them their sins were forgiven . When the Jewish authorities complained about that he simply accepted what they said – and they called it blasphemy - and if he hadn't been God himself it would have been blasphemy – no good Jew would ever claim to be able to forgive – but Jesus made that claim. In doing so he upset the Jews but he challenged people to think about who he really was.

Jesus lived a life of forgiveness and it defines our faith – so how should we live?

Simply we should forgive – be should be slow to judge and slow to bear a grudge but quick to forgive and to forget.

Matt 18 we read how Peter came to Jesus and said  “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?” 22Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.

How should we forgive?

Quick to forgive and forget. When someone hurts us we have to learn to be able to shrug it off and carry on. People are different. Some people are easily offended, and retain hurts. Some aren't so bothered.

If you're the kind of person who takes offence – I am like that by nature - need to ask God to help you take things less to heart, not to make an hurt into a grudge. It happened to me last week – someone said something to me that hurt - I have to say – no, it wasn't meant, just lay it aside – not easy to do.
If you’re the kind of person who is less easily hurt – realise that others can be offended by what you say.

Longer term hurts – really destructive. Country Parish two brothers in the same street in the same village hadn't spoken to one another for 20 years – both forgotten why. Extreme – but it does happen. We fall out and we don't forgive - and the broken relationship is caused more by unforgiveness than by the original offence.

Have to have the courage to forgive. Even we continue to think we're in the right – just waiting for the other person to say sorry – no - have to make the first move. Forgiveness matters that much.

Sometimes we need to forgive our parents – even if they're not still alive – feel hurt by them, let down, blamed them for the people they have made us. Forgiving them is the start on the road to putting that behind us

Sometimes we need to forgive our children when they've let us down and not been all we hoped. Prodigal Son story reminds us of how effective forgiveness can be.

Repentance – truly being sorry and turning away – is an important part of forgiveness. God forgives us when we are repentant, and we should be repentant before others to seek their forgiveness. But for our own sake we should be able to forgive even those who are not repentant towards us.

Spent time talking to people, who were abused as children – say I can't forgive him and he shows no repentant – abusers usually go on denying their actions. Even in that extreme situation I would say have forgiveness in your heart – not as a gift to the person who hurt you, but for your own sake, so God can deal with you and gently restore you.

Forgiveness means a new start – problem with being human is that we have long memories. Goldfish have a memory span of 60 seconds. Swim round their bowl – "oh look, a miniature model of a shipwreck that's really interesting, let's have a look". Next time round the bowl  - "oh look, a miniature model of a shipwreck that's really interesting, let's have a look".

But not so easy for us – we just can't forget. We have to pray and we have to learn to forgive and forget – not ever again to associate that person with that hurtful action or word. Put it behind you. We're told that when God forgives he removes our sins from us as far as the east is from the west – in other words completely and utterly. Our prayer should be that we should be able to do that when we forgive – start again, having learned for that experience but not being scarred by it.