February 18, 2025 • 31 mins
What if forgiveness isn't about forgetting or feeling good about the person who wronged you? Discover the transformative truth behind forgiveness and its profound impact on both our spiritual lives and interpersonal relationships. This episode takes a thoughtful look at common misconceptions within Christian circles and connects them to a theological understanding of why forgiveness is essential for a relationship with a morally perfect God. By examining the nature of human imperfection and sin, we highlight the necessity of seeking divine forgiveness to bridge the gap between humanity and the divine.
Join us as we navigate the complex balance between divine justice and mercy, exploring how God's wisdom unfolded a plan for fellowship with sinful humans through Jesus Christ. We unpack the Christian belief that Christ's sacrifice offers a path to restore our connection with God and emphasize the importance of acknowledging one's sin. Delving into the often-overlooked struggle of self-forgiveness, we challenge its biblical basis and explore its place in accepting God's all-encompassing grace. This conversation invites you to reflect on the deeper meanings of sin, redemption, and spiritual fellowship.
Finally, we explore the degrees of forgiveness expected within Christian circles and the power of God's forgiveness as a guide in our spiritual journey. By diving into scriptural stories like the directive to forgive "70 times seven" and the parable of the unforgiving servant, we illustrate that forgiveness is not about being a doormat or neglecting justice. Instead, it is about releasing the desire for retribution while also setting boundaries. Be inspired by the reminder of the gospel's power and God's promise to remember our sins no more, as we encourage you to embrace and share this powerful message of grace.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
All right, everyone, welcome to the second Theo
podcast.
Sam and Tim here and we havebeen doing somewhat of a series.
I don't know if we'd call it aseries, but we're doing anxiety,
depression and forgivenesstoday, all tied to just kind of
Christian circles and maybe someof the biggest struggles that
Christians have within thesecircles.
So anxiety being one ofdepression and just what does
(00:23):
forgiveness actually look like.
So we'll talk about that today,as always.
Follow us on instagram.
We've been enjoying doingvideos for that, trying to put
out some more in the comingweeks.
But we're at psych underscoreand underscore theo and if you
want to email us any questionsor you have some topic
recommendations, you can emailus at psychandtheo at gmailcom
(00:46):
and also follow us on Spotifyand Apple Podcasts.
We have a new look.
You know Tim has his bluelights in the background there.
It looks great.
I have some little highlightsnot looking as great, but we'll
make it work at some point.
But yeah, we're excited to talkabout this topic because I
think there's a lot ofmisunderstanding of what
forgiveness can look like forthe Christian.
(01:07):
So you know how we do things.
First we start with definingwhat this actually is what is
forgiveness and then I'll getinto some of the questions of
what this looks like within achurch context.
So what is forgiveness, tim?
So what is forgiveness?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Tim.
Yeah, so a lot of people thinkforgiveness means that when
someone does me wrong, I'm goingto choose to forget it like
forgive and forget.
They conflate those two, orthat it means like I suddenly
will choose to feel good aboutthe person again or feel good
about the situation, orsomething like that.
These are all things, whatforgiveness is not Forgiveness.
(01:45):
Obviously, in order forforgiveness to even come up as
something that needs to beconsidered, there must be
something that's been done wrong.
Like an offense has been made, atransgression of some sort, and
the person that has beenwronged must choose to offer
forgiveness or not.
And forgiveness means let'ssplit those two words for and
(02:09):
give so for, as in like forrunning, like to go before and
then give, so I'm going to givesomething beforehand.
If you think of it that way,forgiveness means that I'm going
to, in advance, extend mercy tothis person.
Extend, or at least I'm goingto forego, my right to hold
(02:31):
something against someone.
That's what forgiveness is.
So if I forgive a debt, like ifsomebody owes me money, and I
forgive that debt, it doesn'tmean that I like that person.
It doesn't mean that I thinkthey're a great person or that I
want to hang out with them.
It means that I'm now choosingnot to hold their debt against
them anymore.
(02:53):
So, I'm forgiving the debt.
If someone wrongs me, like,let's say, they lie about me and
they slander me and they gossipabout me and they break my
trust in some way.
It's a close friend.
They've broken my trust onsomething that's really, really
important to me.
Well, forgiveness means notthat I choose to trust them
(03:15):
again, because trust isdifferent than forgiveness.
Trust is something that has tobe earned, but forgiveness means
I'm going to no longer holdthat offense against them, like
I'm not going to demandsomething from them for that
offense.
That's what forgiveness means.
Let's put that in a theologicalcontext.
So I think everyone at somepoint can understand basic
(03:38):
forgiveness.
You know and we all understandthat, hey, we all need to be
forgiven of some things.
We all do wrong things to eachother and we have wrong things
done to us.
In the theological context, wehave a relationship not just
with each other but with God.
We are all trying to relate toGod in some way, some of us more
(03:59):
than others.
Some of us maybe not at all.
There's a small, maybe not atall, but in the Christian
worldview, our ability to have arelationship with God is
contingent upon us beingforgiven of sin.
Someone might be wondering whydo we need to be forgiven of sin
?
Okay, so God is a is a morallyperfect being by definition.
(04:19):
If we think about who God is,god is a morally perfect being.
He's a creator of the world.
He made everything.
He doesn a morally perfectbeing.
He's the creator of the world.
He made everything.
He doesn't commit evil himself.
He doesn't do wrong things to us, he doesn't sin against us.
He's a morally perfect being,but he creates creatures in his
image, like us, who have thefree will to either do right or
(04:41):
to do wrong, and we, as notperfect beings, ultimately
inevitably do wrong.
We ultimately sin, and, if youwant to go deeper than that,
we're born with a nature thathas this proclivity to sin, and
so, by the very fact that we arehuman beings, that we're less
than God, we actually will dothings that are wrong.
(05:05):
We'll do things that aremorally wrong to do, and then,
when we do those things that aremorally wrong, the Bible calls
that sin.
Sin meaning that we fall shortof God's moral perfection, we
fall short of the standard thatGod has to be in fellowship with
him, and this is key tounderstanding, like even the
(05:25):
Christian worldview, just likewhy would God set?
up this whole thing to beginwith, if he knows we're going to
sin.
Well, in order to havefellowship with a morally
perfect being, we ourselves mustin some way be made morally
righteous to have that kind offellowship, if that morally
perfect being isn't going towant to fellowship with beings
(05:47):
who are sinful.
And so we have to understandthat he is perfect, he's God,
we're not, and so there's thischasm of separation.
We can't experience the fullpresence, the full fellowship
with God as sinful humancreatures.
So something has to be doneabout that.
(06:07):
God himself must forgive theseoffenses, must forgive our moral
imperfection, not just animperfection, because that kind
of puts it mildly, because it'snot just like, well, I'm
imperfect.
The imperfect.
Imperfection means that we dothings that are selfish, we do
things that are evil.
We do things that are evil, wehave evil intents in our hearts.
These are things that corruptus throughout our lives, our
(06:32):
being in the state that we are.
We are corrupted spiritualbeings, but we all desire a
union with God.
This is something that's innateto human beings, because we're
created in his image.
So, whether we realize it ornot, we do desire union with god
.
But that's impossible in ourcurrent state.
So god himself must forgivethese moral sins in order for
(06:56):
that fellowship to be restoredwith him.
The gospel and the christianitysays that god himself is the
one that takes that burden uponhimself to restore that
fellowship.
You might be wondering whycan't God just forgive sins?
Why?
Speaker 1 (07:09):
can't he just?
Speaker 2 (07:10):
forgive them.
Well, we can get into the wholegospel story, but essentially,
where there is wrong that's beendone, restitution must be made
in some way.
He's a merciful God, but he'salso a just God.
And think of it this way Likeif I want forgiveness for the
wrong things that I do, but Iwant God to punish someone for
(07:31):
the wrong things that have beendone to me by that person, god
can't do both of those things atthe same time without doing
something else.
Okay, he can't just forgive youand then judge the other person
.
He's morally perfect, so he hasto be perfectly just in his
judgments.
So if you want him to judge theother person, well then he's
going to judge you.
(07:51):
This is why Jesus says inMatthew seven like with what
standard you judge other people,that standard will be used to
judge you.
So yeah, we, we, we want God tobe a perfect judge, but we
don't want them to judge us.
God, in his wisdom, provides theanswer to this question how
does he judge?
(08:11):
How does he a morally perfectjudge who can judge all sin
perfectly and yet be a righteous, merciful, gracious God, full
of love that desires fellowshipwith even these sinful human
creatures?
And the answer to that is JesusChrist.
God himself takes on human form, the flesh that we also have,
and dies in our place, like sinbrings forth death.
This is the christian worldviewthat sin brings forth death.
(08:33):
We die in this sin.
We can't have fellowship withgod, and so we die in this
sinful state.
God takes on human form.
He is perfectly obedient in hishuman form, but still dies a
death on the cross, and thuspays that payment for sin that
we accrued, and so he makes thatpayment Now.
(08:55):
Now he is the one that, byfaith, we accept his payment.
So now he is the one who stepsin our place.
It takes the payment and, inreverse, we receive his
righteousness to us.
So then we are brought back intofellowship with God.
So the point of this is thatforgiveness in a theological
context can only make sense ifyou understand what Christian
(09:17):
gospel is.
God extends his forgiveness toall human beings.
He makes it available to allhuman beings.
Forgiveness to all human beingshe makes it available to all
human beings If they acknowledgetheir sin, if they acknowledge
their inadequacy to pay for thatsin, and they accept his
payment for their sin.
He pays that sin for them.
He restores them to a rightrelationship with them and
(09:37):
forgiveness is extended to themin their human state, and that's
the core of the gospel.
With that, then, when it comesto a Christian learning how to
forgive other people, that's thecore of the gospel.
With that, then, when it comesto a Christian learning how to
forgive other people, that'salways in the backdrop of our
lives.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
No, that was amazing, man.
I didn't think of that piecethat you said about.
Obviously we understandforgiveness because of what
Christ did for us, but theaspect of God not being able to
and correct me if I'm wrong withunderstanding this God not
being able to relate to us inour unforgiven state.
(10:14):
But it's only the reason why wehave community with Him or are
able to relate to Him throughprayer or community, is only
after we accept his forgivenessthrough Christ.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
It's a fellowship.
Fellowship is the word Okay,fellowship Okay.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
We can't have full fellowship with God in our
unforgiven, sinful state.
Okay, that makes more sense,okay, sin must be dealt with,
and forgiveness must be extendedand then given to the person.
And that happens throughaccepting what Christ did on the
cross, accepting what God didfor us, and then seeking God's
forgiveness.
Then payment is made, payment,the payment that Christ did on
(10:54):
the cross that is extended andto our account, let's say and
then our fellowship with God isnow restored in a spiritual
sense, and then we can now havethat fellowship with God that he
has desired with us all along.
But knowing that God createsfallible human creatures with
free will, he knows that they'regoing to sin.
(11:15):
So this is why Paul says fromthe foundation of the earth, god
has already had this plan inmind.
The wisdom that he had inChrist, he already had that in
mind from the foundation of theearth.
He knew what was going tohappen with human beings.
He knew that they were going tosin.
If God, being this perfectlyloving being who desires
fellowship and desires a familyof creatures created in his
(11:39):
image, he says, okay, if Icreate these creatures, just
like the angels, the angels havefree will and some of them fall
.
If I create these creatures,just like the angels, the angels
have free will and some of themfall.
If I create these creatures,they're going to fall too,
because they're not me.
So how?
If you understand this, godunderstands this perfectly
instantly.
But for us we have to kind ofwork through this as like little
kids.
How would you set up a systemwhere you can have fellowship,
(12:01):
forever, perfectly, in a family,with these creatures who you
know are going to sin?
Well, then you make thearrangements that payment will
be made for them.
That's the gospel, yeah, so Godis not surprised by our sin.
He knows that's going to happenand so he has already made the
way for that sin, like thehubris, that we can actually pay
(12:27):
for that sin, that we canactually pay for our own sin.
God knows we can't do that.
Like, how could you pay for?
all your sins, pay for all theways that you've rebelled and
disobeyed God, the father, andhe knows that you, he knows that
you can't.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
And he's waiting for us to realize that too.
So we come to christ and we sayI can't pay for these sins and
I, I want to be with god, I wantfellowship with god, I want a
relationship with god.
That's why, jesus, I am the way, the truth and the life.
And no, no man could come tothe father but by me.
But he sends his son into theworld, not to condemn the world,
(13:00):
but that the world, through him, might be saved yeah, that's so
great about it.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
You know, as as you were sharing that I wonder if
you see the the connection herewith some people Christians who
are struggling with acceptingGod's forgiveness.
So there's this aspect in theresearch that talks about
self-forgiveness, andself-forgiveness doesn't seem to
be a concept that we find inscripture.
And again, correct me if I'mwrong.
(13:26):
But for people who arestruggling with accepting God's
forgiveness, oftentimes what youhear other people share is well
, you need to forgive yourselfright Before you accept God's
forgiveness.
Oftentimes what you hear otherpeople share is well, you need
to forgive yourself right Beforeyou accept God's forgiveness.
It seems like you're stillholding on to this thing from
your past.
You got to forgive yourselffirst and I'm wondering if you
could kind of delineate for usis there a difference between
(13:47):
those two things?
Like, is self-forgivenesssomething that we see in
scripture or is that somethingthat kind of demonstrate that we
haven't accepted God'sforgiveness and we're just
holding on to shame?
Like how would youdifferentiate between those two?
Speaker 2 (14:03):
So I don't buy, I don't agree with someone who
says you need to forgiveyourself first before you come
to God.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Is self-forgiveness a thing, though?
Like can they forgivethemselves?
Is that something that you do?
Well, I think.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
I think that self-forgiveness I don't know.
I've personally I've alwaysstruggled with the term
self-forgiveness because I thinkit's shame.
I think it's something,something that you are beating
yourself up and we're holdingthings against ourselves.
What I think ultimately it isis someone who struggles to
receive the grace of God intheir life, Like we can come and
(14:36):
we can ask forgiveness and Godforgives us of our sins and he
restores us to right fellowship,but we ourselves still have
shame and regret and we want topunish ourselves.
We want to do things to feellike we've made up for our
mistakes.
We want to do things to feellike we've made up for our
mistakes and, yeah, like thereis a point where something can
(14:57):
become self-hatred and I thinkthat's rooted in a form of
spiritual pride, because ittakes humility to accept God's
forgiveness.
Yeah, but yeah, I don't know.
You know I have struggled withthis concept of self-forgiveness
, like forgiving myself orsomething.
I'm not saying it's not true,I'm just saying that I don't
(15:19):
know.
I think it's a simpler way toput it.
I think it's just like shameand regret.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
It's kind of with the shame, rather than you're
actually forgiving yourself.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Yeah, you know, I think our narcissistic
generation might focus on that,be like I'm going to forgive
myself of this, forgive myselfof that.
I think there is a place forself-compassion, for having
compassion for oneself andcompassion.
You know Christ, several placesin the gospel Jesus looks upon.
It describes him looking uponpeople with compassion.
(15:50):
Compassion is you're looking atsomeone, you're seeing them and
what they're struggling with,you're empathizing with them and
all the while, extending graceand forgiveness to them and
offering them a way out.
And I think, maybe, if you thinkabout that from a
self-reflection standpoint,having compassion on yourself,
looking at your past, looking atyourself from the past, and
(16:11):
having compassion on yourself, Iunderstand the mistakes that I
made.
I know why I made them.
I did some good things, somebad things from my past.
You know, and I'm just kind oftrying to figure it out yeah,
life, yeah.
So having that kind ofcompassion toward yourself, the
kind of compassion that youwould have toward a friend who
is struggling with regret intheir own life, you can extend
(16:33):
that same kind of compassion toyourself.
That that, I think, is, I think, easier to understand rather
than oh, forgive yourself ofthis, I don't know, that's,
that's me.
I'm speaking personally now.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
No, no that's good, that's good.
You know, I brought up a keyconcept the idea of
self-compassion.
There's this really goodpsychologist, his name is Dr
Gabriel Mate, and he talks aboutthat aspect and he talks about
five different levels ofcompassion and but he he
references the Latin word ofcompassion, which means
compassion, but he breaks itdown is to suffer with.
(17:08):
So when you're talking aboutthe idea of self compassion, it
is looking back at that person,the old you, I guess, that was
making or made mistakes andexperienced suffering and all
that.
And it's the present day.
You kind of suffering alongwith that younger version of you
.
And it's this idea of you're notjudging the person to your
(17:29):
point, you're not shaming theperson for the mistakes or
choices that they made, butrather you're allowing yourself
to just kind of sit there in thesuffering along with them,
which gives you a sense ofempathy and care for the present
day of a person who'spresenting but yeah, I think
that does play a lot into theshame piece was a really great
point that I think Christians dostruggle with.
(17:50):
You know, another thing thatcomes up when we talk about
forgiveness a great descriptionand demonstration of what the
gospel looks like, of why weunderstand forgiveness the way
that we do, but oftentimesChristians may see forgiveness a
necessary piece from that isreconciliation, and I wonder if
you kind of elaborate on that,like does forgiveness mean
(18:12):
reconciliation?
Are they two separate terms,and is reconciliation necessary
to be a, to actually forgivesomeone?
Speaker 2 (18:21):
well, there are two separate things.
Forgiveness only requires oneperson it requires you.
You can choose to forgivesomeone, even if that person
isn't repentant, never will willbe repentant maybe or maybe
they're dead and they're passedon and there's no possibility of
them being repentant for thething they did to you.
(18:41):
You can still choose to forgivethat person.
Reconciliation requires atleast two people because it
requires you to reconcilesomething that was broken or
separated.
So reconciliation is a bringingtogether of two or more things
back together.
So you know, in the gospel,Paul says this in Romans,
(19:03):
chapter 5, when we come toChrist and we are saved or
justified by Christ, our sinsare forgiven.
So we receive that With that,we receive that with that we
receive reconciliation with god.
So in the process of salvationit's instantaneous we are
forgiven, we receive god'srighteousness and we are
(19:24):
immediately reconciled back togod, because god has always been
there waiting to be reconciledwith us.
It's us who have to come backto him.
But with two people it might bethat you are extending your,
you're ready and you're willing,you want to extend forgiveness
to the person and you want to bereconciled, but they don't want
(19:45):
to be reconciled.
You can still choose to forgiveand that means choosing not to
hold that thing against theperson, but that doesn't mean
you've reconciled with thembecause, again and that means
choosing not to hold that thingagainst the person but that
doesn't mean you've reconciledwith them Because, again, just
this trust is a separate concept.
Trust must be earned andrestored.
So two reconciliation requiresthat person to admit that they
(20:07):
are wrong and come back and workthings out with you.
So you can still extendforgiveness to them.
But that doesn't mean you haveto let them back into your life.
You might.
It's still fine to wait untilthat person comes to themselves,
their senses, and says you knowwhat I was wrong.
Then reconciliation can happen.
But, forgiveness is in us, toforgive our brothers and sisters
(20:29):
, or always be willing and readyto extend that forgiveness to
them.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Yeah, no, that's good .
I'll close with this lastquestion.
You know, we often hear what wesee it in scripture, where it
talks about how often should weforgive, and the recommendation
is what?
70 times seven, right?
Obviously, the implicationthere is that we are always
called to forgive, but there'ssome people that I think I've
seen in Christian circles thatdon't think that forgiveness is
(20:56):
always necessary, that sometimesjustice needs to be served, and
sometimes that could be thelack of not receiving
forgiveness from the person thatwe've offended or have hurt.
So, yeah, so is forgiveness aChristian duty.
Is that something that doesneed to happen?
Maybe not reconciliation, soyou differentiate between those
two but is forgiveness somethingthat is that Christians need to
(21:20):
do?
Speaker 2 (21:21):
Well, there could be varying degrees of forgiveness.
Okay, so let's say thatsomebody makes a huge mistake
and maybe they damage yourproperty, maybe it's you can
think of all kinds of thingsthat you know they do something
that costs you financially.
Okay, they offend you and itcosts you financially in some
way.
And then they come aroundseeking your forgiveness and say
I'm so sorry, yada yada.
(21:43):
There can be a degree offorgiveness where you're like
okay, yeah, I'm going to forgivethis person, it's okay, I'll
let you back in fellowship withme.
Maybe it's like let's just takea scenario here you have a
restaurant, okay, and a personcomes in and they cause a big
scene.
They break some things,whatever, they get drunk or
(22:06):
something and you got to callthe police and they get taken
away, blah, blah, blah.
Well, they come back later andthey say I'm really sorry for
what I did.
I lost control, yada, yada.
One aspect of forgiveness isokay, yeah, I forgive you.
You're a human being just likeme.
You made a mistake, Iunderstand, I recognize that and
I want to let you come back tomy restaurant.
(22:29):
So you're letting them backinto fellowship with you.
However, you're going to needto pay for the things that you
broke, so restitution needs tobe made, and that you need to
pay for the things that youbroke.
You got to replace the cups andthe glasses and the table and
whatever else you broke.
That's a fair kind ofrestitution that can be expected
(22:50):
of the person.
Now you, you could extend alevel of forgiveness for it.
You know what, I'll take careof it, I'll pay for it.
But I don't think that is aduty, so much as forgiving the
person, extending fellowshipback to them, but you can also
expect them to pay for thethings that they broke without
holding a grudge against them.
So that's just.
That's like an example of wherethere's degrees of forgiveness.
(23:13):
You mentioned the passage of 70times seven.
That passage, I was going tosay.
You know, one of the scriptureverses that is, I think, the
most challenging and powerfulfor forgiveness is Matthew 18.
And this is where Jesusmentions.
Peter asks how many timesshould we forgive our brother?
(23:34):
70 times, seven, times seven.
He's like no, 70 times seven.
Right before that, jesus tellsthis parable of a servant who is
unforgiving.
It's called the unforgivingservant, and this servant has a
massive debt with his master andhe knows that if his master
comes to collect.
He's going to be thrown inprison and his family is going
(23:55):
to be ruined.
His life is going to be over.
It's going to be awful.
So he goes to his master and hejust begs forgiveness, and the
master actually forgives him ofhis debts and says okay, I will
forgive you of your debts.
Then that servant turns aroundand goes to people who owe him
really small debts and he startsdemanding that they repay their
(24:19):
debts to him and he startsthreatening to throw them in
prison and to abuse them.
Well, word gets back to themaster that this servant has
done this, and so he gets calledback to the master and the
master's like I, basically Iextended forgiveness to you, and
yet you're doing this now.
You're a wicked servant.
And so then he throws him intodebtor's prison at that point.
(24:43):
And so g and so jesus.
That then says that basically,you need like, if you withhold
forgiveness from people in thislife, it's going to be withheld
from you yeah and so thenpeter's like well, how many
times should we forgive someoneright?
and jesus is like 70 times 7means it's a full and complete
(25:03):
forgiveness.
It doesn't mean that you're apunching bag or a doormat in
life.
You can have boundaries again.
Trust is different thanforgiveness.
Reconciliation is differentthan forgiveness.
Forgiveness means that I'm notgoing to hold it to the person's
account in my life.
I'm not going to sit to demandthat God judged them for what
(25:25):
the wrong they did to me.
Like, in fact, I may.
I may even pray and say Lord, Iforgive that person.
Like help me, help me to letthis go, I want to forgive this
person, help me to let it go.
Or or verbally saying in yourmind I forgive this person for
what they did to me.
Even if you know thatreconciliation is impossible,
(25:49):
you can still forgive the person.
That's what Christians arecalled to do, because we
ourselves have been forgiven ofour sins and in order to apply
that fully in this life, we mustcontinue to extend forgiveness
to people.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
Yeah, no, that's great there and I assume that
gives us a better understandingalways of the gospel right Kind
of what Jesus did for us on thecross in extending that
forgiveness it almost makes itsweeter to understand.
Okay, when we practice thisit's a, it's a reminder of kind
of what Christ did for us.
So I really appreciate you, Iappreciate you sharing that.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
Just one more thing with prevention justice.
There there are situationswhere somebody commits a heinous
crime it could be murder,sexual assault, abuse, armed
robbery, some something thatreally does harm people in very
significant ways.
You can, as a Christiansometimes this could happen to
(26:50):
you it's possible to forgivethat person and yet still allow
for the legal, naturalconsequences to follow from that
.
So the state, the government,still has the responsibility to
punish that kind of evil, andthat is that can still be
(27:11):
allowed to carry forward whileyou still extend forgiveness to
the person themselves.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
Yeah, but in interpersonal relationships.
Yeah, sometimes people take theapproach of I need to kind of
establish justice here wherethey may cut off, and maybe that
that that kind of plays back tothe aspect of setting
boundaries.
But I think sometimes do peopletake on an established justice
by punishing this person, eitherby spreading rumors about them
(27:40):
or by cutting off completecontact.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
Either by spreading rumors about them or by cutting
off complete contact.
I would say that's not justice,that's revenge.
So that comes from an attitudeof vindictiveness, where I'm
going to take matters into myown hands and I am going to now
rectify the situation by gettingback at the person.
That's very different thanallowing God to mete out the
(28:07):
justice that that he's going tomeet out.
You can still.
You can still desire that godjudges the situation.
In fact, that's a good thing todo.
Like god, you're the perfectjudge, you judge the situation.
The for christian forgivenessmeans I go to the perfect judge
and I say you know what, lord, Iforgive this person.
I'm not going to hold what theydid to me.
(28:28):
I'm not going to hold itagainst them.
You see everything perfectly.
Please, you deal with this.
And I'm asking for you to dealwith this in the way that you
see fit.
That's a that's a good way todeal with something like that.
Now again, like if somebodyreally does you wrong, it
doesn't mean that you can'tbring it up.
You know, matthew 18 also isthe passage that talks about
(28:49):
confronting your brother whodoes wrong to you.
There's a method ofconfrontation and rectification
of these things.
That process is a processwhereby we get reconciled.
So forgiveness doesn't mean like, well, clyde punched me in the
face today again, I guess I'lljust let it go.
(29:09):
It's like no, like Clyde needsto answer for that, so it'll
clay.
I asked Clyde Clyde, why'd youpunch me in the face?
And Clyde's like because Idon't like you.
So I'm like well, I'm gonna go.
I'm gonna go to Sam.
I'm like Sam.
Clyde punched me in the face.
And Clyde's like, because Idon't like you.
So I'm like well, I'm going togo to Sam.
I'm like Sam, clyde punched mein the face and I've already
talked to him about it.
And you're like okay, we'regoing to go talk to him together
(29:29):
.
Clyde is still obstinate.
Okay, we're going to take a fewmore and go talk to him.
We're going Tim in the faceevery day until I see him.
He's so obstinate.
And it gets to the point wherechurch discipline becomes the
matter of the day and that meansthat ultimately, the person,
the church collectively, handsjustice over to God and says
(29:53):
okay, this person is unrepentantin their sin.
They don't want reconciliation,they don't want to be forgiven.
Ultimately, they don't thinkthey need forgiveness.
Okay, god, you deal with it.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
Wow, wow, man.
Well, I think we coveredeverything regarding forgiveness
.
I think that was great, man,really clear, good,
gospel-centered episode.
I love it.
Yeah, any final thoughts, man?
Speaker 2 (30:21):
Before we head out, anything I missed or anything
you want to add.
No, I mean.
Well, just to encouragechristians I was thinking about
this today that the bibledescribes when we are forgiven.
He says he takes our sins andhe he there, he puts them as far
as the east is, from the west,from him, and he remembers them
no more.
So that that is the power ofGod's forgiveness in Christ and
(30:45):
that forgiveness extends notjust to our past sins but to our
future sins as well.
God's not surprised by our sins.
We may be surprised anddisappointed when we think, like
man, I'm growing so spirituallyand then next week we find
ourselves in the depths of sin.
We think like we might get sofrustrated by that and think,
(31:08):
well, this, just like god justmight maybe so frustrated and
hate me and not like me.
And we need to remember godsees all of this like christ's
forgiveness extends to all ofour sins and we just need to to
confess our sins and keep comingto him and confessing our sins.
Speaker 1 (31:26):
Amen, brother, amen.
Well, I love it.
Hopefully, guys, this was ahelpful episode regarding the
very important topic offorgiveness, which is a crucial
piece of our faith and our walkwith Christ.
So, yeah, share this episode.
Thank you for tuning in and wewill see you next time.
All right, everyone, welcome to the second Theo
podcast.
Sam and Tim here and we havebeen doing somewhat of a series.
I don't know if we'd call it aseries, but we're doing anxiety,
depression and forgivenesstoday, all tied to just kind of
Christian circles and maybe someof the biggest struggles that
Christians have within thesecircles.
So anxiety being one ofdepression and just what does
(00:23):
forgiveness actually look like.
So we'll talk about that today,as always.
Follow us on instagram.
We've been enjoying doingvideos for that, trying to put
out some more in the comingweeks.
But we're at psych underscoreand underscore theo and if you
want to email us any questionsor you have some topic
recommendations, you can emailus at psychandtheo at gmailcom
(00:46):
and also follow us on Spotifyand Apple Podcasts.
We have a new look.
You know Tim has his bluelights in the background there.
It looks great.
I have some little highlightsnot looking as great, but we'll
make it work at some point.
But yeah, we're excited to talkabout this topic because I
think there's a lot ofmisunderstanding of what
forgiveness can look like forthe Christian.
(01:07):
So you know how we do things.
First we start with definingwhat this actually is what is
forgiveness and then I'll getinto some of the questions of
what this looks like within achurch context.
So what is forgiveness, tim?
So what is forgiveness?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Tim.
Yeah, so a lot of people thinkforgiveness means that when
someone does me wrong, I'm goingto choose to forget it like
forgive and forget.
They conflate those two, orthat it means like I suddenly
will choose to feel good aboutthe person again or feel good
about the situation, orsomething like that.
These are all things, whatforgiveness is not Forgiveness.
(01:45):
Obviously, in order forforgiveness to even come up as
something that needs to beconsidered, there must be
something that's been done wrong.
Like an offense has been made, atransgression of some sort, and
the person that has beenwronged must choose to offer
forgiveness or not.
And forgiveness means let'ssplit those two words for and
(02:09):
give so for, as in like forrunning, like to go before and
then give, so I'm going to givesomething beforehand.
If you think of it that way,forgiveness means that I'm going
to, in advance, extend mercy tothis person.
Extend, or at least I'm goingto forego, my right to hold
(02:31):
something against someone.
That's what forgiveness is.
So if I forgive a debt, like ifsomebody owes me money, and I
forgive that debt, it doesn'tmean that I like that person.
It doesn't mean that I thinkthey're a great person or that I
want to hang out with them.
It means that I'm now choosingnot to hold their debt against
them anymore.
(02:53):
So, I'm forgiving the debt.
If someone wrongs me, like,let's say, they lie about me and
they slander me and they gossipabout me and they break my
trust in some way.
It's a close friend.
They've broken my trust onsomething that's really, really
important to me.
Well, forgiveness means notthat I choose to trust them
(03:15):
again, because trust isdifferent than forgiveness.
Trust is something that has tobe earned, but forgiveness means
I'm going to no longer holdthat offense against them, like
I'm not going to demandsomething from them for that
offense.
That's what forgiveness means.
Let's put that in a theologicalcontext.
So I think everyone at somepoint can understand basic
(03:38):
forgiveness.
You know and we all understandthat, hey, we all need to be
forgiven of some things.
We all do wrong things to eachother and we have wrong things
done to us.
In the theological context, wehave a relationship not just
with each other but with God.
We are all trying to relate toGod in some way, some of us more
(03:59):
than others.
Some of us maybe not at all.
There's a small, maybe not atall, but in the Christian
worldview, our ability to have arelationship with God is
contingent upon us beingforgiven of sin.
Someone might be wondering whydo we need to be forgiven of sin
?
Okay, so God is a is a morallyperfect being by definition.
(04:19):
If we think about who God is,god is a morally perfect being.
He's a creator of the world.
He made everything.
He doesn a morally perfectbeing.
He's the creator of the world.
He made everything.
He doesn't commit evil himself.
He doesn't do wrong things to us, he doesn't sin against us.
He's a morally perfect being,but he creates creatures in his
image, like us, who have thefree will to either do right or
(04:41):
to do wrong, and we, as notperfect beings, ultimately
inevitably do wrong.
We ultimately sin, and, if youwant to go deeper than that,
we're born with a nature thathas this proclivity to sin, and
so, by the very fact that we arehuman beings, that we're less
than God, we actually will dothings that are wrong.
(05:05):
We'll do things that aremorally wrong to do, and then,
when we do those things that aremorally wrong, the Bible calls
that sin.
Sin meaning that we fall shortof God's moral perfection, we
fall short of the standard thatGod has to be in fellowship with
him, and this is key tounderstanding, like even the
(05:25):
Christian worldview, just likewhy would God set?
up this whole thing to beginwith, if he knows we're going to
sin.
Well, in order to havefellowship with a morally
perfect being, we ourselves mustin some way be made morally
righteous to have that kind offellowship, if that morally
perfect being isn't going towant to fellowship with beings
(05:47):
who are sinful.
And so we have to understandthat he is perfect, he's God,
we're not, and so there's thischasm of separation.
We can't experience the fullpresence, the full fellowship
with God as sinful humancreatures.
So something has to be doneabout that.
(06:07):
God himself must forgive theseoffenses, must forgive our moral
imperfection, not just animperfection, because that kind
of puts it mildly, because it'snot just like, well, I'm
imperfect.
The imperfect.
Imperfection means that we dothings that are selfish, we do
things that are evil.
We do things that are evil, wehave evil intents in our hearts.
These are things that corruptus throughout our lives, our
(06:32):
being in the state that we are.
We are corrupted spiritualbeings, but we all desire a
union with God.
This is something that's innateto human beings, because we're
created in his image.
So, whether we realize it ornot, we do desire union with god
.
But that's impossible in ourcurrent state.
So god himself must forgivethese moral sins in order for
(06:56):
that fellowship to be restoredwith him.
The gospel and the christianitysays that god himself is the
one that takes that burden uponhimself to restore that
fellowship.
You might be wondering whycan't God just forgive sins?
Why?
Speaker 1 (07:09):
can't he just?
Speaker 2 (07:10):
forgive them.
Well, we can get into the wholegospel story, but essentially,
where there is wrong that's beendone, restitution must be made
in some way.
He's a merciful God, but he'salso a just God.
And think of it this way Likeif I want forgiveness for the
wrong things that I do, but Iwant God to punish someone for
(07:31):
the wrong things that have beendone to me by that person, god
can't do both of those things atthe same time without doing
something else.
Okay, he can't just forgive youand then judge the other person
.
He's morally perfect, so he hasto be perfectly just in his
judgments.
So if you want him to judge theother person, well then he's
going to judge you.
(07:51):
This is why Jesus says inMatthew seven like with what
standard you judge other people,that standard will be used to
judge you.
So yeah, we, we, we want God tobe a perfect judge, but we
don't want them to judge us.
God, in his wisdom, provides theanswer to this question how
does he judge?
(08:11):
How does he a morally perfectjudge who can judge all sin
perfectly and yet be a righteous, merciful, gracious God, full
of love that desires fellowshipwith even these sinful human
creatures?
And the answer to that is JesusChrist.
God himself takes on human form, the flesh that we also have,
and dies in our place, like sinbrings forth death.
This is the christian worldviewthat sin brings forth death.
(08:33):
We die in this sin.
We can't have fellowship withgod, and so we die in this
sinful state.
God takes on human form.
He is perfectly obedient in hishuman form, but still dies a
death on the cross, and thuspays that payment for sin that
we accrued, and so he makes thatpayment Now.
(08:55):
Now he is the one that, byfaith, we accept his payment.
So now he is the one who stepsin our place.
It takes the payment and, inreverse, we receive his
righteousness to us.
So then we are brought back intofellowship with God.
So the point of this is thatforgiveness in a theological
context can only make sense ifyou understand what Christian
(09:17):
gospel is.
God extends his forgiveness toall human beings.
He makes it available to allhuman beings.
Forgiveness to all human beingshe makes it available to all
human beings If they acknowledgetheir sin, if they acknowledge
their inadequacy to pay for thatsin, and they accept his
payment for their sin.
He pays that sin for them.
He restores them to a rightrelationship with them and
(09:37):
forgiveness is extended to themin their human state, and that's
the core of the gospel.
With that, then, when it comesto a Christian learning how to
forgive other people, that's thecore of the gospel.
With that, then, when it comesto a Christian learning how to
forgive other people, that'salways in the backdrop of our
lives.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
No, that was amazing, man.
I didn't think of that piecethat you said about.
Obviously we understandforgiveness because of what
Christ did for us, but theaspect of God not being able to
and correct me if I'm wrong withunderstanding this God not
being able to relate to us inour unforgiven state.
(10:14):
But it's only the reason why wehave community with Him or are
able to relate to Him throughprayer or community, is only
after we accept his forgivenessthrough Christ.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
It's a fellowship.
Fellowship is the word Okay,fellowship Okay.
Speaker 1 (10:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
We can't have full fellowship with God in our
unforgiven, sinful state.
Okay, that makes more sense,okay, sin must be dealt with,
and forgiveness must be extendedand then given to the person.
And that happens throughaccepting what Christ did on the
cross, accepting what God didfor us, and then seeking God's
forgiveness.
Then payment is made, payment,the payment that Christ did on
(10:54):
the cross that is extended andto our account, let's say and
then our fellowship with God isnow restored in a spiritual
sense, and then we can now havethat fellowship with God that he
has desired with us all along.
But knowing that God createsfallible human creatures with
free will, he knows that they'regoing to sin.
(11:15):
So this is why Paul says fromthe foundation of the earth, god
has already had this plan inmind.
The wisdom that he had inChrist, he already had that in
mind from the foundation of theearth.
He knew what was going tohappen with human beings.
He knew that they were going tosin.
If God, being this perfectlyloving being who desires
fellowship and desires a familyof creatures created in his
(11:39):
image, he says, okay, if Icreate these creatures, just
like the angels, the angels havefree will and some of them fall
.
If I create these creatures,just like the angels, the angels
have free will and some of themfall.
If I create these creatures,they're going to fall too,
because they're not me.
So how?
If you understand this, godunderstands this perfectly
instantly.
But for us we have to kind ofwork through this as like little
kids.
How would you set up a systemwhere you can have fellowship,
(12:01):
forever, perfectly, in a family,with these creatures who you
know are going to sin?
Well, then you make thearrangements that payment will
be made for them.
That's the gospel, yeah, so Godis not surprised by our sin.
He knows that's going to happenand so he has already made the
way for that sin, like thehubris, that we can actually pay
(12:27):
for that sin, that we canactually pay for our own sin.
God knows we can't do that.
Like, how could you pay for?
all your sins, pay for all theways that you've rebelled and
disobeyed God, the father, andhe knows that you, he knows that
you can't.
Speaker 1 (12:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
And he's waiting for us to realize that too.
So we come to christ and we sayI can't pay for these sins and
I, I want to be with god, I wantfellowship with god, I want a
relationship with god.
That's why, jesus, I am the way, the truth and the life.
And no, no man could come tothe father but by me.
But he sends his son into theworld, not to condemn the world,
(13:00):
but that the world, through him, might be saved yeah, that's so
great about it.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
You know, as as you were sharing that I wonder if
you see the the connection herewith some people Christians who
are struggling with acceptingGod's forgiveness.
So there's this aspect in theresearch that talks about
self-forgiveness, andself-forgiveness doesn't seem to
be a concept that we find inscripture.
And again, correct me if I'mwrong.
(13:26):
But for people who arestruggling with accepting God's
forgiveness, oftentimes what youhear other people share is well
, you need to forgive yourselfright Before you accept God's
forgiveness.
Oftentimes what you hear otherpeople share is well, you need
to forgive yourself right Beforeyou accept God's forgiveness.
It seems like you're stillholding on to this thing from
your past.
You got to forgive yourselffirst and I'm wondering if you
could kind of delineate for usis there a difference between
(13:47):
those two things?
Like, is self-forgivenesssomething that we see in
scripture or is that somethingthat kind of demonstrate that we
haven't accepted God'sforgiveness and we're just
holding on to shame?
Like how would youdifferentiate between those two?
Speaker 2 (14:03):
So I don't buy, I don't agree with someone who
says you need to forgiveyourself first before you come
to God.
Speaker 1 (14:10):
Is self-forgiveness a thing, though?
Like can they forgivethemselves?
Is that something that you do?
Well, I think.
Speaker 2 (14:15):
I think that self-forgiveness I don't know.
I've personally I've alwaysstruggled with the term
self-forgiveness because I thinkit's shame.
I think it's something,something that you are beating
yourself up and we're holdingthings against ourselves.
What I think ultimately it isis someone who struggles to
receive the grace of God intheir life, Like we can come and
(14:36):
we can ask forgiveness and Godforgives us of our sins and he
restores us to right fellowship,but we ourselves still have
shame and regret and we want topunish ourselves.
We want to do things to feellike we've made up for our
mistakes.
We want to do things to feellike we've made up for our
mistakes and, yeah, like thereis a point where something can
(14:57):
become self-hatred and I thinkthat's rooted in a form of
spiritual pride, because ittakes humility to accept God's
forgiveness.
Yeah, but yeah, I don't know.
You know I have struggled withthis concept of self-forgiveness
, like forgiving myself orsomething.
I'm not saying it's not true,I'm just saying that I don't
(15:19):
know.
I think it's a simpler way toput it.
I think it's just like shameand regret.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
It's kind of with the shame, rather than you're
actually forgiving yourself.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Yeah, you know, I think our narcissistic
generation might focus on that,be like I'm going to forgive
myself of this, forgive myselfof that.
I think there is a place forself-compassion, for having
compassion for oneself andcompassion.
You know Christ, several placesin the gospel Jesus looks upon.
It describes him looking uponpeople with compassion.
(15:50):
Compassion is you're looking atsomeone, you're seeing them and
what they're struggling with,you're empathizing with them and
all the while, extending graceand forgiveness to them and
offering them a way out.
And I think, maybe, if you thinkabout that from a
self-reflection standpoint,having compassion on yourself,
looking at your past, looking atyourself from the past, and
(16:11):
having compassion on yourself, Iunderstand the mistakes that I
made.
I know why I made them.
I did some good things, somebad things from my past.
You know, and I'm just kind oftrying to figure it out yeah,
life, yeah.
So having that kind ofcompassion toward yourself, the
kind of compassion that youwould have toward a friend who
is struggling with regret intheir own life, you can extend
(16:33):
that same kind of compassion toyourself.
That that, I think, is, I think, easier to understand rather
than oh, forgive yourself ofthis, I don't know, that's,
that's me.
I'm speaking personally now.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
No, no that's good, that's good.
You know, I brought up a keyconcept the idea of
self-compassion.
There's this really goodpsychologist, his name is Dr
Gabriel Mate, and he talks aboutthat aspect and he talks about
five different levels ofcompassion and but he he
references the Latin word ofcompassion, which means
compassion, but he breaks itdown is to suffer with.
(17:08):
So when you're talking aboutthe idea of self compassion, it
is looking back at that person,the old you, I guess, that was
making or made mistakes andexperienced suffering and all
that.
And it's the present day.
You kind of suffering alongwith that younger version of you
.
And it's this idea of you're notjudging the person to your
(17:29):
point, you're not shaming theperson for the mistakes or
choices that they made, butrather you're allowing yourself
to just kind of sit there in thesuffering along with them,
which gives you a sense ofempathy and care for the present
day of a person who'spresenting but yeah, I think
that does play a lot into theshame piece was a really great
point that I think Christians dostruggle with.
(17:50):
You know, another thing thatcomes up when we talk about
forgiveness a great descriptionand demonstration of what the
gospel looks like, of why weunderstand forgiveness the way
that we do, but oftentimesChristians may see forgiveness a
necessary piece from that isreconciliation, and I wonder if
you kind of elaborate on that,like does forgiveness mean
(18:12):
reconciliation?
Are they two separate terms,and is reconciliation necessary
to be a, to actually forgivesomeone?
Speaker 2 (18:21):
well, there are two separate things.
Forgiveness only requires oneperson it requires you.
You can choose to forgivesomeone, even if that person
isn't repentant, never will willbe repentant maybe or maybe
they're dead and they're passedon and there's no possibility of
them being repentant for thething they did to you.
(18:41):
You can still choose to forgivethat person.
Reconciliation requires atleast two people because it
requires you to reconcilesomething that was broken or
separated.
So reconciliation is a bringingtogether of two or more things
back together.
So you know, in the gospel,Paul says this in Romans,
(19:03):
chapter 5, when we come toChrist and we are saved or
justified by Christ, our sinsare forgiven.
So we receive that With that,we receive that with that we
receive reconciliation with god.
So in the process of salvationit's instantaneous we are
forgiven, we receive god'srighteousness and we are
(19:24):
immediately reconciled back togod, because god has always been
there waiting to be reconciledwith us.
It's us who have to come backto him.
But with two people it might bethat you are extending your,
you're ready and you're willing,you want to extend forgiveness
to the person and you want to bereconciled, but they don't want
(19:45):
to be reconciled.
You can still choose to forgiveand that means choosing not to
hold that thing against theperson, but that doesn't mean
you've reconciled with thembecause, again and that means
choosing not to hold that thingagainst the person but that
doesn't mean you've reconciledwith them Because, again, just
this trust is a separate concept.
Trust must be earned andrestored.
So two reconciliation requiresthat person to admit that they
(20:07):
are wrong and come back and workthings out with you.
So you can still extendforgiveness to them.
But that doesn't mean you haveto let them back into your life.
You might.
It's still fine to wait untilthat person comes to themselves,
their senses, and says you knowwhat I was wrong.
Then reconciliation can happen.
But, forgiveness is in us, toforgive our brothers and sisters
(20:29):
, or always be willing and readyto extend that forgiveness to
them.
Speaker 1 (20:34):
Yeah, no, that's good .
I'll close with this lastquestion.
You know, we often hear what wesee it in scripture, where it
talks about how often should weforgive, and the recommendation
is what?
70 times seven, right?
Obviously, the implicationthere is that we are always
called to forgive, but there'ssome people that I think I've
seen in Christian circles thatdon't think that forgiveness is
(20:56):
always necessary, that sometimesjustice needs to be served, and
sometimes that could be thelack of not receiving
forgiveness from the person thatwe've offended or have hurt.
So, yeah, so is forgiveness aChristian duty.
Is that something that doesneed to happen?
Maybe not reconciliation, soyou differentiate between those
two but is forgiveness somethingthat is that Christians need to
(21:20):
do?
Speaker 2 (21:21):
Well, there could be varying degrees of forgiveness.
Okay, so let's say thatsomebody makes a huge mistake
and maybe they damage yourproperty, maybe it's you can
think of all kinds of thingsthat you know they do something
that costs you financially.
Okay, they offend you and itcosts you financially in some
way.
And then they come aroundseeking your forgiveness and say
I'm so sorry, yada yada.
(21:43):
There can be a degree offorgiveness where you're like
okay, yeah, I'm going to forgivethis person, it's okay, I'll
let you back in fellowship withme.
Maybe it's like let's just takea scenario here you have a
restaurant, okay, and a personcomes in and they cause a big
scene.
They break some things,whatever, they get drunk or
(22:06):
something and you got to callthe police and they get taken
away, blah, blah, blah.
Well, they come back later andthey say I'm really sorry for
what I did.
I lost control, yada, yada.
One aspect of forgiveness isokay, yeah, I forgive you.
You're a human being just likeme.
You made a mistake, Iunderstand, I recognize that and
I want to let you come back tomy restaurant.
(22:29):
So you're letting them backinto fellowship with you.
However, you're going to needto pay for the things that you
broke, so restitution needs tobe made, and that you need to
pay for the things that youbroke.
You got to replace the cups andthe glasses and the table and
whatever else you broke.
That's a fair kind ofrestitution that can be expected
(22:50):
of the person.
Now you, you could extend alevel of forgiveness for it.
You know what, I'll take careof it, I'll pay for it.
But I don't think that is aduty, so much as forgiving the
person, extending fellowshipback to them, but you can also
expect them to pay for thethings that they broke without
holding a grudge against them.
So that's just.
That's like an example of wherethere's degrees of forgiveness.
(23:13):
You mentioned the passage of 70times seven.
That passage, I was going tosay.
You know, one of the scriptureverses that is, I think, the
most challenging and powerfulfor forgiveness is Matthew 18.
And this is where Jesusmentions.
Peter asks how many timesshould we forgive our brother?
(23:34):
70 times, seven, times seven.
He's like no, 70 times seven.
Right before that, jesus tellsthis parable of a servant who is
unforgiving.
It's called the unforgivingservant, and this servant has a
massive debt with his master andhe knows that if his master
comes to collect.
He's going to be thrown inprison and his family is going
(23:55):
to be ruined.
His life is going to be over.
It's going to be awful.
So he goes to his master and hejust begs forgiveness, and the
master actually forgives him ofhis debts and says okay, I will
forgive you of your debts.
Then that servant turns aroundand goes to people who owe him
really small debts and he startsdemanding that they repay their
(24:19):
debts to him and he startsthreatening to throw them in
prison and to abuse them.
Well, word gets back to themaster that this servant has
done this, and so he gets calledback to the master and the
master's like I, basically Iextended forgiveness to you, and
yet you're doing this now.
You're a wicked servant.
And so then he throws him intodebtor's prison at that point.
(24:43):
And so g and so jesus.
That then says that basically,you need like, if you withhold
forgiveness from people in thislife, it's going to be withheld
from you yeah and so thenpeter's like well, how many
times should we forgive someoneright?
and jesus is like 70 times 7means it's a full and complete
(25:03):
forgiveness.
It doesn't mean that you're apunching bag or a doormat in
life.
You can have boundaries again.
Trust is different thanforgiveness.
Reconciliation is differentthan forgiveness.
Forgiveness means that I'm notgoing to hold it to the person's
account in my life.
I'm not going to sit to demandthat God judged them for what
(25:25):
the wrong they did to me.
Like, in fact, I may.
I may even pray and say Lord, Iforgive that person.
Like help me, help me to letthis go, I want to forgive this
person, help me to let it go.
Or or verbally saying in yourmind I forgive this person for
what they did to me.
Even if you know thatreconciliation is impossible,
(25:49):
you can still forgive the person.
That's what Christians arecalled to do, because we
ourselves have been forgiven ofour sins and in order to apply
that fully in this life, we mustcontinue to extend forgiveness
to people.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
Yeah, no, that's great there and I assume that
gives us a better understandingalways of the gospel right Kind
of what Jesus did for us on thecross in extending that
forgiveness it almost makes itsweeter to understand.
Okay, when we practice thisit's a, it's a reminder of kind
of what Christ did for us.
So I really appreciate you, Iappreciate you sharing that.
Speaker 2 (26:30):
Just one more thing with prevention justice.
There there are situationswhere somebody commits a heinous
crime it could be murder,sexual assault, abuse, armed
robbery, some something thatreally does harm people in very
significant ways.
You can, as a Christiansometimes this could happen to
(26:50):
you it's possible to forgivethat person and yet still allow
for the legal, naturalconsequences to follow from that
.
So the state, the government,still has the responsibility to
punish that kind of evil, andthat is that can still be
(27:11):
allowed to carry forward whileyou still extend forgiveness to
the person themselves.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
Yeah, but in interpersonal relationships.
Yeah, sometimes people take theapproach of I need to kind of
establish justice here wherethey may cut off, and maybe that
that that kind of plays back tothe aspect of setting
boundaries.
But I think sometimes do peopletake on an established justice
by punishing this person, eitherby spreading rumors about them
(27:40):
or by cutting off completecontact.
Speaker 2 (27:43):
Either by spreading rumors about them or by cutting
off complete contact.
I would say that's not justice,that's revenge.
So that comes from an attitudeof vindictiveness, where I'm
going to take matters into myown hands and I am going to now
rectify the situation by gettingback at the person.
That's very different thanallowing God to mete out the
(28:07):
justice that that he's going tomeet out.
You can still.
You can still desire that godjudges the situation.
In fact, that's a good thing todo.
Like god, you're the perfectjudge, you judge the situation.
The for christian forgivenessmeans I go to the perfect judge
and I say you know what, lord, Iforgive this person.
I'm not going to hold what theydid to me.
(28:28):
I'm not going to hold itagainst them.
You see everything perfectly.
Please, you deal with this.
And I'm asking for you to dealwith this in the way that you
see fit.
That's a that's a good way todeal with something like that.
Now again, like if somebodyreally does you wrong, it
doesn't mean that you can'tbring it up.
You know, matthew 18 also isthe passage that talks about
(28:49):
confronting your brother whodoes wrong to you.
There's a method ofconfrontation and rectification
of these things.
That process is a processwhereby we get reconciled.
So forgiveness doesn't mean like, well, clyde punched me in the
face today again, I guess I'lljust let it go.
(29:09):
It's like no, like Clyde needsto answer for that, so it'll
clay.
I asked Clyde Clyde, why'd youpunch me in the face?
And Clyde's like because Idon't like you.
So I'm like well, I'm gonna go.
I'm gonna go to Sam.
I'm like Sam.
Clyde punched me in the face.
And Clyde's like, because Idon't like you.
So I'm like well, I'm going togo to Sam.
I'm like Sam, clyde punched mein the face and I've already
talked to him about it.
And you're like okay, we'regoing to go talk to him together
(29:29):
.
Clyde is still obstinate.
Okay, we're going to take a fewmore and go talk to him.
We're going Tim in the faceevery day until I see him.
He's so obstinate.
And it gets to the point wherechurch discipline becomes the
matter of the day and that meansthat ultimately, the person,
the church collectively, handsjustice over to God and says
(29:53):
okay, this person is unrepentantin their sin.
They don't want reconciliation,they don't want to be forgiven.
Ultimately, they don't thinkthey need forgiveness.
Okay, god, you deal with it.
Speaker 1 (30:05):
Wow, wow, man.
Well, I think we coveredeverything regarding forgiveness
.
I think that was great, man,really clear, good,
gospel-centered episode.
I love it.
Yeah, any final thoughts, man?
Speaker 2 (30:21):
Before we head out, anything I missed or anything
you want to add.
No, I mean.
Well, just to encouragechristians I was thinking about
this today that the bibledescribes when we are forgiven.
He says he takes our sins andhe he there, he puts them as far
as the east is, from the west,from him, and he remembers them
no more.
So that that is the power ofGod's forgiveness in Christ and
(30:45):
that forgiveness extends notjust to our past sins but to our
future sins as well.
God's not surprised by our sins.
We may be surprised anddisappointed when we think, like
man, I'm growing so spirituallyand then next week we find
ourselves in the depths of sin.
We think like we might get sofrustrated by that and think,
(31:08):
well, this, just like god justmight maybe so frustrated and
hate me and not like me.
And we need to remember godsees all of this like christ's
forgiveness extends to all ofour sins and we just need to to
confess our sins and keep comingto him and confessing our sins.
Speaker 1 (31:26):
Amen, brother, amen.
Well, I love it.
Hopefully, guys, this was ahelpful episode regarding the
very important topic offorgiveness, which is a crucial
piece of our faith and our walkwith Christ.
So, yeah, share this episode.
Thank you for tuning in and wewill see you next time.
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