Sermon for March 25th

There are two problems most people have with forgiveness. Why God would forgive and why they would forgive. The first problem comes with trying to get a grasp on why God would forgive us. Either we don’t think we’ve done much in our lives that would necessitate needing forgiveness or else we don’t think we’ve done much in our lives that doesn’t need forgiven. Either way, we can’t figure out why God is so interested in forgiving us.

The second problem is that we don’t understand why we need to forgive others when they are usually much worse than us. In tonight’s reading, Jesus reminds us that these problems are somehow connected. “For if you forgive others their trespasses your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.” In the Lord’s Prayer, we pray that God deals with both of our problems—with being forgiven and with forgiving.

Let’s get to the first problem first, why DOES God forgive you? Why do we start every service with a confession and an absolution when somebody new to Christianity might not even think they have sinned? They might be turned off by having to do such a countercultural thing. Isn’t having to confess sins and get them forgiven kind of a downer? The simplest answer is “because you need it.”

I am sure that having to confess sins is a downer and quite awkward especially to someone who is a new Christian; however, that doesn’t change the need. Despite the awkwardness and socially unacceptable character of forgiving sins, if the church stops proclaiming this, we are all in trouble. God forgives sins, pure and simple, and if we are a place to hear God’s word, then we’d better expect forgiveness to come up a lot. We pray in the Lord’s Prayer that God would somehow, someway get our churches, our pastors and our Christian brothers and sisters to find us and forgive us so that we can’t live a moment without knowing it.

Sometimes, however, as Martin Luther put it, we know that we need forgiveness, but we also know that “we deserve nothing but punishment” and can’t figure out why God would forgive us at all! In this case, we pray that God would stay true to his word despite our objections and continue being the crazy God he is. We pray that he would always hear our prayers despite our unworthiness and would not hold our awful flaws and failings against us or allow them to hinder our prayers. After we pray for faith and for things in our prayers, we pray that God might remember his promise of forgiveness. For, without forgiveness, we would only be God’s enemies instead of God’s children.

But the most difficult problem with forgiveness is that God demands that we must forgive others as we have been forgiven. Why must our ability to forgive have anything to do with the forgiveness we receive?

I used this example in the online Bible study this last week, but I’m going to refer to it again. When people are married, they must say some vows—make some promises to one another before witnesses. Must they say them? Well, yes, although these vows seldom seem like much of a demand on those who are head-over-heels in love. Will I love you till death do us part? Of course, I will snookems.

However, these promises, these vows made at a wedding, seem much more demanding when there are problems in a marriage leading one or both partners to look into divorce proceedings. Then that whole “for better or for worse” part seems a lot more difficult. Men and women going through a divorce often find themselves wondering if there should be an inherent limit to how much “worse” they should stand or how “poor” they should be. The loving promises made long ago seem like awful demands today.

You often hear that marriages are built on trust. Forgiveness is also based on trust. You can hear that your sins are forgiven day in and day out, but until you believe those words, until you trust that God means it, you won’t want to forgive anyone else. God’s forgiveness needs to become a reality for you before you’ll be willing to make it a reality for someone else. We pray, especially in the Lord’s prayer, that God puts faith in your heart, faith to believe that he is willing, loving, able and faithful to forgive your sins so that you will gladly want to share that joy with others. It is a matter of the heart and we ask in our prayers that God would give us all new hearts and new spirits, to trust him not only to forgive us but to help us forgive others.

When you hear that your sins are forgiven, you can trust that it happened. But, as Jesus says to his disciples, if upon hearing your forgiveness you remember a grudge you are holding, you will know in that moment where you have ACTUALLY placed your trust. When you realize the depth of sin and its hold on you, it’s easy to forgive another because of the mercy that has been poured out for you. You trust in God alone to handle it. On the other hand, when you cannot forgive, you’ve set your trust on yourself. You’ve placed yourself on the judgment seat. How can you believe that God can forgive you when YOU want to be in charge of who gets forgiven and who does not? If you are unwilling to forgive someone else, you’ll find that you trust your own forgiveness less and less because you want to be the one in control instead of God.

What will you do in that moment? Well, that’s why we do a confession and absolution each worship service, so that you might be given faith again and again to remind you who is God and who is not. When your heart is full of bitterness, anger, unforgiveness and even hatred, well, the best place to go is for another dose of absolution from God. Just pray that the Holy Spirit can get it through your thick skull and your hard heart that forgiveness is not just about you and your salvation but about the life and salvation of the world. Everyone needs it. You do too.