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Forgiveness 3

             The Pharisees and the teachers of the law began thinking to themselves, “Who is this fellow who speaks blasphemy? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” (Luke 5:21)

             Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.” (Luke 17:4)

            One of the complaints the Pharisees and teachers of the law had against Jesus is that He claimed to be able to forgive people. Yesterday, we considered verses from Leviticus  that discussed the sacrifices needed for sins to be forgiven according to the law. So, here’s the logical question that should be considered. If someone took the appropriate sacrifices to the priest and the priest performed the sacrifices, did God forgive the sin? Does it make sense to say that a follower of God would then not forgive them? Could then not forgive them?  At the very least, shouldn’t this have sparked some discussion among law teachers?

 We face the same issue as we are sinned against by others. One comment I’ve seen in memes and comments is that an apology isn’t an apology unless accompanied by a change of behavior. If you want to be forgiven,  you must never sin the same way against that person. The moment you repeat a sin you’ve proven your apology was a lie.  Apologies do not make people perfect and incapable of repeating the sin – no matter how much both you and the sinner may wish it did. And  that’s not what Jesus teaches. Even if they sin and repent seven times in a day, you’re to forgive.

This brings us to an important point about forgiveness. If someone tries to kill you (and fails) seven times in a day, are you supposed to forgive? Yes. Are you supposed to continue to sleep in the same household? Continue to allow that person to kill you if he/she ever gets it right? No. Forgiveness doesn’t involve tossing our brains in the garbage. There’s a difference between someone lying to you seven times in a day and someone trying to kill you seven times in a day. The point is that you can forgive someone without allowing him/her to do more damage.  You can even forgive someone who doesn’t show the slightest inclination to change or doesn’t acknowledge that a wrong was done.

The whole point of forgiveness is that you make choices that remove any roadblocks on your part from the relationship, whether they remove the roadblocks from their side or not. If the relationship remains broken, it’s on their side, not yours. 

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