…Human forgiveness is based on the joyful generosity of divine forgiveness. Listen again to the lord’s words to the slave in verse 33: ‘Should you not also have mercy on your fellow slave as I had mercy on you?’ If we cannot offer forgiveness to others, we may not have been able to repent and receive God’s forgiveness for ourselves. The debtor slave has an abundance of sorrow and self-pity but no true repentance.
Jesus’ final words are crucial. This is a heart issue. We can only forgive others as God has forgiven us if His mercy has already changed our hearts. ‘My heavenly Father will also do the same to you if each of you does not forgive his brother from the heart.’ Matt 18:35
There is a confrontation looming. Jesus loves us too much to leave room for doubt. If we do not forgive, it is because we have not received forgiveness ourselves, despite the faith position we may profess. Maybe we are kidding ourselves, and this is where we acknowledge that we don’t believe the gospel at all.
Beloved, do you find it hard to forgive yourself? True guilt results from breaking God’s law. Tell Him about it; He is faithful to forgive and restore. 1 John 1:19. False guilt or condemnation is much harder to bear. You will have to work to alleviate it yourself because you do not believe God has accepted you by His own free grace. Instead of taking your guilt to God and leaving it there, you carry it with you as a means of self-punishment. Take it to God anyway; tell Him all about it. 1 John 1:19. Take a slow journey through Psalm 51 and then:
- Stop blameshifting, shifting responsibility, or implying your accuser is actually a worse wrongdoer than you and is exaggerating the harm you have done and/or impugning your motives. This is counterfeit repentance, a tempting tactic that Adam and Eve also found hard to resist.
- Stop the self-pity. Beloved, this is also a counterfeit. It looks like repentance but is self-absorption—the essence of sin.
- Stop self-flagellation. Dear one, this attempts to pressure God and others into excusing wrongdoing without the need for repentance and is a rejection of God’s mercy.
- Confess fully, without explanation or self-justification.
- Repent by changing your behaviour, not just your sentiments.
- Receive God’s unstinting and profoundly personal forgiveness, and rejoice. The cloud of grief and shame will lift, and you will sing again.
Your salvation was never the result of your morality. It’s not a prize to be won. It is a gift.
Do you want more? Read the late Tim Kellers book, ‘Forgive: Why Should I and How Can I?’ Thorough, wise, clever, kind and true.