“The Case for Jesus Christ: Eternal Forgiveness”                   

Jesus: the same, yesterday, today, and forever!

Jesus: the Son of Man, the Christ, the Lord!

Oh, how much is contained in those two all-encompassing phrases about Him!

Nowhere does history show a fountain of righteousness as He in Whom pureness always has been present and always will be the same!

He depicted His Kingdom for us, not just in His life, but in the fullness of His work and in the transforming principles He set into action.

It is the Lord Jesus Christ Who speaks to our moral dilemmas as One Who, shared the temptations and burdens of man. 

His holy humanity seems miraculous to us - not because He is the Son of God - but because He lived life exactly as He preached and taught it to be lived.

He never flinched nor wavered about it.

Even to His dying day, when all of the sin of the whole world, all the pain, agonies, torments, and abuse were unmercifully heaped upon Him, He stayed true to His own teachings.

Have you seen that operating, especially in the scene at the Cross?

It is Luke who recorded one of the first sayings after Jesus was crucified.

What was it?

‘Father, forgive them... - Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.’

Is this not one of the very practical, observable principles He demonstrated and taught as He hung there in His pain and humiliation?

Forgiveness is what He prayed for them - He prayed to God His Father to absolve those responsible for this brutal act.

What bitter irony! 

Jesus is the One Who brought only good news to all of mankind. 

There was nothing in His character or actions that could be used as leverage against Him - not one thing!

But, at His death, the people watched, the soldiers mocked, and one of the criminals beside Him blasphemed Him.

And - just as He taught His disciples to do, He did exactly
the same, even in the face of all of His horrible sufferings.

He prayed, ‘Father forgive them; for they know not what they do.’

He did not say: ‘I will get even with you.’

He did not ask God to punish His enemies in such a way that they would never forget it and be forced to repent.

Oh, no!

Rather than the spirit of revenge and retaliation that is so common with us, Jesus enthroned, in His humanity, that most difficult of virtues to cultivate, the virtue of forgiving freely.

In humility - in submission to the will of God, He stood over and against high-mindedness and pride. 

He opened the book to this life-principle when He taught His disciples to pray, saying: ‘And forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.’

‘Forgive the one who has done you wrong and you will be forgiven for your own wrongs,’ He taught. 

‘God’s mercy flows through the same channel, whether it is being given or received’, He was saying.

For, how could Christ’s forgiveness of our transgressions be justifiable for ourselves if we do not forgive those who ‘trespass against us’?

‘If you mark our transgressions, Lord, who could stand?’ we sometimes sing.

And - if we are honest, we will answer that question with ‘certainly not I, Lord’.

So, Jesus, in His suffering humanity, forgave any and all who wronged Him when He prayed, ‘Father, forgive them for they know not what they do’.  

He demonstrated that humility in unlimited forgiveness was the only road to reconciliation.

We see this when Peter came to Him one day and asked: ‘Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?’

Seven times seemed quite generous to Peter, especially since there was no mention made about the offending party making amends.

And Jesus answered: ‘I tell you, Peter, not seven times but seventy-times-seven times!’

The difference between what Peter proposed and what Jesus answered was not a matter of keeping track.

It was a matter of the nature of forgiveness, the kind of forgiveness that goes beyond all calculation.

Yes, Lord - if you mark our transgressions, who could stand?   Who could stand?, we ask ourselves once again.

Unlimited forgiveness - forgiveness that is not numbered or kept in our book of records - that is what Jesus illustrated and expressed on the Cross.

Now - if we go back to His sermon on the Mt, we see that He uttered the most absurd and the most astounding
counsel a Christian could ever hear.

Just think of how at cross-purposes this is with our old nature as we look at the guidance He gave His disciples.

He said, while He was telling them about the Kingdom of God and the only way to live in it, to ‘love your enemies and pray for them that persecute you.’

Now - most of us do not take this very seriously - no - not at all - that is too ideal, we say.

People who wrong, who abuse, who misuse us, who undervalue us, who take advantage of us are hard to forgive completely and thoroughly - are they not? - and love them? and pray for them, too? - ‘NEVER’ we are prone to say.

But - the simple fact was that Jesus expected His disciples to do exactly that - to take it seriously and to live by it.

We may say ‘I cannot do that’.

But we must never say it cannot be done, for Jesus’ work at, in, and through the Cross undercuts the ‘I cannot’ of our impotence to do so.

When He opted for forgiveness and reconciliation, He is talking about living in His Kingdom just as He lives.

And the promise to live there stands - as we forgive, so we are forgiven!

Now - this is not some pious, idealistic talk!

This is one of the deepest moral struggles of our time.

Look at all the problems we are having in the world - look at the warring nations - look at our nation, at our history, at our broken families - everywhere you turn, forgiveness and reconciliation are in dismal need!

From a worldly viewpoint, sociologists tell us that forgiveness has great potential to solving many social problems, including crime.

‘Retaliation, or seeking vengeance, leads to the perpetuation of increasing a more severe retaliatory, violent response,’ they say.

And, they go on announcing today that it is forgiveness, not retaliation, that represents ‘the most strategic intervention in reducing violence in our society.’

Did you catch that: forgiveness is the most critical, the most important, vital, crucial intervention in order to reduce violence?

(I quote): ‘Forgiveness stops the ongoing cycle of repaying vengeance with vengeance that appears to contribute to the perpetuation of an increasingly violent society.’ (Unquote)

This is from a noted psychologist.

Is this not what God sought to ingrain from the beginning of time - to forgive freely?

Is this not what Jesus Christ taught through all of His earthly life?

The cycle of abuse and violence comes to an end through forgiveness - He made that clear.

Read Mt 18:21-35 once again in this light.

So - what our sociologists and psychologists are proposing is nothing new to we who know Christ.

Every day we are personally called to live in His Kingdom on this life principle.

Every day we come up against people who Jesus, as the Son of Man, said we must forgive and love.

We meet these moral dilemmas every day.

There have been occasions that I have observed on the news of people who have had wrongs done to them and their families - a loved one murdered, a child abused, someone cruelly taken from them, the Columbine incident, whatever.

And how my heart responds with ‘thank-you, Lord’ when I hear of this one and that one saying, - and certainly not without tears in their eyes and their hearts broken, - ‘I forgive him’ or ‘we forgive them’.

That is the spirit of Christ’s reconciliation.

More than likely, the offenders will never know of having been forgiven - and, more than likely, many would not even care.

But - for the Christian, the grace of God is flowing freely in such a tender and loving way when he is forgiving.

What is happening?

The forgiving spirit is breathing in the refreshing air of regeneration!

Broken hearts are being healed! 

The injuries we are feeling within are being released. 

Dark thoughts, destructive ideas, negative feelings are being done away with.

And, reconciliation is restoring splintered relationships - it is giving them the chance to grow in eternal love!

Do you think things would be different in the world today - with nations, with people, with families, with marriages just through the healing of forgiveness and through the harmony of restoration?

The history of the Cross - through and through - proved the strength of that truth of forgiving implemented there.

When we look at it, do you see any way of escaping the conclusion that Jesus’ teaching on forgiveness and His actual forgiveness on the Cross confirms that power of the forgiving love of God in Christ?

It surely obliges us to look only toward that provision of God’s forgiveness that He made in His Son.

In it, there are miraculous qualities where nothing is left untouched by its healing power.

Its regenerating force impacts everything and everyone - everything is affected.

In Rev 22, there is a pastoral scene of peace with the river of pure water flowing from the throne of God.

And there are trees on either side of the river.

Fruit is abundant on them.

And, their leaves are called ‘leaves for the healing of the nations.’

So powerful and so abundant is the vitality of the trees that their leaves produce healing for the nations.

The imagery of the abundant fruit and the medicinal leaves
are coming from the trees that are rooted in the effects of Christ’s death.

It is the message of the Gospel of Christ: God through His Son is rebuilding that which was broken down.

The Cross of the Lord Jesus brought about that restoration.

And, with it, the plain and clear indication of God’s mind in the work of the Cross that insures forgiveness is broadcast all over the world for all time.

Oh - how true Jesus Christ was to the exact representation of the Divine nature!

And, thus, His Gospel gives us the assurance that He invades our capacity to forgive.

He has made it plain that only as we let Him make us trees of forgiveness can we experience the meaning of forgiveness.

Yes - to forgive and to forgive and to forgive and to forgive again - this is that absurd principle of living in Christ’s Kingdom.

And it goes on - it will be forever that living hope - it remains the same - yesterday, today, and forever.

It is the principle of life shown on the Cross by Jesus, the Man. 

It is the power for life effected through Christ by the Cross.

I leave you with this one verse to ponder this week.

It is found in Eph 1.

Let me start with verse 3 that says, ‘Praise be to the 
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who has crowned us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms in Christ...’.

And then skip over to verse 7: ‘It is through Him, at the cost of His own blood, that we are redeemed and our sins are forgiven. Therein lies the richness of God’s free grace.’

Take this with you this week and ask the Lord to open it to see more fully what we really have in Jesus Christ.  

The Lord bless you once again!

Let us pray: