Forgive, forgive and forgive (Luke 17a)

Forgive, forgive, and forgive  

Luke 17:1-10

Key Verse 4 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."

Introduction: Today we are going to talk about sin. As sin causes all problems of the world, so it is within believers’ community.  Jesus taught about sins of the people of the world so that they may know their sins and that they may enter the kingdom of God. But here Jesus talked about sins among his disciples (Apostles). Since they believed Jesus and became the kingdom people, the sins in and among believers must be seen in a little different perspective. It is well revealed in Paul’s first letter to the church in Corinth.

1 Corinthians 1:2 To the church of God in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus and called to be his holy people, together with all those everywhere who call on the name of our Lord Jesus Christ-- their Lord and ours:

The perspective centers on one thing, conforming to God. Since God has chosen the believers as His people, we are to conform to His holiness. In order for us to be holy, all forms of sin must be done away with in one way or other. Here the way to do away with sin among believers is forgiving. This way of getting to Holiness is totally antithetical to the way of the world, which focuses on judgment through the way of punishing sins. We are compelled to be holy. The way to be holy is to forgive and forgive and forgive… Why does forgiving lead us holy or why should we forgive so many times? I pray that through Jesus’ teaching in today’s passage, we may learn and acquire the spirit that forgives.

1.    Things that causes people to stumble (1-2)

1a Jesus said to his disciples: "Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come...”

The entire chapter 16, Jesus taught the most common sin among people, i.e. ungodly handling of money. When the world is rife with such sin, the believers surely feel its effects. Jesus said that things that causes men to stumble are bound to come. This implies that the disciples cannot escape it or prevent its coming. It becomes obvious when we read Paul’s first letter to Corinth. In that church, there were various sins, division, arrogant, sexual immorality, law suit, disagreement on food sacrificed to idol, differing opinion gifts, and no consideration for the poor and weak. Present churches are not much different. We may find far longer list of problems than this one when we look at the present churches. Though there are so many, I like to mention two, the most worrisome things that has begun to permeate the believing community.

First one is sexual immorality. The world does not care about what God has set on how to go about sexual relationship. We believers cannot stand with the norm of our society, particularly in regard to sexual relationship. The world norm is very unbiblical. One can have any sexual relationship with others as long as they agree with each other. The extreme extension of this norm accepts porn as a way of life. So this society is filled with porn and about half of population uses porn. According to Barna group statistics, among church goers about one third of teen ages and young adults use porn in US. These are things that causes men to fall. We feel that large tidal waves of these problem overwhelm the believers in one way or another. Actually many fell into sin and caused much problem among believers. As we well remember, many reports on the issue on Catholic priests’ sexual abuse of children pasted the front pages of newspapers. Less than a year ago, a prominent church pastor was found to have ungodly sexual relationship and was forced to quit the ministry and the ministry was totally dismantled. This is flooding our society and bears a heavy load over the lives of believers and many, literally many already fell under. It is painful and causes lots of damage to the church as a whole.

Second tidal waves of the thing that causes believers to sin is money. Men’s mind is driven by desires for money. I watch once in a while a show called American greed. In this I found that many commit crime because of their untamed desire for money. Few years ago, financial crisis came about because of pervading greed in major banks. In the midst of such turmoil was a man Bernie Madoff. He handled billions of dollars of other’s money like Ponzi scheme and many thousands of people lost their entire saving in a matters of days. Some killed themselves because they could not bear such loss.

We are not immune to this problem. Actually much of believers’ mind and world view or philosophy are well grounded on materialism. Money motivates people’s mind than anything else. Money is the driving force of almost all activities. Often I feel that I have to have certain thing so that I may be able to do what I wish to do for the Lord. In other word we, Christians, knowingly and unknowingly, adopted the life style of the people of the world and its materialistic ways of handling money.  Some works more than 60 hours a week so as to make family live in comfort. Students are motivated to study hard in order to make more money. I found one such example in one whom I know. At my work there was a nurse. She was a very capable nurse and always wore a big cross neck lace on her neck. But she complains so many time about others. I found out that she works two jobs, working at one of nearby hospital all through the night. When she comes to work next morning, she was so tired and had no motivation to do anything and complains to everyone saying that they do not do what they supposed to do.  This is a picture of American dream and money driven life. In the midst of this, she caused many troubles for others.

So money driven mind drives young men’s mind to focus on how he can make money. The question of ‘How can I please God?’ is least of his or her concern. I am not talking about the people of the world but believers. When driven by such desire, more often than not, believers get into the trap of sin and cause trouble among believers.  

Things that causes men to sin are coming, they are coming through all the media, wherever we go and wherever we turn our eyes we can see. They come with beautiful packages, labeled with love, comfort, happiness, convenience and pleasure.  They are so attractive and so benign that we seldom think it in terms of sin.

Yet as we noted in the first letter to Corinthians, there were various sins in and among the believers. Division, arrogance/pride, uncaring for the needy, even sexual immorality, deception, law suit … though these are not of open challenge to God’s authority and or His Lordship, if they are left unresolved, it will lead to sin and eventually fall out of God’s blessing as God’s chosen. The things that cause men to sin are bound to come. This does not mean that men will inevitably sin but it means things that causes men to sin will come surely. This means that we cannot avoid its coming and we have to confront those things and we have to find a way to deal with it. Simply we as believers and as a body of believers should have a way to handle properly the thing that causes believers to stumble. 

First, we as individual must not fall into sin for it will cause a great harm to others and will surely cause stress to that person. Jesus warned those who introduces sins of this world to the believing community in this way;

1b Jesus said to his disciples:.., but woe to anyone through whom they come. 2 It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.

It is very serious because he or she did not think about or care for these little ones. Such person’s primary concern was the need of himself or herself. When one is solely driven by one’s desire, not considering all other members of the church, he or she will more likely to bring sins of the world into the church. So think twice before we decide to do something to suit our desires. The world offers with sweet deals. But those sweet deals are often impregnated with various forms of hidden sins. So be careful and think in humble mind and in the fear of the Lord.

When one does so, what would happen to the person? He or she will get themselves into a situation like being thrown into a sea with a millstone in their neck. What did Jesus mean by this? It does not mean he or she will die in sin. He wanted to warn of coming death, then Jesus could have clearly said so. But Jesus did not. In this parabolic word, Jesus denoted a complex situation whereby one get into a near death situation;

Jonah 2: 4 Then I said, 'I am driven away from your sight; yet I shall again look upon your holy temple.' 5 The waters closed in over me to take my life; the deep surrounded me; weeds were wrapped about my head 6 at the roots of the mountains. I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever; yet you brought up my life from the pit, O LORD my God. 7 When my life was fainting away, I remembered the LORD, and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple.

God does not take sin lightly. God will not sin slide by without any remedy to rectify it. God does this for the sake of his people. God did this to Jonah. Eventually Jonah prayed to the Lord and God heard his prayer;

            Jonah 2:1 Then Jonah prayed to the LORD his God from the belly of the fish, 2 saying, "I called out to the LORD, out of my distress, and he answered me;..  7 When my life was fainting away, I remembered the LORD, and my prayer came to you, into your holy temple.

God had never lost his love and his purpose for Jonah’s life. He saved Jonah out in the depth of sea in the belly of fish for he was God’s chosen. Yet sin of disobedience was washed away from the heart of Jonah.  The root of sin is so deep and in order to uproot it from the deepest depth, often God force us to go down so deep into the depth of death.  But God is God of mercy and he never let us go for good. We must trust in God’s utmost wisdom in handling sins of our fellow believers.

So by all means, it is better for us not to fall into the temptation of the world. Then how can we get out of such trap under the power of sin? Or, how can we do as individual or as a corporate body of believers? 

2.    Watch yourselves (3-4)

How can we watch ourselves so that sin may not have any footing in and among us? First, it must begin with the one who is wronged. Here Jesus said that he has to rebuke his brother of the wrongs. It is not easy to rebuke someone.  He might be misunderstood as false charge or eschew blames of himself. But he has to say with clarity what he did wrong. This is to say clearly that what they did was not godly and wrong. This should be not with anger or pride or blame but to point of the wrongs before God. This is a rebuke. It is seeing what they did in God’s perspective. When we are wronged, we tend to be emotionally charged against the person and immediately demand for restitution whatever he caused. But the first thing that he should do is to help the person see things in God’s perspective in hoping that he may repent of his sin.

The next thing is, if they repent, forgive them. We are to note that ‘if they repent’ we are to forgive them. Many gave wisdom of forgiving. When you forgive whether one repents or not is a wise thing to do. But here Jesus taught something different, giving our forgiveness is depends on whether he repents or not. I believe that Jesus said this on the perspective of restoration of the relationship. Even if one wronged against us, we can forgive the person from our hearts. But delivery of the forgiveness to that person depends on whether he repents or not. This is well revealed in the life of Joseph in his handling of his brothers. When God blessed him to be the prime minister of Egypt, he said this;

Genesis 41:51 Joseph named his firstborn Manasseh and said, "It is because God has made me forget all my trouble and all my father's household."

He forgave his brothers already in his mind at this point. But when he saw the ten brothers bowing down to him, he did not give away his forgiveness right away. Instead he waited and tested and forced them to utter and to act in repentance. Finally Judah in full repentance said this;

Genesis 44:16 "What can we say to my lord?" Judah replied. "What can we say? How can we prove our innocence? God has uncovered your servants' guilt. We are now my lord's slaves-- we ourselves and the one who was found to have the cup."

We need both; rebuke and repentance. It may take much time and much struggle and stress, these are needed to make us holy and acceptable as God’s people and to the Lord of holiness. In the process of this we grow in faith toward holiness. We must be able to bear and persevere the hard process of this. We must not looking for easy solutions or quick fix. Men’s mind take time and we cannot turn lives of people like steering wheel. As we noted it took 30 years for Joseph’s brothers to repent.

The next step is to forgive.

4 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."

One man was arrested in charge of raping several ladies. On the court he was about to be sentenced to death. In great remorse he pleaded for the mercy and forgiveness from those he violated.

"What you did to me changed the course of my life but I have taken this senseless, violent attack and used this as an opportunity to transform myself and my life for the better," the woman wrote.

Sin has its cost and the cost must be paid by those who are wronged. It may be a minor thing. But more often than not, the cost of sin is so great that we cannot bear. All the more we have hard time to forgive. But here Jesus said that we are to forgive, not one or two or three time, but seven times in a day. Practically this means to forgive them as long as they come to you in repentance no matter how many time they do. As we noted from the woman, forgiving is not without cost. It may be material loss, or damage one’s fame or honor, or loss of relationship so on. Yet we are to forgive unlimited times. If we have to forgive, we raise question, where is justice? Or what is justice? It seems to force us to pay for the sins of others no matter how heavy the cost may be.  This burdens our heart! Often the burden is so great that it looks almost impossible. In the depth of our heart cries, “I want full restitution, it shall not me but let him pay the cost!” Knowing this fully Jesus’ disciples said this; 

5 The apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith!"

How can this be possible?

3.    Forgiveness with the attitude of a servant (5-6)

How can anyone forgive seven times in a day? Reb and I often fought about little things. Most of the time, I would not talk and would not want to forgive. Like this even with a small things, it takes more than a day to forgive and accept each other.  How can we forgive others seven times in a day? In a political arena, when one does wrong to the other, there are three way to solve the problem:; go out war against those who did wrong for full restitution; pay full cost of the wrongs, or meeting in between. Practically there no such thing as forgiving, and forgiving seven times is simply not the way of this world. It is totally against justice and against our righteousness and it against our grain of righteous mind. But Jesus the Lord taught them to forgive and they needed a great help in this regard. How can it be possible? 

6 He replied, "If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it will obey you.

The apostles felt that they needed assistance for their faith. But Jesus said that if they have faith as small as a mustard seed, they can say the mulberry tree be uprooted and be planted it in the sea, it will obey.

First they just need a faith of particular quality (may we call it genuine one? ) instead of adding more faith or need assistance in their faith. In this faith, they can even say the mulberry tree and it will obey. This faith is so powerful and effective. If they have that faith, then they can do what they wanted to do, even forgiving others seven times in a day. So they needed the faith that Jesus mentioned. It is interesting for Jesus to say this because they felt their faith is far greater than any one among the crowd. Here also the disciples were called ‘the apostles’ implying that they were fully committed to Jesus in faith; i.e. they were not any more in a state of learning, i.e. disciples but apostles, men of mission. It was clear that they had faith and they demonstrated faith well above and over other people. Then why did the apostles feel they were in great need of faith in order to follow Jesus’ command to forgive? How was their faith different from the faith Jesus was talking about?  In order to help them, Jesus gave them a parable;

7 "Suppose one of you has a servant plowing or looking after the sheep. Will he say to the servant when he comes in from the field, 'Come along now and sit down to eat'? 8 Won't he rather say, 'Prepare my supper, get yourself ready and wait on me while I eat and drink; after that you may eat and drink'?

There was a servant and master. The servant worked all day long in the field as he was supposed to do. He worked hard with diligence and honesty well over 12 hours. He came home late at 8 pm. He was so tired and weary. He was badly in need of rest and he felt he deserved a rest. But as soon as he came home, the master told him to prepare him a supper and get ready to wait on him. The master’s request was beyond his reasonable understanding. It looked very unfair and even could be considered unjust.  But Jesus spoke on this event in the perspective of the master;

9 Will he thank the servant because he did what he was told to do?

The master owns the servant and he paid for his life a huge sum of money. So he has full right to use his servant as he fit. Not just 12 hours but 24 hours a day the master has right to use his servant. As long as his body is able, the servant must do what the master told him to do. He has no right at all. He fully owes his whole life to the master that he has nothing to say against the master’s request. It sounds very harsh for the servant and still hard to accept especially to the minds of the people of postmodern generation. How can this be applicable to the setting of forgiving so many times in a day? Are we to enslave ourselves to the Lord in this way?

4.    I own you and you have nothing to claim as your own (8-10)

10 So you also, when you have done everything you were told to do, should say, 'We are unworthy servants; we have only done our duty.'"

Here Jesus spoke directly to his disciples, i.e. apostles that they had to forgive even seven times in a day but also have to do it because they were unworthy servant and that was their duty because it is the command of the master Jesus. Is Jesus saying that I am the master and you are my servant-slave, so you must do what I am telling you to do? Isn’t it tyranny or dictatorship or abuse of ownership or inhumane?

As Jesus says, his demand for his servant is true; he wants us to obey fully because we are his servants and he owns us. But this is not his tyranny, or abuse of his authority or unloving or inhumane demand! 

Why did Jesus have such power and authority to command us such difficult and hard thing? Jesus taught this not as an authority but for them to have certain mindset; the mindset is capture in the word ‘unworthy servant’.  In the previous paragraph, the mind of unworthy servant is captured in the word ‘faith’ that can move even the mulberry tree.

First I like to discuss about the faith of Jesus’ disciples. The disciples believed and was convinced fully that Jesus as the Lord and Messiah. So they chose to follow him and believed that Jesus was going to give them a great blessing in the coming kingdom.  In this faith, they were far better than anyone among the crowd. Truly they knew Jesus best and believed Jesus more than anyone out there. They were so certain that Jesus was the Messiah and King of Israel. But they had not known all the truth that Jesus was going to reveal to them yet. They had not seen Jesus’ suffering and death on the cross. They had not known Jesus’ love and they had not known Jesus’ truth in its full extent. So their faith was not good enough, insufficient or incomplete.  Even we can say that the faith that they had was not the kind of faith that Jesus wanted them to have eventually. This characteristic is well revealed in the exchange between Jesus and Peter;

Jn 13:8 “No,” said Peter, “you shall never wash my feet.” Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”Jn 13:14 Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet.

In this exchange we can see Peter’s loyalty to Jesus. Peter wanted to serve Jesus out of his own will and strength. Peter was willing to give everything that he had for Jesus’ sake. So he felt he could do it and he would do it.  But Jesus declares that unless he washes Peter’s feet, he has no part with Jesus.

The faith that Jesus demands from his disciples; the faith is also revealed through what Jesus did on the cross. Just before Jesus was arrested, his disciples asked questions on whereabouts of Jesus. At this time, Jesus demanded faith from his disciples in this way;

 John 14:12 Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father.

The disciples were facing to see Jesus’ death on the cross. Even seeing such tragic death of Jesus, still they would believe in Jesus, then they could do greater things. In other word, the faith in Jesus must include Jesus’ death on the cross. As we know, Jesus died and gave his life for sinners like us.   It was to pay for our sins and to show the way of life and to reveal the truth of God. In this the great love of God, grace of God is embedded. Paul expressed his faith in Jesus in this way;

Gal 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Here when he said that Christ lives in me, he meant that the spirit that Jesus had as he was dying on the cross for the sake of sinners is at work with power. This more clearer as we hear Paul’s testimony;

1 cor 15: 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.

As we noted, faith and grace cannot be separated. So many a times Paul introduced himself, a servant of Jesus Christ. The word ‘servant’ is the same word of this parable (v7)  (Rom 1:1; Gal 1:10) Paul defined more clearly what it means that one has faith in Jesus;

Romans 8:9 You, however, are not in the realm of the flesh but are in the realm of the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, they do not belong to Christ.

Jesus came as a servant and lived as a servant. He was the servant of the Lord. As Lord’s servant he served sinners even to the point of his death. Truly he gave all even including his life, shedding all of his blood and his body being whipped, speared, nailed on the cross, being torn apart even to the point of death. This was the grace and love that Jesus gave to us and this is the spirit Jesus wants his followers to have. And this spirit must be expressed in forgiving sins of other fellow believers. This is the mind of ‘unworthy servant’.  In this spirit the servant can serve the master even at the mid night. In this spirit of servant, Jesus’ disciples can forgive more than seven times in a day.

The faith like a mustard seed is the faith that is filled with the spirit of Christ. If our mind and spirit is governed by the spirit of Christ, our heart has the attitude of ‘the unworthy servant’.

Romans 12:1 Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God-- this is your true and proper worship.

Forgiveness is what makes us unique and different from other people. It cuts the cycle of sin-judgment-sin. This is how sin of the world and sin within us are nullified and purified. At the same time, through forgiveness the grace that we have through our faith in Christ is revealed. By forgiving we testify to the truth that Jesus the one crucified on the cross is our Lord. Like this, through forgiveness we bear the mark of Jesus’ apostles.  And through our forgiveness we welcome all sinners to God’s grace. In this regard forgiveness is the essential part of believer’s life, and the life of church.

Finally when we forgive our hearts are filled with joy and true understanding of the truth that God embedded on the cross of Jesus. It is well revealed in Joseph’s life:

Genesis 45:1 Then Joseph could no longer control himself before all his attendants, and he cried out, "Have everyone leave my presence!" …2 And he wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard him, and Pharaoh's household heard about it.

Genesis 45:4 Then Joseph said to his brothers, "Come close to me." When they had done so, he said, "I am your brother Joseph, the one you sold into Egypt!

Joseph was filled with joy in getting back all of his brothers and had joy of knowing God’s unlimited wisdom in saving his people. Forgive and forgive and forgive, then you will be filled with joy, joy of getting back all your brothers and sisters and joy of knowing God’s grace and wisdom in Christ, and God’s utmost will for his chosen.

May God bless you richly in the Lord!