Supernatural Forgiveness

Use these materials to go deeper into this message on your own, or with your small group.
Series Overview
Group Questions
Student Study Guide

9:00 Service | 10:30 Service | Sermon Audio

Good morning Chapel family. Happy Thanksgiving week. Earlier this year, I was making plans for what I would preach in the fall. I knew this would be an unusual season. I knew things could get ugly. I knew emotions would be high and relationships would be strained—even within families. I knew there would be a lot of anger and suspicion and name-calling. I knew there would be people urging me to choose a political side—to preach partisan messages.  

So in light of all that, I decided that what we needed to hear more than anything else was the invitation Jesus gave to his disciples 2,000 years ago: “Seek first the Kingdom of God.” Because if we are followers of Christ, it doesn’t matter what political side we’re on; that’s not our deepest identity. Our truest identity is that we are citizens of the Kingdom of God. And therefore, the way we act and speak should be noticeably different from the culture around us—especially during election season.  

So every week this fall, we’ve looked at a different New Testament teaching that shows a different angle of what it means to live out that Kingdom identity. And today as we close out the series, I want to talk about a hugely important part of walking in God’s kingdom, and it’s this: how do you respond when people mistreat you?  

There used to be a popular bumper sticker that went like this: “I don’t get mad; I get…” Can you finish it? I get even. In other words, if you offend me; if you do me wrong, just wait—I’ll get you back. Which is kind of scary, when you’re driving 75 miles an hour on the Jersey Turnpike. But it’s actually more scary in everyday life. Lately I’ve been having lots of conversations about how we respond to people who hurt us, and I’m telling you—those conversations have been emotional and raw. Because everyone has been sinned against. And the way you handle that will affect your life like nothing else. And by the way, this topic has everything to do with Thanksgiving.  

Today’s passage is from Matthew 18, starting in verse 21… 

21 Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?” 

22 Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. 

23 “Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24 As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. 25 Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt. 

26 “At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ 27 The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go. 

28 “But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded. 

29 “His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’ 

30 “But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31 When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened. 

32 “Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. 33 Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ 34 In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed. 

35 “This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.” This is the Word of the Lord. 

The passage starts out with a question by Peter: How many times should I forgive somebody who sins against me? Did you notice that Jesus didn’t question the premise of what Peter was saying? Jesus didn’t say, “Oh Peter—lighten up. People don’t ‘sin’ against you. You’re way too sensitive!” He didn’t say that. Because people do sin against us. All the time.  

One of the strange privileges of being a pastor is that you get sort of a front-row seat to the pain in people’s lives. So I’ve seen the devastation of learning that your spouse has been cheating on you. I’ve seen businesspeople getting betrayed and ruined by their business partners. I’ve seen teenage girls being excluded, or mocked for their body shape, or sometimes being ridiculed for their faith. I’ve seen parents facing the blizzard of emotions when their son comes home from school and says he’s being bullied, and he doesn’t want to go back. I’ve seen some of those things and I’ve experienced some of those things, and I know you have too. Man, we get sinned against. There probably are times when we’re over-sensitive and thin-skinned. But there are plenty of times when we get sinned against. And that’s why Peter’s question matters so much: Jesus, how many times am I supposed to forgive somebody who does me wrong? 

There was a tradition within Judaism that said we should forgive someone up to three times. That would demonstrate tremendous grace, to forgive that many times. So when Peter asked the question, he thought he was going way above and beyond by suggesting we should forgive the same person seven times! And as usual, Jesus was thinking on a whole other level. 

So Jesus says, “No—not seven times. You should be willing to forgive 77 times.” So are we supposed to keep track, like, “Okay, that’s number 78. I’m done with you!” Of course not. Jesus used a ridiculously high number to make the point that there should be no limit to our forgiveness. Because Jesus knew human nature, and he knew that unforgiveness is toxic for our souls. 

But it sounds crazy, right? And it brings up so many questions in our minds. So to help us wrap our minds around this, Jesus tells a parable.  

A king is settling accounts with his servants. A guy gets called in who owes the king a huge amount of money, which he can’t even come close to paying back, but he begs for mercy so the king forgives his debt and lets him go. But then that guy goes out and finds someone who owes him a much smaller amount of money; the guy begs him for mercy; but he refuses and he has the guy thrown into debtor’s prison (which was a thing back then). And then the king finds out. And he’s so upset and disappointed that he has the guy thrown into jail. 

So…what does it mean for us to live this out, in our actual lives, when we get sinned against? And what does this have to do with Thanksgiving?  

Let me divide the message into two parts. Point number one: The Poison of Unforgiveness. The man in this parable is a bitter person. Despite the amazing mercy he just received from the king, he’s walking down the street and he sees this guy who owes him money. And of course, in this parable, when someone owes you money, that symbolizes that the person has sinned against you—they owe you a moral debt. So this guy—who’s walking away from his meeting with the king and he sees the guy who owes him money—represents us, and how we view someone who has sinned against us. And just seeing that person, or hearing that person’s name, stirs up emotions in us. It all comes back—how they hurt us; how unfair it is; how other people should know how awful this person is; but the main thing is, we have something against them. And just like the guy in the parable, it can be hard to let it go.  

So how do you know if you’re living with that poison in your soul? Let me give you five symptoms. Five signs that my soul is poisoned by unforgiveness: 

First, Re-living Offenses. When I’m lying in bed, or when I’m driving, I find myself re-living the wrongs that have been done to me. I put myself back in that moment, and I feel those feelings again. And there’s almost a sick pleasure in doing that, because it brings strong emotions of self-pity, and being a victim, and that can be strangely enjoyable. Many times when we re-live offenses, we fantasize about finally getting revenge on that person for what they’ve done to us. Ooh, that’s fun to think about.  

Second, Character Assassination. Whenever the name of the person who offended you comes up in conversation, if somebody says something positive about that person, it bothers you. Because they obviously don’t know what that person is really like! So you look for opportunities to get other people on your side and join you in blacklisting that person.  

Here’s a painful one: a soul poisoned by unforgiveness can show up in Re-Victimization. You’ve heard the stats: people who were abused as kids are more likely to abuse their own kids. They don’t set out to do that, but the cycle seems to want to repeat itself. Because getting sinned against is a big deal, and it’s destructive if we don’t deal with it wisely. 

Fourth, sometimes you see it in Insomnia. There was a recent study reported in the Journal of Psychology and Health, where they found that people who are more forgiving sleep better, and longer, than people who don’t. A related article explained it like this: “People who don’t forgive…tend to linger on unpleasant thoughts and feelings, such as anger, blame, and regret. This can involve painful rumination—repetitive thoughts about distress. That resentment or bitterness could be detracting from sleep quality and well-being.” 

And then fifth, lack of forgiveness often results in Awkward Holidays. You know what I’m talking about. You’re going to gather at someone’s house for Thanksgiving, and she’s going to be there. That person who annoys you or frustrates you, or maybe they really hurt you. And you’re having a really hard time letting it go. So when it comes time for dinner, you’re going to try to find a spot on the other end of the table from her…or maybe you’ll volunteer to sit at the kids table, to stay as far away from her as possible. It’s just awkward. Unforgiveness does that. 

So…when you look into your own soul, do you see any poison? How is it affecting the people around you? How is it holding you back? How is it robbing you of the life God has for you? What is the Holy Spirit whispering in your heart right now? 

If you find yourself being poisoned by unforgiveness, how do you free yourself from that? Let’s talk about The Path to Forgiveness. When the king found out that this man—whom he had forgiven so much—had not shown the same kind of mercy to the man who owed him a much smaller debt, the king was shocked and angry. Why? Because he just assumed that when you’ve been shown great mercy, you’ll naturally want to turn around and show that same kind of mercy to others.  

So why didn’t the guy act that way? Because apparently, he didn’t fully understand how serious his own debt was. There was some denial going on. And it’s so much like us. We have a stubborn tendency to minimize our own sin, and maximize the sins of others. So we fixate on a speck of sawdust in our friend’s eye, oblivious to the big stick lodged in our own eye. See, if I don’t think my own sin is that bad, when God offers forgiveness, it doesn’t seem like that big of a deal. That’s a warped perspective, and we need something radical to re-focus us. 

Can I tell you the best way to re-focus? Spend more time with Jesus. Because the more we hang around Jesus and hang around the cross, the more our perspective gets brought into line with reality. This is why Paul the Apostle could say, Christ Jesus came to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. He saw the size of his own debt, and the staggering grace of the King who forgave his debt. And that realization transformed his life and made him a radically forgiving person.  

That connection—between being forgiven and being forgiving—is not only taught in this passage; it’s all over the Bible. Let me show you three places, and let’s read these verses out loud, together. 

You ready? The first one comes from the Lord’s Prayer—read this with me:  

And forgive us our debts, 
    as we also have forgiven our debtors. 

Colossians 3:13… 

Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. 

And Ephesians 4:32… 

Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you. 

When you read the Bible it’s impossible to miss it: if we truly understand that we are forgiven people, we will be forgiving people. 

Now: does this mean you allow yourself to be mistreated or abused over and over again? No. The Bible also talks about confronting sin and holding abusers accountable. Does this mean that full reconciliation with the other person is always possible? Unfortunately, no—because some of that depends on the response of the other person. But even if that person won’t admit what they’ve done, and doesn’t think they need to be forgiven, that doesn’t stop you from forgiving.  

If we don’t do that—if we refuse to forgive, the consequences are serious. In the parable, the king throws the unforgiving man into jail. What does that jail symbolize? Well, in one sense, it symbolizes eternal judgment. Hell. Because if we go through life refusing to extend mercy, that means we’ve never truly received God’s mercy—we’ve never received his salvation—and we’ll spend eternity trying to pay off our unpayable debt. But in a more immediate sense, I think the jail symbolizes the hell that we live with every day in this life when we refuse to forgive.  

Are you living in that jail? It’s a miserable place to live, and you don’t need to stay there. Keep spending time with Jesus—let him remind you that your sin is bigger than you realize, but his grace is even bigger. And then extend that grace to the people around you. Your life will be so much better. 

I mentioned at the beginning of this message that forgiveness has everything to do with Thanksgiving. Are you starting to see that connection? The reason the man in the parable refused to forgive was because he wasn’t thankful for what he had received. And any time we walk around with a heart that’s ungrateful…entitled…discontent…we’ll find it very difficult to forgive. Because forgiveness flows from a thankful heart. In fact, the Greek word for “grateful” comes from the same root as the word for “grace.” So here’s how it works: if I’m grateful to God, I’ll show grace to you. Let me say that again: if I’m grateful to God, I’ll show grace to you.  

That’s why forgiveness flows from a grateful heart.  

And that brings us back to Thanksgiving. Any time you get families together, there’s a strong likelihood that there will be a history of hurts and offenses and unresolved conflicts. Right? That’s why some of you aren’t looking forward to Thanksgiving—because you’re going to see some people you’d rather not see. So if you’re feeling a little anxiety about Thanksgiving, know that you’re not alone. Especially in 2024—especially post-election—there’s all kinds of tension in families.  

So what do you do? Well, if forgiveness flows from a thankful heart, here’s what I suggest: this Thanksgiving, intentionally create an environment where people can express their gratitude.  

In the 1990s there was a Harvard psychology professor named Shawn Achor, who conducted a massive study on happiness. People were asked to take five minutes at the end of every day, and write down three things they were thankful for. They didn’t have to be big things, but they had to be specific, like, “I’m thankful that my daughter gave me a hug.” “I’m thankful there was no traffic on the way home from work.” “I’m thankful for the taste of the fresh cilantro in my Chipotle burrito bowl.” So that was it—every day, express thanks for three specific things, and do that for one week. 

Of course they did it in the right way, with control groups, and the people didn’t know what they were being tested for. And here’s what they found—it’s pretty amazing: at the end of the week, the people who had practiced gratitude were significantly happier and less depressed. They tested them again after a month—and they had only done the writing-down exercise for a week—but a month later, they were even more joyful and content. And after three months, they were even more happy. It seemed to snowball. And the only thing the researchers could figure is that that simple practice of writing down three thankful things actually trained their minds to search for the good in their lives. Isn’t that amazing? And similar results have been found in multiple other experiments.  

There’s something powerful about expressing your gratitude.  

This is a recurrent theme in the New Testament. Romans chapter one is talking about what happens to a person when they fall further and further away from God—so it’s a picture of somebody who’s not well in their soul—and look what it says in verse 21: For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. In other words, part of the essence of ungodliness is never expressing gratitude. And of course the other side of that coin is…When you’re healthy and whole… thankfulness has a lot to do with it. 1 Thessalonians 5:18 says, Give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. Ephesians 5:20 says always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. So there’s something about that act of expressing gratitude that does something healthy to our souls.  

So…Thanksgiving is four days away. Does your family do the thing where you go around the table and everyone has to say one thing they’re thankful for? That’s a good concept, but can we be honest? Sometimes it’s kind of awkward, and some people hate it, and, you know, the kids go, “I’m thankful for this corn. I’m thankful for the butter.” So it’s my family’s turn to host this year. And last time we hosted, I think it was six years ago, Norma Jean and I schemed up something creative. And it worked pretty well, so we’re doing it again this year. Here’s how it works: I’m going to throw out specific categories to sort of prime the pump of gratitude. For example, here are a few of the categories… 

A person I’m thankful I met.  

A place I’m thankful I traveled to. 

A movie I’m thankful I saw. 

I’m just going to read those, one at a time. And then just leave a few seconds for anyone to comment. And hopefully they won’t just say the answer; they’ll explain it briefly. And if you don’t want to say anything, you can just sit there and be thankful for the corn. Here are a few more… 

A gift I’m thankful I received. 

A hardship I’m thankful I experienced. That’s kind of a stretch, right? But potentially powerful. 

A feature of my home I’m thankful for. 

A part of my faith I’m thankful for. 

And, Something about my family I’m thankful for. 

I’m really looking forward to this. Because expressing gratitude is powerful. If you decide to try something like that in your family, I’d love to hear how it goes. And if you do try it, see if speaking your gratitude begins to change the atmosphere, and maybe even soften people’s hearts toward one another. See if it plows the soil for forgiveness to grow. See if it softens your heart toward that family member who’s offended you. Because forgiveness really does flow from a grateful heart.  

I don’t know the many ways that you’ve been sinned against, but I know you have been—maybe by family members; maybe by others. and I would never minimize the wrongs that have been done to you. But here’s what I also know: you have a choice. You can you allow those things to define you; you can lie in bed and re-live those offenses; you can fantasize about revenge. And if you do, it will poison your soul. Or, you can allow your perspective to be shifted by gospel of Christ—being so grateful for how he’s forgiven you and blessed you in countless ways…and out of that gratitude, choose to forgive. I promise you, that spirit of forgiveness will change the atmosphere of your Thanksgiving, and it will change the course of your life.  

Stand for closing. 

As I head into my Thanksgiving, can I tell you something that I am deeply grateful for? Here at The Chapel, we have been through a fall unlike any other. The intensity of election season, combined with the multiple staff changes here at The Chapel, and a whole lot of other things. And through all of that, God has been so good to us. And today is a perfect example of that: celebrating six baptisms today; this afternoon I get to lead a membership class with almost 30 new members. God is at work here. So I said this at the beginning of the fall season, and before we start Advent next week I want to say it one more time: Life is hard…but God is good. I’m really thankful for that. Let’s pray…