You're Just Like Your Father (July 14th, 2019) - Dan Brubacher

Good morning, church.

Good morning, New Market.

Good to be with you.

And uh thank you, team, for leading us in worship and remembrance.

Just a great time uh to be together.

And it's uh my joy to be with you.

Uh it was really an honor when I received the invitation a few weeks ago from Pastor Mike.

And um, this is my first time uh speaking, but my second time uh visiting you here in New Market.

I was here in the very early days of the church.

Um, I don't know the name of the school, but the other school, I think in the first year of your existence.

And it's just awesome to see what God is doing here, what he is building here.

He is building his church, and uh you guys are a part of that and making that happen.

And so uh just a blessing to be here.

I bring greetings from Harvest and Barrie and your friends and your extended family there.

Uh we uh we love there, our our staff and our church family.

We love your pastor, we love his family, and we love you guys.

And um, we're cheering you on from just a little bit up north of the 400 there, you know.

And uh we uh we love getting reports, and it's great to be here and see it firsthand.

But we're uh we're cheering you on and just expectant for all that God still has.

Uh, he's just getting started here, guys.

He's just getting started, he's got so much more to do, and uh can't wait to hear all about it.

You know, one of the things I love about uh visiting another Harvest Bible chapel is the fact that you, like us, love God's word and uh you love to have it uh taught to you.

You love to open it up, you love to study it for yourself, and so uh as someone who's coming to proclaim it, that's a really great thing to know in advance in your audience.

And so we're gonna do that together this morning.

Uh, you know, several years ago, I was at an event where I uh bumped into a longtime family friend.

Uh, and this person had known my parents and me really since I was an infant, but I hadn't seen her uh for a number of years.

And um we began to talk together and just, you know, reacquaint ourselves.

And after I had spoken really just a sentence or two, she kind of kind of crooked her head and and just paused and almost looked confused, and she said, Would you say that again?

And uh I thought maybe I hadn't been speaking loud enough or clear enough, so I began to repeat my words and and as I was talking, she shook her head and she chuckled and she said, The body is a little different, but the voice is the same.

You sound just like your father.

Now, that exchange didn't come as a surprise to me for because for as long as I can remember, I've had people tell me that our appearances and that our uh characteristics, our personalities, our mannerisms, our behaviors, that they match up in many ways.

And as a youngster, I actually embraced that.

I wanted to be like my dad, like many sons want to be like their dads, and I wanted to follow in his footsteps, and for me that meant I aspired to be a pastor.

Now that that desire actually shifted as I grew older until God eventually brought me back full circle, and yes, I am a pastor.

But as a preschooler, I often set up a makeshift pulpit in our living room.

And uh I suited up in my official pastor outfit of old glasses and red pants and no shirt.

Do not ask me why that was the outfit, but that's what it was.

I have no explanation for that.

And uh, lead services with singing and uh with a sermon that I would write, and my parents actually had recordings of that that somehow got lost.

But um, I would even do communion.

I'd get crackers and and uh juice and whatever audience I could scrounge up, that was my church.

And many of you can relate to all of this in some way or another because you've heard the same kind of comments.

I mean, people have told you you're a spitting image of your mom, or I just can't get over the similarities between you and your dad.

Or have you ever noticed that your kid is just like you?

It's a family resemblance, right?

Now, I want us to consider this this morning from a spiritual perspective.

As people observe your life, as they as they see your character and your conduct, as they as they see what's on the inside and what's on the outside, do they think, wow, you are just like your heavenly father?

I I cannot get over the unmistakable family resemblance between you and him.

Is that what they say?

And we're gonna explore this theme today by looking at a few verses from the Apostle Paul found in the book of Ephesians.

And so if you have a copy of God's word with you today, and I hope you do, whether old-fashioned paper like I like or electronic, one way or the other, I hope you've got God's word with you.

And uh get that open to the book of Ephesians.

If you're new to the Bible, this is in the New Testament, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, Galatians, and then Ephesians, all right?

Ephesians.

And the apostle Paul wrote this to a first century church, and I want you to know he wrote it to us as well.

And he wrote it to help us grow as followers of Christ.

So I want you to look at the very end of chapter 4, beginning of chapter 5.

I'm gonna pick up at verse 32.

And here's what he writes to us: he says, Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love, as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

Let's just bow and pray for a moment and ask God to speak to us through his word this morning.

Father, I thank you so much for this gathering, this church that you're building.

Thank you for this time this morning where we have entered into worship, where we have lifted high the name of Jesus, celebrated who he is, and remembered what he has done for us.

And God, I pray that that has moved each of us to a place of worship and surrender and submission.

And now, as we come to your word, I pray that you would do through it what you have promised to do.

God, it's an amazing thing.

You've said that you will not allow your word to return void, that it's living and active, that it will bring about the results that you want.

And so, God, we collectively we invite that to be so here in this room, in our hearts, in our lives today.

Pray that I would get out of the way and you would by your spirit speak to each of us and conform us into the image of your Son, that you would make us more like our Heavenly Father.

And we pray to that end in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, um, you'll you're gonna see that the the outline this morning really is it's one big idea, kind of one sentence in summary of the the entire sermon.

Here's the sermon in a sentence.

You might want to write this down.

I resemble my heavenly father when I love like I've been loved, and forgive like I've been forgiven.

I resemble my heavenly father when I love like I've been loved and forgive like I've been forgiven.

If you take away nothing more than that this morning, you will have learned a very valuable spiritual lesson.

I hope you're gonna stick with me and learn a few other things along the way, but but that truth alone is worth just burning into your heart and asking God to do that.

So we're gonna kind of take that in chunks and let's start with that first part.

I resemble my heavenly father.

And I'm seeing this in Ephesians 5, verse 1.

Ephesians 5:1

I think you'll see it as well.

It says, Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children.

And Paul begins by reminding us of our status as God's beloved sons and daughters.

We've sung about that already this morning in that beautiful song.

And he he's actually alluding back to some things that he said earlier in his letter.

Back in chapter 1, verse 5, he had mentioned how we are adopted.

And in chapter 2, 19 and 3, verses 14 and 15, he talked about how we're part of God's family.

So he's alluding back to this family concept.

And we could pause right here for a few moments, friends, and um we could just meditate on the simple and yet profound truth that by grace through faith, we're the children of God.

That you and I, we are members of his family.

And I and I want you to hear me.

No matter what your earthly family has been like, and I I don't have the privilege of knowing any of your stories.

And some of you may have come from wonderful families, and some of you may have come from not so wonderful families.

But no matter what your earthly family has been like in Christ, you are part of a spiritual family with a heavenly father who loves you and who chose you and who embraces you.

That truth alone should keep us going, even when things get rough.

Amen?

I mean, God loves us, he's chosen us, he's embraced us.

And it's on that basis that we're his beloved children that Paul urges us, you see it right there, he says to be imitators of God.

And actually, the the the Greek word here that's translated imitators is the one from which we get the word mimic.

Now, you guys know what a mimic is, right?

I mean, it's it's someone who who's seeking to duplicate speech and patterns and expressions and gestures from another person, right?

And I gotta tell you, growing up, my middle brother Dave, who is the world's biggest tease, I mean, he loved to mimic me.

As much as possible, he would say exactly what I said in the exact way that I said it.

He would follow me everywhere I went.

He would do everything I did.

And um, probably if you have a younger sibling, or maybe some of you are the younger sibling, you know exactly what I'm talking about, right?

You've either had that in your life or you are that for an older brother or sister.

And um, you know, there's individuals that have made quite a splash, quite a career out of mimicking other famous people.

And I was thinking, for example, of the past three decades on the show Saturday Night Live.

And the various actors who have um you have carefully and yet comically imitated the presidents, you know, Bush and Clinton and Obama and Trump.

And to do this well, they put forth much effort to learn and then to copy the speech patterns and the mannerisms of whatever particular president that they were responsible to imitate, to mimic.

And get that in your mind.

That is the idea here in Ephesians 5, verse 1.

Ephesians 5:1

We must imitate God with determination, with intentionality.

We gotta work out it.

And kind of on that note, it's really important to know that the term that's translated here as be, see, it says, therefore, be imitators, it's actually the word become.

And this isn't just kind of a nerdy grammar lesson for people like me who enjoy that kind of thing.

It's actually a very important distinction because the verb be has the idea of a finished product.

But the verb become has the idea of ongoing process.

In other words, imitating God is a lifelong mission, friends.

You know that.

None of us has arrived.

Relying our Heavenly Father in our character and in our conduct, it happens gradually, it happens progressively, it happens little by little, moment by moment, day by day.

We're always in that process of becoming, never having fully arrived until that glorious day when we meet Jesus face to face and we are like him because we see him.

Until that day, guys, we're in process.

But how?

How does that happen?

How do we actually become imitators of God?

How does this spiritual family resemblance actually take place where people would say, you look just like your heavenly father?

How does that actually happen?

Well, I want to make a couple of suggestions, and I think as you'll see, this relates not only to the spiritual, but it also relates to the physical.

And you'll see the comparison in that.

The first thing is this is that there's the role of nature.

There's the role of nature.

You guys know this.

A child receives DNA from his parents and to greater or lesser degrees takes on their appearance, takes on their personality, takes on their mannerisms.

Um, you know, people said that about me and my father.

It's almost scary to see that with one of my own children now.

How much they're like me.

And in a similar way, when we become God's beloved children, we receive, catch this, we receive the genetic material of the Holy Spirit.

All right?

The genetic material of the Holy Spirit.

His gifts and his fruit begin to show up in our lives.

And you remember this.

Scripture talks about us becoming a new creation, about us having a new nature, about us putting on a new self.

I mean, that's that's all language about our spiritual DNA.

And as this spiritual DNA begins to take effect in our lives, we increasingly resemble our Heavenly Father.

And so that's the natural, or actually, it might be even better to say that's the supernatural side of the story, all right?

It's the natural, it's the supernatural side of the story.

That's God's part.

But then, secondly, there's also the role of nurture, the role of nature and the role of nurture.

And you know this as well that as a child grows up in a family, he's observing all the time.

He is emulating his parents' behavior and mannerisms and speech and personality and all of those things that make the parent who they are.

And in a similar way, as God's children, we need to seek to learn and observe as much as we can about our Heavenly Father.

Things like what it, what is God like?

And how does God think?

And how does how does God act?

And you know, what grips his heart, what matters to him?

Those are all things that we need to learn and to observe.

And then we need to seek to imitate those things in every respect.

That's our part.

And so you've you've got God's part, the the natural or the supernatural, you've got our part, the the nurture, and those come together in a beautiful, divine human cooperative, and they make us more and more like our Heavenly Father.

They give us this growing family resemblance.

Does that make sense?

But what does that what does that mean at a practical level?

Well, just another couple of thoughts you might want to jot down if you're taking notes.

The first is this I can't imitate without intimacy.

I can't imitate without intimacy.

We must spend time, both both quantity time and quality time, with our Heavenly Father.

We need to meditate on His word, we need to communicate with Him in prayer, we need to lift high the name of Jesus in worship, we need to quiet our hearts before Him.

Really, what I'm talking about is we need to cultivate the relationship.

We need to cultivate the relationship because that's what it is between child and parent.

And so I just asked you this morning, how is that going?

How's that going in your life?

You cultivating that relationship?

Because it's only when we truly know God at a deep and meaningful level that we will be able to mimic Him.

So I can't imitate without intimacy.

Number two, I can't imitate in isolation.

I can't imitate in isolation.

Guys, this is a community project, not a solo effort.

This isn't something that we just kind of go off into a closet and do ourselves.

We need each other.

We gotta surround ourselves with fellow Christ followers who can encourage us toward our common goal, and we can encourage them.

It's a mutual thing.

We need we need to seek out spiritual support.

We need godly friends, we need a small group around us, we need a church family.

We need all of this resource to help us be imitators of God.

And so I just I got again ask you to think about this.

Who's walking with you?

Who's walking with you on this journey?

And who are you walking with on this journey?

We must pursue intimacy, we need to fight isolation if we want to resemble our heavenly father.

And then Paul focuses in on two very specific, very kind of encompassing areas where our family resemblance should show up.

And I've already mentioned this, but notice first, I resemble my heavenly father when I love like I've been loved.

When I love like I've been loved.

This comes from chapter 5, verse 2.

And walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us, a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

You know, the believer's walk, it's a key concept for the Apostle Paul all through his writings.

And the word walk really speaks of how we conduct our lives on an everyday basis.

And already in this letter that he's writing to the Ephesians, he's used the word walk in several ways.

He's talked about the fact that we should walk in good works, that's in chapter 2, verse 10.

And that we should walk worthy, that's in chapter 4, verse 1, that we should walk differently than the world, that's 417.

And then just a little bit later in chapter 5, he's going to talk about us walking in the light and walking in wisdom.

But right here, he's urging us, as God's children, to walk in such a way that our lives are marked by love.

I think you'd agree with me that our culture tosses the word love around pretty haphazardly, pretty carelessly.

I mean, in just minutes, we can use it for everything from pizza to our favorite sports team to a day at the beach to our spouse.

And I think hopefully we all recognize there's a spectrum in those references, but the reality is that we tend to view love mainly as a nice warm, fuzzy feeling.

That's not the biblical view of love.

The biblical view of love is that it's an action more than an emotion.

Friends, love is a do thing more than a feel thing.

And British pastor and scholar John Stott, he defined genuine love as a willingness to surrender that which has value in our life to enrich the life of another.

Or maybe we could say that love is the sacrificial choice to pursue the good of another rather than the good of yourself.

That's love according to God's word.

And Paul instructs us to walk in love as Christ loved us.

And so what he's saying is that God's love is revealed in the person and the work of his son.

That is to be our example.

Jesus' love is the paradigm we're to follow, it's the standard we're to reach after.

And so we need to think for a few moments about how it is that Christ loved us if our goal is to walk in love just as Christ loved us.

All right?

I think it's it's pretty safe to say that Jesus is the most loving person that's ever walked the face of this earth.

And the four gospel accounts, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, I mean, they're just filled with examples of his genuine care and his concern for others.

And we could, you know, we could make a list of his healings and his provisions and his coming alongside people in their brokenness and all of these things that he does that demonstrate his love.

But the fact of the matter is that Jesus' greatest expression of love was in his death.

It's in what we've celebrated and remembered this morning.

And that that's why Paul goes on and he elaborates and he says that we're to walk, notice this, in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

He he clarifies what kind of love he's actually talking about.

And he he uses Old Testament imagery and he compares Jesus' sacrifice of his own life to the animal sacrifices that were presented on the altar in the Old Testament time in the tabernacle and then later in the temple.

And when the priests offered those sacrifices, they those sacrifices, incredibly, they appeased God's righteous anger.

And they made payment for the sins of the people.

And friends, and this is such an awesome thing.

And in the same way, Jesus' death on the cross paid the penalty of our sin.

It paid the penalty of our sin.

It made it possible for us to have a restored relationship with our Heavenly Father.

And so, I mean, we can talk a lot about love, but this is love in Ultra HD.

I mean, this love, it's bold.

This love is brilliant.

This love is breathtaking, friends.

And so I'd like to put forward for you three ways the cross demonstrates the depth of Christ's love for us.

And in so doing, it provides a model for the kind of love we're to have one for the other, all right?

Three ways the cross demonstrates the depth of Christ's love for us.

Here's the first one: by how much it cost him.

By how much it cost him.

I think we all intuitively understand the correlation between the degree of a person's sacrifice and the depth of their love.

And the greater the sacrifice, the greater the love, right?

Generally speaking.

As the saying goes, talk is cheap and actions speak louder than words.

And so, like, how far would I be willing to go?

What personal price would I be willing to pay to prove my love for someone else?

I want to tell you something.

Jesus Christ went all the way.

Jesus Christ paid the ultimate price to demonstrate his love for us.

It cost him absolutely everything.

I want you to just listen to a few verses from Philippians chapter 2.

Philippians 2 · chapter mention

They'll be on the screen.

This is Paul writing here.

He says, Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

And I know many of you know that passage, but I don't want you to miss what it's saying.

Jesus was God.

He possessed all of the honor, all of the glory that go along with being God.

And he had every right to hold on very tightly to the privileges of heaven.

But is that what he did?

No, Jesus instead, he willingly suffered the indignity of becoming an ordinary human like you and me.

I know we think we're pretty great, but that was a massive indignity for the Son of God.

He wasn't a person of fame or fortune, just an ordinary human.

More than that, it actually says he was a selfless servant.

He was always seeking the good of others.

And his humble devotion to his heavenly father ultimately led him to sacrifice his very life on an old rugged cross.

The most disgraceful, the most excruciating form of capital punishment in the ancient world.

And if that weren't enough, in addition to the physical torment, Jesus endured a spiritual separation from his father as the sins of the world were placed on his shoulders.

Do you remember when he cried out from the cross?

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

So if we if we just kind of summed it all up, Jesus left the highest of highs for the lowest of lows.

The cross cost him absolutely everything.

And the question is, why?

Like, why would he do that?

Well, because of his great love for you and for me.

And the apostle Peter he emphasizes the same point when he writes these words.

He says, You were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers.

Not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the precious blood of Christ.

A ransom, our rescue.

It cost far more than money could ever buy.

Its price was the precious blood of Christ.

If we have remembered this morning.

And so, friends, the depth of Christ's love is demonstrated first by how much it cost him.

Secondly, by how little we deserve it.

By how little we deserve it.

In fact, I'm kind of being overly generous with my words because we don't deserve it at all.

It's not little deserving, it's no deserving.

I mean, this just doesn't add up.

It doesn't make sense.

And that's what Paul says in Romans 5.

He says, for while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.

For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, although perhaps for a good person one would even dare to die.

But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

And back in Ephesians 2, he puts it like this: he says, God being rich in mercy, because of his great love with which he loved us, even while we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ.

See, the point is that Jesus loved us and he loved us deeply even when we didn't deserve it.

Even when we were ungodly sinners, when we were dead in our trespasses, when we wanted nothing to do with him, that's when he rushed in with his love.

And you know, my observation is that for the most part, if we're really honest with ourselves, we take this truth for granted.

It's almost like we presume upon God's mercy and grace and we begin to think that we do deserve the love of Christ.

Now, listen, we are all wonderful church people.

We would never say those words.

We're smart enough not to say it, but that's actually what we begin to think.

It's how we live.

And perhaps you're even on that program this morning.

And I just want you to know there is tremendous freedom in acknowledging our complete lack of merit before Christ.

It's tremendous freedom.

I mean, we deserve nothing but separation from God because of our sinfulness.

But but that's not just bad news.

That bad news, that stark reality, it just shines the spotlight on Jesus and on his sacrificial death, what he has done for us.

The depth of his love is demonstrated by how little we deserve it.

So by how much it cost him, by how little we deserve it, and thirdly, by how much we benefit from it.

By how much we benefit.

Just think about this.

I mean, Jesus gave everything when we deserved nothing, and now we receive everything.

He gave everything, we deserve nothing, now we have everything.

I mean, his sacrifice, in spite of our sinfulness, it brings us salvation, it brings us satisfaction.

And I just want you to reflect with me for a few moments of some of the benefits that flow into our lives because of the love shown on the cross.

I mean, we were enemies of God.

I think we sang about that this morning.

We were enemies of God, but now we have been reconciled.

We have a restored relationship.

We were enslaved by sin.

We sang about that, but now its power has been broken.

We actually now can choose to do what's right.

We couldn't do that before.

We were spiritual orphans.

But now we're part of God's great big family with many brothers and sisters and a few weird cousins scattered around.

Not us, not here.

I mean, we have the moment-by-moment presence of God.

It brings us comfort in times of trouble.

Brings us encouragement.

We have purpose, we have direction for our lives.

We have the promise of abundant life, rich and full, here and now.

We rest in the assurance and the anticipation of our eternal future with God.

I mean, I could just go on and on.

We could write a long list of the benefits that are ours because of Christ.

I think Psalm 103, verse 2 sums it up well.

Psalms 103:2

It says, Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not his benefits.

So you see that the cross demonstrates the depth of Christ's love for us.

Have you received, this is the question, have you received that sacrificial love personally?

Are you a beloved child of God, a son or a daughter of the king today?

And if not, why would you go on in that state?

Why not make that decision today?

Become part of God's family.

And then let's put the family resemblance on display.

Let's be imitators.

Let's strive to follow his example and how we seek to love others.

Again, he said, walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us.

And so I just want us to do some honest evaluation as we kind of wrap up this point.

Is you ready to do that?

Ready to be honest with the Lord?

We've talked about the three ways Christ's love shows the depth of his love, his sacrifice.

I want to apply that to our lives.

Let me ask you these questions.

How much does your love for others really cost you?

In time, in energy, and in resources, in reputation, and in inconvenience, in opportunities lost that could have been seized?

I mean, is it is it simple and straightforward to make your love happen, or is it sacrificial on your part?

Would you say that you're laying yourself down for the good of another?

What personal price are you paying?

How much do you love those who don't deserve it?

I mean, it's relatively easy to love people who love you, to share with people who share with you, to be nice to people who are nice to you, right?

I mean, kind of a tit for tat, I'll scratch my back if you scratch my back, kind of love.

That's easy.

But how about those who try as they might will never be able to kind of even things out?

You're always going to be giving more than you will ever receive.

Or more than that, how about those who may be very difficult to love?

I mean, maybe they're just apathetic as you seek to show them Christ's love day in and day out.

It's like they don't even care.

It doesn't even register with them.

Or maybe you're maybe your worlds are just so far apart that things seem kind of awkward to kind of rush into that situation.

Or maybe they're even antagonistic toward you.

Do you love those who don't deserve it?

Just like Christ loved you when you didn't deserve it.

Lastly, how much does your love truly benefit others?

I mean, does it make a tangible difference in their lives?

And people say, my life is better, my life is fuller, my life is richer, it's more meaningful because of your love toward me, you've made a big difference in my life.

And that's the key question to think about by way of application.

What shifts do you need to make in your love for others to better reflect Christ's love for you?

So we're talking about this family resemblance thing and about being imitators of God.

I resemble my heavenly father when I love like I've been loved.

And now I resemble my heavenly father when I forgive like I've been forgiven.

Look back at verse 32 of chapter 4.

It says, be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.

And as we saw in chapter 5, verse 2, again, be really means become, because we're all works in progress.

Show slowly but surely, we're becoming more like our Heavenly Father.

And this family resemblance, it shows up in a couple of ways.

Notice it says to be kind.

And really, this is just talking about the kind of the sweet disposition that we have towards others, how we we put love into action in useful ways.

That's what it means to be kind.

And then he says to be tenderhearted.

You're gonna love this.

This word literally means to have healthy intestines.

All right?

That's what the Greek actually means.

That's a it's you don't you don't learn that everywhere, guys.

You gotta come to church for that kind of thing.

And the reason for that is because the Greeks understood their emotions to be located kind of in their internal organs.

That's how they understood their bodies.

It actually makes sense because we talk about that today, right?

Like I feel it in my gut.

Whether it's a good feeling or a not so good feeling, that's where the kind of the seat of emotions are.

But really, you guys know tender heart is it really feeling is referring to a feeling of compassion toward others.

And we we just don't have time to kind of get off on this, but it's worth considering what a difference it would make in our world, what a difference it would make in our churches, what a difference it would make in our families, what a difference it would make in our workplaces, in our relationships.

How much more we would resemble our Heavenly Father if our interactions, if our conversations were bathed in kindness and tender-heartedness.

It's really that simple.

But you and I both know it's not that easy, right?

It's simple, but it's not easy.

And it's because we fall short so often, and instead we display many sinful patterns, and and Paul mentioned them just a little bit earlier in chapter four.

He talks about things like falsehood and theft and corrupting talk and bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander and malice and all sorts of things.

It's because of all that that we frequently find ourselves in the position of needing to make things right with other people.

And that's why Paul exhorts us to forgive one another as God in Christ forgave you.

So, I mean, what's forgiveness?

Well, forgiveness is a decision to release a person from the obligation that resulted when they injured you.

That's what forgiveness is.

It's it's it's laying down a grievance, it's letting go of the right to take revenge, and it's leaving the outcome with God.

And I cannot tell you how crucial this is because there simply are no enduring relationships without forgiveness.

No relationship that will last the test of time, that will endure decade after decade without the ability to forgive both ways.

It's an absolutely essential quality if we're going to live in harmony with others over the long haul.

And we all know this to be true by personal experience.

We have relationships that have continued through difficulties, and most of us also have some relationships that have sadly fallen by the wayside because one or the other or both of us weren't able to actually forgive.

I want you to notice also the verbal connection to chapter 5, verse 2 in the word as.

Do you see how that word as?

Just like I'm instructed to love others as Christ loved me.

Here now I'm instructed to forgive others as I have been forgiven.

It's love as you've been loved, and forgive as you've been forgiven.

I mean, that, friends, that is an astounding task to forgive others as I have been forgiven in Christ Jesus.

I mean, do you really understand the extent to which God has pardoned you?

I mean, do you really grasp what his forgiveness is like?

And I think one of the best places to kind of get a glimpse, get a clear picture, snapshot of God's forgiving love, his forgiveness, is in Matthew chapter 18.

Matthew 18 · chapter mention

And if you want to turn to Matthew 18, you can.

The verses will be on the screen.

But just to set the context, Jesus has been teaching in Matthew 18 about resolving conflict and about granting forgiveness and about pursuing reconciliation.

That's kind of the conversation he's having.

And then the Apostle Peter pipes in, as he often does, very impetuous.

And beginning in verse 21 of Matthew 18, he says this.

He says, Lord, how often will my brother sin against me and I forgive him?

As many as seven times?

You gotta understand, you gotta get your mind into Peter's mind, and he's actually trying to score some brownie points by making this suggestion.

It's almost as if he's expecting Jesus to say, like, Wow, Peter, I just can't even believe what you're suggesting.

You are a forgiveness machine.

Like, this is this is off the charts forgiveness.

I never heard anything so incredible in my life.

Seven times forgive seven times?

Who can imagine such a thing?

You are a champ, way to go.

That's what Peter's hoping to hear back from the Lord.

He's so proud of his answer.

But is that how Jesus responds?

No.

Instead, he answers, I do not say seven times, but 77 times.

In other words, what he's saying is, Peter, you've missed the point entirely.

I mean, like if you've got a tally sheet on the fridge and you're saying, okay, one, two, three, if that's your approach to forgiveness, then you don't understand my heart.

Like, don't keep track.

Forgiveness isn't something that you count or that you measure, it's something that you offer without limit.

I mean, when you think you've already gone the extra mile, the journey has just begun.

That's what Jesus is saying.

And then to drive home his truth, Jesus tells a story.

And I love how he does that.

He tells a story to kind of just make the point so clear.

And he does that beginning in verse 23.

He says, Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants.

When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him 10,000 talents.

Just for perspective, in that era, one talent was roughly equivalent to 20 years' wages.

Okay?

20 years' wages, one talent.

So a debt of 10,000 talents was more than any person could ever hope to pay back in many, many lifetimes, right?

I mean, like in today's world, think multiple billions of dollars.

Okay?

Pretty dire situation.

The story continues.

And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold with his wife and children and all that he had in payment to be made.

Of course he couldn't pay.

So the king basically said, like, let's just cash him out, cut our losses, get what we can, and move on.

Like, this is never gonna happen.

And so the servant fell on his knees, imploring him, have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.

Wishful thinking.

And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave the debt.

This is totally unexpected.

This is totally out of kind of left field, totally amazing.

The king decides to show mercy and completely release the servant from his obligation, from his debt.

Nothing more owing.

And then notice what happens next.

But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii.

Again, some context.

A denarius was a day's wage.

All right?

A day's wage.

So this servant, his debt was a significant amount of money.

But compared to what the first servant owed, I mean, like it's a drop in the bucket, right?

A hundred denarii, a hundred days' wages, half a year.

And the servant who had been forgiven the immense debt was himself not very forgiving.

Look what Jesus says.

He says, and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, Pay what you owe.

Make it right.

So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, have patience with me and I will pay you.

I mean, it it's deja vu.

It's the exact same thing the first servant had said to the king.

Second servant is saying the exact same thing.

And can you believe this?

This guy who had just been forgiven billions of dollars is now squeezing his friend for a few thousand.

It's ridiculous.

Verse 30.

He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt.

And when his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed.

And they went and reported to their master all that had taken place.

And when the king found out about the servant's harsh action, he was enraged, and rightfully so.

Then his master summoned him and said to him, You wicked servant, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me.

And should you not have had mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you?

And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers until he should pay all his debt.

So also my heavenly father will do to every one of you if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.

I gotta tell you, that last line haunts me.

That's what it says right there.

And what that tells me is that forgiveness is a necessary quality for the follower of Jesus Christ.

There's just no way around it.

And we could spend a whole message series, and perhaps Pastor Mike has done that, talking about forgiveness and the ins and the outs and the steps you should take and the steps you should avoid and excuses that we make instead of forgiving people, and how it's kind of got a crisis and a process and all of this important stuff about forgiveness.

But I just want to leave you with three very quick principles from this story about God's forgiveness that we should strive to imitate in our own lives and put into practice.

Here they are, three things.

First, God's forgiveness is fast.

God's forgiveness is fast.

Notice the king doesn't waste any time canceling the servant's debt.

I mean, he doesn't sit and stew, he doesn't think about how he's been wronged.

He doesn't string the servant along and make him suffer before working things out.

That's how we often operate.

Just gonna make them pay a bit.

Yeah, I'll get around to forgiving them, but it's kind of nice to watch them suffer.

That's not how God operates.

It's immediate.

He grants forgiveness fast.

Second, God's forgiveness is full.

It's full.

There's an old Garth Brooks song that says, we bury the hatchet, but we leave the handle sticking out.

That's true, isn't it?

I mean, we we kind of like to keep the hurt close by in case we feel the need to kind of pull it back out at some point in time to our own advantage.

You never know when you might need to pull that out down the road, right?

We just keep it close by.

I mean, again, that's not how God treats us.

He doesn't do anything halfway.

He doesn't hold anything back.

He wipes the slate clean.

He he starts fresh.

The king canceled the servant, entire debt, and it was massive.

His forgiveness is full.

And third, God's forgiveness is free.

It's free.

By that I don't mean it costs nothing.

I mean, we've already talked about how Jesus' death cost him everything.

But what I mean is that he bears the entire cost.

Jesus takes it all on himself so that his forgiveness is freely offered.

It's freely available, it's freely obtainable for any and all who would choose to receive it.

You could receive it today.

And I ask you, are we that free in granting forgiveness to others?

To the people that have hurt us perhaps very deeply?

Or do we pick and choose who gets in on the blessing?

I wish this weren't the case, but I'm guessing that probably all of us have at least one broken relationship where the healing power of forgiveness is desperately needed.

And I just ask you, what is God saying to you in this moment about that?

What step do you need to take to imitate his example of pardon?