Forgiveness - What If They Don’t Repent?

Good morning, Good News Church. It is good to see you.

Today we are continuing our series, How to Handle Relational Drama.

We are now in part six of our series, and then today's sermon is sort of a part

two of a series within a series.

This week's sermon is kind of part two of last week's sermon because we are

at the part of the larger series, okay, like we're at part six,

but we're at the part of the series where we are talking about forgiveness.

And so our associate pastor, Doug Davison, began this sort of two-part mini-series

on forgiveness last week when he talked about forgiveness for the repentant.

And then today I'm sort of picking up with, or we are, you know,

we're doing the other part of the sermon.

So last week and this week combined are the two sermons on forgiveness in the

larger part of the series.

So Doug Davison taught us that when a brother or sister repents,

we must forgive, right? We learned that last week. Do you remember it?

Okay, good. One of the most practical things that he brought up,

I thought, was the concept of fake forgiveness.

Do you remember when he brought that up, right? That sometimes we pretend to

forgive when we really haven't. And I wanted to just add a little more commentary on that if I could.

I think that fake forgiveness is a particularly Christian behavior.

And I don't mean that in a good way. I think it's a bad thing that we do.

For the people that I know that are not Christians, okay, for the most part,

the people I know who are not believers in Jesus Christ, They tend to be people

who they don't believe the Bible or they don't believe the Bible the way that

we do, feeling obligated to do what it says.

And therefore, when you ask them, hey, how do you feel about her?

A lot of times they'll just tell the truth, okay? Because they don't,

those of us who are Christians, we go, I believe the Bible.

We know that there are things in the Bible like Doug talked about last week

where there is limitless forgiveness, right?

Boundless forgiveness, 70 times seven. I keep forgiving someone.

And so a lot of people I know who are not Christians, they go,

well, I don't go by the Bible.

You can say to them like, well, then how do you feel about her?

And they will say, oh, I hate her.

And sure, hate is bad. I want to go on the record saying that,

but it's sort of refreshing because at least they're like telling the truth.

Whereas Christians, I think, will probably be maybe just as hateful,

but they will not say that, right?

I feel like there have been more times than I can keep track of where we've

talked about somebody and they go, oh, oh, this is a Christian.

They'll go, well, I've forgiven her, okay?

I just don't ever want to see her ugly face again as long as I live, all right?

And if she's at Walgreens at the same time I am, I'm like, I'm going to duck

into the band-aid aisle and wait for her to be gone because I don't ever want

to speak to her, but I've forgiven her in my heart. All right. Have you seen this?

You know, and I'm sitting there going like, do you hear yourself?

Like, that's ridiculous. That's, that's not forgiveness.

And so it seems like there's some memo that went around among Christianity.

I don't know where it came from.

It's not from the Bible, but something went around that somehow a lot of Christians

got the idea when it comes to forgiveness, I don't have to do it.

I just have to say that I'm doing it.

That's lame and not what the Bible says. So Doug taught us last week to forgive

the brother or sister who repents.

And so today is kind of part six, but kind of part two.

Today, we're going to cover the other side of the topic.

What if they're not sorry? What if they don't repent?

What if they would do it to you

all over again, right? What do we do for forgiveness in those situations?

And it's sort of difficult. You can imagine the answer might be a a little bit

complex because in some situations you might go, well, goodness,

it can't just always be like, well, just pretend it didn't happen.

I would imagine some of you can think of specific situations,

maybe like safety issues.

All of us in this room could probably picture situations where you would think

this person should not keep enduring harm under the guise of forgiveness, right?

When the person is not repentant, when the person is saying,

I'm going to keep doing it all over again.

And then the person just keeps dealing with this thing that has not been repented

of over and over again and the cycle never gets broken, right? Have you seen that?

And so you can imagine where you go, yeah, yeah, no, that's not the time for

like, well, let's just pretend it never happened. Let's just forgive.

And yet, if that's true, that there are cases where you do not fully pardon

someone, then what do you do with like the bitterness on the inside of you that happens?

Like, let's say there is a situation where you say like, well,

that's it. I'm not going to forgive.

Well, then what do you do with the bitterness that's poisoning you?

Because that's there, right? Whether you forgive them or not,

like there's a thing that's inside of you that you have to address no matter what, isn't there?

Like, I think there were a lot of us that, I don't even think you have to be

a Christian to believe this, probably everybody agrees with this.

Like you understand that there is, whatever you wanna call it,

that when someone wrongs you and that hate or that bitterness or that anger

or that malice, if it just stays in there, it'll destroy you.

So what do you do in these complex situations? These are big questions and they

are very relevant to our lives.

So that's where we're gonna go this morning. The question is,

are Christians responsible to forgive the unrepentant?

And here's what I'm gonna do this morning. I'm gonna give you my answer.

I'm gonna give you my short answer to that question. And then I'm going to defend

my answer with the Bible.

Okay, you ready for that? All right, here's the answer. So here's the question.

The question is, are Christians responsible to forgive the unrepentant?

I believe the answer to that question is no.

Okay, now, that's funny. Someone said yes. There were people over here in the

first service that also went yes, even louder than you.

They were like, awesome. Okay, and then I would imagine there are some of you

that had the exact opposite reaction, right?

When I said you don't have to forgive the unrepentant, some of you went,

yes, I love this church. And then others of you just went.

Like, I thought we were at a Christian church, Gertrude. Why in the world did he say not to forgive?

And so now you're imagining, you know, where you're going to go to church next

week, right? Because you're sitting there going, it's not going to be here.

What are we? Are we Lutheran? Are we Methodist? Because we're not this,

whatever this is. That guy just said not to forgive.

So what I'm going to ask is both sides, the people that went and the people

that were like, yeah, I'm going to ask you both to do me a favor.

And would you please hear me out all the way to the end of the sermon? Okay.

If you want to go to another church next week, that is fine with me.

You go with my blessing, but please hear this whole message before you make

your judgment. Fair enough?

All right, here we go. So I'm going to show you from the Bible,

why it is I believe what I believe and what I think it says.

Let's start with 1 John 1.9.

1 John 1.9 is a very famous lots of people know it, lots of people love it,

lots of people have it memorized, lots of people have it on coffee mugs,

and refrigerators, and things like that.

It is a beautiful verse, I'm gonna read it to you now.

1 John 1, 9 says, "'If we confess our sins, "'he is faithful and righteous to

forgive us our sins, "'and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.'",

Isn't that a great verse? This is a wonderful promise of God.

The reason why this verse is on more refrigerators than other verses is because

it's just, it is this one of these wonderful verses that we cling to,

especially in times where we have sinned.

There have been times in my life where I have sinned and I pray to God and I

have like said these words back to God, you know, like, God, I am sorry.

And your word says that if I confess, you are faithful and just to forgive me

of my sins and cleanse me from all unrighteousness.

So it is a wonderful promise.

But it is a conditional promise. Did you notice that?

What's the first word of the verse? If. That's crazy. How'd that get in there?

It says, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us

our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Right? It seems to imply that there's a condition here. And I don't think the

condition is, I don't think this is just a one-for-one, not factoring any other things.

Like I think that this verse assumes the rest of the Bible, right?

And so our forgiveness comes from Jesus as we repent of our sins and we trust in Jesus.

In other words, I don't think this verse all by itself, you just take it out

of the Bible separate from all the other verses.

I don't think this verse is teaching that confession is this like good work that you do.

And then the payment that God gives you for your confession is forgiveness.

I think what this verse is assuming the rest of the Bible, and that is Jesus

Christ paid the price for our sins when he died on the cross.

And Jesus is willing to forgive his people. But who are his people?

It's the people who confess their sins.

It's the people who say to God, like, I am bad. You are good.

I agree with you about my sin. I agree with you about my behavior.

I want to turn from my ways to your ways.

And what does Jesus do with those people? He is faithful and righteous to forgive

us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

So does God forgive the unrepentant?

Well, this verse seems to imply that he doesn't. And the rest of the Bible,

I think, makes that very clear that he doesn't.

The very fact that there is a heaven and a hell, and they're not empty, right?

People go to both places, show that God does not just blanket forgive everybody,

no matter whether they repent, doesn't matter if they confess,

doesn't matter what they believe, everybody's just forgiven.

No, the Bible does not treat hell as if it's empty or as if no one goes there

when it warns people about hell.

Obviously, God forgives the repentant and doesn't forgive the unrepentant.

Now, that's just standard Christian theology going all the way back to the beginning.

But if that's true, then here's the question.

Does God hold us to a higher standard that he holds himself to?

Are we praying to a God who says, I do not forgive the unrepentant,

but I require you to forgive the unrepentant.

I'm requiring of you that which I never do.

That would be a really interesting situation. I don't think that's the case,

but I could imagine someone might go, well, that verse is about God's forgiveness.

It doesn't talk about how we're supposed to treat each other.

That's a good point. Let's go to some scriptures that teach what we are supposed

to do when we are sinned against, because there are Bible verses that specifically

say what to do in that situation.

So let's look at Luke chapter 17.

Luke 17 · chapter mention

These are the very words of Jesus. We have looked at them multiple times in

this series, but we're gonna look at them at least this one more time.

Jesus said this when he was talking about how to handle when someone sins against

you. He says, be on your guard.

If your brother sins, rebuke him. And if he repents, forgive him.

And if he sins against you seven times in a day and comes back to you seven

times saying, I repent, you must forgive him. Do you remember this verse?

Now here's what's interesting is, first of all, we got some ifs in here,

right? He says, be on your guard. He says, if your brother sins, rebuke him.

So it seems to be if this condition is met, then this is the thing you do,

right? If your brother sins, then you rebuke him.

And I would imagine the opposite is also implied, right? If your brother doesn't

sin, do you rebuke him for not sinning?

Well, no. If he sins, you rebuke him. If he doesn't sin, you don't rebuke him, right?

But it is interesting because it doesn't say, if your brother sins, forgive him.

I think there would be a lot of us that would just assume like that Jesus could

have just, you know, he could have been way less wordy if he would have just

said what he really meant, right?

What he really means is, if your brother sins, just forgive him.

Doesn't matter what he says doesn't matter what he does right just forgive him

but Jesus didn't say that he said

if your brother sins not he doesn't say forgive him he says rebuke him,

and then we have another if and if he repents forgive him isn't that strange

because we were saying here you probably don't rebuke him if he doesn't sin

but then do we apply that to the second half of the sentence if he repents forgive

him well what if he doesn't repent,

the passage specifically says if he repents you are to forgive him.

And then if it wasn't, if that's not clear enough, look at the next verse.

And if he sins against you seven times a day and comes back to you seven times

saying, I repent, you must forgive him.

There seems to be like a one for one ratio, like a, like a mathematical thing.

Like he sins, if he sins against you seven times and repents seven times,

you're supposed to forgive seven times.

But the, what's the implication here? What if the person sins seven times and

repents three times, right? What are you supposed to do?

Because if he repents, forgive him. This is interesting.

Now, I realize someone might go, well, no, no, no. I see where you're going.

You're saying that if he doesn't repent, you don't forgive him.

But that's actually not what Jesus said.

He didn't say that. In fact, he doesn't address that in this verse, Mario.

You can't logically say that if he repents, forgive him means if he doesn't

repent, don't forgive him.

Because we don't know, like if someone had been there that day and asked a question,

we don't know what Jesus would have said.

Maybe he would have said, if your brother's sins, rebuke him.

And if he repents, forgive him.

And if he doesn't repent, still forgive him, right? Maybe Jesus would have said

that. Well, here's the thing.

On this particular occasion, Jesus didn't address what to do if the person doesn't

listen to you or doesn't receive your rebuke.

But Jesus did address that on another occasion. So we actually can see what

Jesus says to do if the person doesn't repent, because Jesus did address that

not in Luke 17, but in Matthew 18.

So let's go to Matthew 18 and read it.

Matthew 18 begins with these words. And this is again, Jesus speaking.

If your brother sins against you, go and rebuke him in private.

If he listens to you, you have won your brother. I want you to notice before

we even read any more, that first verse, Matthew 18, 15, is very similar to Luke 17, 3.

The formula in Luke 17, 3 is you got a brother. What does the brother do? He sins.

What do you do in reaction to the sin? You rebuke. What do they do in reaction

to your rebuke? They repent. And then what do you do in reaction to their repentance? You forgive.

Okay. Almost the same formula here. Here we have your brother.

What does he do? He sins. In reaction to his sin, what do you do?

Rebuke. In reaction to your rebuke, what does he do? In this particular verse,

it says, listens to you rather than repents.

But I think you can see it's kind of the same idea, right? Listens to you in

this case means receives your rebuke, right?

And then what happens? It doesn't use the word forgiveness, but it says,

you've won your brother, right? Clearly there's some sort of like reconciliation.

So Matthew 18, 15 and Luke 17, 3, like they're very similar Bible verses.

It's almost like the same guy said both of those sentences. Okay.

It was, Jesus said both of those sentences. Okay. So if your brother sins against

you, go and rebuke him in private.

If he listens to you, you want your brother. Now here's where it's different though.

Unlike Luke 17, the Matthew version, Jesus actually says, but what if they don't repent?

What if they don't listen to you? What if they take your rebuke and you go,

I don't care about that. I'd do it all over again. What do you do?

In this case, Jesus says what to do. He says, but if he won't listen,

and let me just pause right there.

I think there are a lot of us who grew up in a church environment where the

assumption that we would have, if we've never seen this verse before,

the thing that we just assume is that Jesus would say, rebuke him in private.

If he listens to you, you've won your brother.

But if he won't listen, forgive him anyway.

I think a lot of us grew up in an environment where we're prepared for that's

what Jesus said next. That has to be what he believes. And yet it's not what he said.

He says, But if he won't listen, take one or two more with you,

so that by the testimony of two or three witnesses, every fact may be established.

And if he pays no attention to them, so let's pause here. So now he's supposed

to be paying attention to them. Who's the them? This is the one or two that went with you.

So in other words, if the person sins against you, not only in both cases,

not only did Jesus not say, if a person sins against you, forgive them.

He said, if a person sins against you, rebuke him.

And then if the rebuke doesn't work, right? If they don't repent, if they're not sorry.

They don't take what you have to say, whatever it is. Okay. The second step right here is what?

It's a second rebuke with more people involved. Isn't that interesting that

it doesn't go, well, just forgive him because you already tried once.

No, it says try again with other people involved.

Okay. Well, that sounds like a lot of work, but let's say we do that.

Okay. And now we rebuke the person a second time.

What if they don't listen then? Certainly at that point, we just get to forgive

him, right? It's not what he says.

He says, if he pays no attention to them tell the church.

And if he doesn't pay attention even to the church, so in other words,

the church is now talking to him.

Oh, this is crazy. So now it looks like there's actually three rebukes. You rebuke him.

Then the next time you come back with a couple of other people.

And the next time you come back with even more people, a third rebuke each time

involving more and more people that are part of the congregation.

But once you've done that, like then you could just forgive him, right?

I mean, goodness, this has taken up my whole weekend already.

And I had to call all these people and the whole church got involved.

Like now can we forgive him?

Look what the verse says. Tell the church and if he doesn't pay attention even

to the church, let him be like an unbeliever and a tax collector to you.

You get to the final step and it says treat him like he's no longer a brother, right?

Because it started off with if your brother sins against you and it ends with

treat him like he's not one of you, right?

Now, I don't think that's to say that means to mistreat him.

We're going to get into later in the sermon, how are you supposed to treat the

tax collector or the unbeliever? How do you treat the unrepentant person?

I don't think Jesus is saying mistreat them, but he is clearly saying,

you don't just pardon, you acknowledge the person is not one of you.

Isn't it strange that Jesus taught almost the opposite of what he really believes, right?

Because we all know what Jesus really believes is forgive everybody,

no matter what, every time, always just forgive everybody, whether they repent

or not. Like we know he believes that.

And yet he said something that seems so different than that.

Or did he? No, I believe he actually said exactly what he meant.

The truth is Christians are not instructed to pardon the unrepentant.

Now please don't leave yet okay because there

is way more to it than that and so I can imagine

there may be some of you that are very offended I cannot believe these

calls himself a pastor and he is saying don't forgive meanwhile I bet there

are another few people that are here that you are going this sermon is awesome

like because there's this guy that at work and he is just a jerk,

like jerkity, jerk, jerk, cannot stand the guy.

And I have been trying to be nice or nice to him because I thought that's what Christians do.

And now I show up at church. I'm so glad I didn't sleep in. This is fantastic.

I don't have to forgive him. I can kick this guy to the curb in the name of Jesus.

I just, I love this church. And if you're in that category, I want to say to

you, hold on a minute, buckaroo.

There is more because we need to ask ourselves the question,

well, then what do we do with the unrepentant?

Sure, there comes a point that you acknowledge they are not a brother,

but then what do you do after that?

And Matthew 18 is not the only passage that addresses this. There's more.

Romans chapter 12 tells you what to do when someone sins against you. So let's go there.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

What do we do with the unrepentant? So Romans chapter 12, I'm gonna start reading in verse 17.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

So the apostle Paul is speaking to the Romans. He's specifically speaking about

what do we do with this issue of these people sinning against us. And look what he says.

He says, do not repay anyone evil for evil.

Oh, well, that's going to take some of the fun out of not forgiving them.

Don't repay anyone evil for evil. If someone does something wrong to you,

you might go, well, then how is it? If I don't forgive them, what am I supposed to do?

I'll tell you first thing what you're not supposed to do. You do not get to do it back to them.

Do not repay anyone evil for evil, even if it feels fair. They did something

wrong to me, so I want to do something wrong to them. No, no, no, do not do that.

Try to do what is honorable in everyone's eyes. And look at this.

If possible, on your part, live at peace with everyone.

That's helpful to know. We're supposed to have these peaceful relationships with everyone we can.

And notice it says live at peace with everyone. It doesn't say live at peace

with the repentant, right? The unrepentant, who cares about them?

No, live at peace with everyone. And I love that it says live at peace with

everyone, but it says, if possible on your part, isn't that fantastic?

Meaning God is saying you need to live at peace with people,

but he's not asking you to do something that is impossible, right?

Only if possible. In other words, there are times where we wanna live at peace

with someone, we wanna reconcile with someone, and they won't,

they won't live at peace with us. Have you been in that situation?

Wow, you guys, all your relationships are just figured out, okay?

First service, they were dysfunctional. You guys know all this.

But I'll just let you know, there are people out there who have reported to

me that there are times where they go, I've done everything I can and I can't

make peace because they won't allow it.

And I love that this verse says, no, you just do what's possible on your part.

The way that I usually counsel people in this situation is I will say,

if there is something that is blocking reconciliation between you and that person,

make sure it is 100% on their side.

Okay. If something is stopping peace happening between you and them, make sure it's all them.

If there is any obstacle to having peace in your relationship,

make sure that obstacle is not on your end at all.

Make sure it's a hundred percent on their end as much as you can on your part,

live at peace with everyone.

And then he goes on and says, friends, do not avenge yourselves.

Instead, leave room for his wrath for it is written vengeance belongs to me.

I will repay says the Lord.

So do not avenge yourselves is actually quite similar to do not repay evil for

evil, right? They have done something wrong to you.

It is not your job to take revenge on them.

In fact, whose job is it to make sure justice is finally met?

God. It says, do not offend yourselves. Instead, leave room for his wrath for

it is written, vengeance belongs to me. I will repay, says the Lord.

It seems to me this passage is saying, okay, they have sinned against you.

You do not sin back. You do not hurt them back.

You leave justice to God.

And that's difficult because there are times where you go, but it's not fair.

They did something to me and I won't do it back to them because that would be fair.

And it seems to me this verse is saying, fair is not your job.

Fair is not your job. The verse doesn't even say fair doesn't matter.

Fair matters. The verse is just saying fair is not your job.

It's someone else's job to worry about fair.

I will repay, says the Lord. And then he says, but in the meantime,

while you're waiting for him to repay, while you're trying to figure,

well, I'm not taking revenge, then what am I doing? Look at this.

But if your enemy is hungry, feed him.

And if he is thirsty, give him something to drink.

So how do you handle this person who they have been evil to you?

And you've decided, okay, I'm gonna leave justice to God. But then what?

You show kindness and love to your enemy.

And this is not the only place that says this. This is Paul talking to the Romans,

but Jesus said essentially the same thing in Matthew chapter five. Let's go there.

Matthew chapter five, different words, but very similar concept.

Jesus is speaking and Jesus says, this is Matthew five, verse 43.

You have heard that it was said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy.

Now remember, this is Jesus.

Same guy that said, treat him like a unbeliever and a tax collector. Okay.

Jesus said this, you have heard it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy.

But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you so that

you may be sons of your father in heaven.

For he causes his son to rise on the evil and the good. That's evil people and good people.

He sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.

It seems obvious to me that Jesus is referring to the unrepentant here, isn't he?

Right? This is not, the way you know, love your enemies and pray for those who

persecute you, you can tell, okay?

He does not say, pray for those who previously persecuted you,

but now they've repented.

And so you've reconciled, and now you can love them and pray for them.

Now, what does Jesus say to do with your enemy and the people who are not repentant?

They are actively still persecuting you. What do you need to give them?

According to Jesus, love and prayers.

So, why would you do that? So, they're actively persecuting me?

Why in the world would I pray for them and love them? The verse actually says why.

It says, so that you may be sons of your father in heaven.

And I think that's Jesus' way of saying, so that you'll be like your dad.

Just like sons grow up to look like their dad, so that you will be like your heavenly father.

Well, what is he like in these situations? Well, it says, so that you may be

sons of your father in heaven, for he causes his son to rise on the evil and

the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.

You want to be like God, according to this passage. That's what Jesus is saying.

You want to be like your father.

And what does your father do? He shows love and kindness even to people who hate him.

How do you know that, Mario? Because of what Jesus says.

Who gets sunrises?

Yes, everyone. Who gets rain?

Everyone. It's not like rain falls just on the crops of the people who love

God and everybody else starves to death.

It's not like the sun rises over the homes of Christians, right,

but everyone else is in darkness. Who gets sunrises?

Everyone, even those who have rejected God.

So that's how God treats even those who hate him. Now, you might say,

well, wait a minute, but I thought you said God doesn't forgive everyone.

I did say that because I believe it.

But apparently he loves and shows kindness in this life, even to people who are against him.

And we are to be like him, not forgiving everybody, but loving everybody.

Now, I can imagine the big objection to this. when someone goes,

I don't know if I buy this, Mario.

And this, I think this verse is the big objection verse. So I just wanna bring

it up now so you don't have to come up to me afterwards and say it.

All right, I can imagine someone might go, I don't know if you know this is

in the Bible or not, Mario, but here's the thing.

When Jesus was dying on the cross, he said, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.

So doesn't that kind of blow your whole theory out of the water about forgiving

the unrepentant? Because Jesus said, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.

So I will say this. Actually, I'll say a couple of things. first thing I'll

say is, maybe I'm wrong. Okay? It's possible.

Okay? It is your job to study the scriptures and compare what I say to it and

only believe that which I'm able to prove to you from the scriptures.

Fair enough? So if possible, I'm wrong. But here's the thing.

The fact that Jesus said that from the cross, I don't think is any problem for

anything that I've been saying in this sermon.

Jesus said, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.

Jesus on the cross was doing exactly the same thing we are supposed to do in

that situation. He was praying for his persecutors.

We're supposed to pray for our persecutors, right? He said, Father, forgive them.

He wanted forgiveness for them. He hoped, I'm sure he hoped that God would forgive

them and that they would repent and all that. He was praying for their good.

Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. But notice Jesus on the

cross did not say, I forgive you to all of the people that were standing there

unrepentantly murdering him.

Jesus had a conversation with the thief on the cross that same day,

remember that? He said to the thief, today you'll be with me in paradise.

The thief recognized he was a sinner and recognized Jesus as the Lord.

And he said, today you'll be with me in paradise. But Jesus did not turn to

the other thief and say, and you will too, no matter what you believe,

no matter what you say. Following me?

Jesus didn't say, I forgive you to

all the people there. He prayed for his persecutors, just like we should.

Now, I imagine you might go, Mario, this is kind of a confusing sermon because

it seems like at the beginning you said you don't have to forgive people, okay?

Which I was kind of excited about that. And then by the end,

it seems like you're kind of saying that I sort of do have to forgive people, okay?

And I just wanna say, no, I did not say that. This is one of those sermons where

you have to listen really closely.

I am saying we must forgive the repentant and we must love our enemies.

And those are two different things. We are to forgive the repentant and we are to love our enemies.

And apparently loving your enemies includes desiring forgiveness for them.

Now you might go, okay, forgive the repentant, love your enemies.

Isn't that a distinction without a difference, Mario? I don't think it is.

Let me explain the difference. I can see why it's difficult for us to pull this

apart in our mind because the two behaviors, forgiving the repentant and loving

your enemies, they do have some things in common, What they both have in common

is kindness, lack of revenge,

not holding any bitterness, right? They both have that in common,

but here's the difference.

Forgiveness says, this is resolved.

And loving your enemy says, this is not resolved.

Forgiveness says, you are pardoned. I'm not gonna bring it up ever again.

Loving your enemy says, it's not over and I am going to bring it up again.

And I may have to bring it up again and again and again. We may have to get

a whole congregation involved, but it's not over yet.

Forgiveness says, no, it is over. There's no next step. There's no other thing I'm waiting for.

Loving your enemy says, I'm still praying for you.

I'm still praying that you'll repent because things are not fine.

But in the meantime, you'll receive nothing but kindness from me while I am

praying for the next step.

Do you see the difference? I think it's very helpful because these things happen

in our life all the time and we have to know what to do in these situations.

Let me give you a story that I hope will help you see the kind of the similarities and the differences.

I heard this story from a guy when I lived out in Texas, Sunday school teacher told this story.

And I think it was a true story that he got from someone that he went to high

school with, but I don't know, over the years, I might've changed it.

So I'll just say this is based on a true story and I might've embellished some stuff.

But I think this is pretty close to a true story. He said, there were two guys

at the same high school and one was a Christian and one was not a Christian.

And the one who was a Christian had the bottom locker and the one who was not

a Christian had the top locker.

And the one who was not a Christian, who was above Christian kid on the locker space, he was a bully.

So he would like regularly, he would open his locker and he would purposely,

accidentally drop his books onto the guy below him, like just to be unkind, right?

Just because it's real hard to prove. Oops, sorry, you know,

you were down there. I didn't mean to.

Oops, sorry, right? And so he could just purposely keep hurting this kid and

it's really hard to, you know, prove it.

And then at one point, I think there was a, some sort of altercation and bully

kid shoves Christian kid on the ground and his books go flying everywhere.

And then this is the part I'm not sure of. So I'll just make up what I think

happened to make it match with the end of the story.

But I think Christian kids on the floor, books are all around,

and he says something along the lines of, Jesus loves you and I love you, okay?

And Bully does not hear that and go, oh, what compassion.

What must I do to be saved, okay? Bully just goes on bullying for the rest of his high school career.

And then 20 years goes by.

And now they're in their late 30s. And Bully calls up on the phone,

former Christian kid, who's now a Christian adult, okay?

This is back before social media. So if you wanted to find a long lost stranger,

you had to like find their phone number. So called him.

And formerly Christian kid, who's now Christian adult, says,

he recognizes the voice on the

other line or the person says his name or whatever. He realizes who it is.

And he goes, what? He said, did you become a Christian?

And former bully says, how did you know?

Right? And Christian adult now says, why else would you be calling me?

And former bully says, well, so here's the thing. And he tells the story of

how he came to know Jesus as an adult.

And he says, the reason I'm calling you is I wanted to ask your forgiveness

for the way that I treated you in high school.

And Christian kid, now Christian adult says, well, this is awesome.

Of course I forgive you, brother. Thank you for calling.

And so at some point, it's assuming the story went that way.

At some point, someone noticed this and pointed out, he said, you know what?

It's good that the guy said, Jesus loves you and I love you,

rather than saying Jesus forgives you and I forgive you.

You see the difference? Probably not helpful to tell someone Jesus forgives

them if it's a situation where maybe Jesus has not yet forgiven them.

And probably shouldn't say I forgive you in a situation where the person is

not, they're not even asking for any sort of reconciliation.

In fact, if he had said that, there'd kind of be no reason for former bully

to ever call him and ask for forgiveness. Why ask for the thing that was already

granted to you back when you were unrepentant, right? Why even reconcile at

all? He already said, I forgive you.

It's a good thing that he said, Jesus loves you and I love you.

And in fact, I think loving your enemies, like part of it is being ready to forgive.

Like when he got that call, it wasn't like, well, I'm glad you called so I could

tell you, no, I don't forgive you, right?

No, he's like, oh, of course I forgive you, brother.

Because part of loving your enemies is being ready to forgive as soon as the

situation becomes available.

And so I hope this is helpful to you. I realize there may be some of you here

who will say, this is all semantics, Mario.

What you call loving your enemies, I call forgiving the unrepentant.

Okay, fine. If you want to use different terminology than me, that is your right.

As long as we understand what the Bible teaches about these scenarios.

If we call it by different names. That's cool. Lots of people call different

things by different names.

As long as we understand that the Bible doesn't say all the same things about

the repentant as it says about the unrepentant.

I personally think this is not semantics. I don't think it's splitting hairs.

I am teaching and have been for years now to teach on the difference between

forgiving the repentant and loving your enemies, not so that you can love one

group and hate the other, but so that you can know when to say this matter is resolved.

And so that you can know when to say it's not resolved. There is more discussion and more prayer needed.

Can you see how that would be helpful? Can you see how practical that is in

real life with all the different situations we go through?

So that's why I wanted to tell you this this morning. I'm excited about it.

And my hope for us as a congregation is that we will be people who are good forgivers,

that we are good apologizers, that we will be good rebukers and we will be good

reconcilers and we will be good prayers.

And I pray that we will be people who are good at not holding bitterness,

but rather showing kindness to people even if they never come around,

even if they never repent.

Let's pray.

Dear Father, thank you.

Thank you that there is so much in your word about the situations we really

go through so that we can piece it together and figure out how to live before you.

Thank you.

I thank you, Jesus, for setting the example, for praying for your enemies on

the cross, for dying on the cross for our forgiveness, for forgiving us when we repent. Thank you.

Thank you for the gospel. Thank you for your grace. Thank you even for your

grace that you give to people who have not repented. Sunrises and rain and all sorts of things.

I pray that you'd help us. I think there's a lot of us.

There's a lot of us who are a part of this church and our lives touch a whole

bunch of other lives in Marion County and beyond.

And so there are a lot of us that are hearing your word on these topics and

then we're going, wow, I need to go have a conversation with my brother.

Oh, now I gotta go apologize.

Oh, now I need to go confront this brother. Oh, now I gotta go talk to my dad.

I haven't talked to him all year.

I just pray that you'd be with us and give us wisdom and give us courage to

do the right thing and help us in our relationships that we would be like you.

We love you. And we pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Let me end with these good words from God's word.

Therefore, be imitators of God as dearly loved children and walk in love as

the Messiah also loved us and gave himself for us, a sacrificial and fragrant

offering to God. That is good news.