Speaker 1: 0:06

I'm sorry to say, the cold monster stopped by my house again, so I apologize for my voice this morning. But God is good. I was reminded. I don't know if you see the northern cardinal that sat on the window over here while we were singing that last song. It was sweet that sat on the window over here while we were singing that last song. It was sweet.

Speaker 1: 0:26

A good many years ago I took note that there was a world-renowned Harvard-educated psychiatrist named Dr Carl Miniger and he once said that if he could convince the patients in psychiatric hospitals that their sins were forgiven he said 75% of his patients could walk out the door that day. Very powerful testimony. Not long ago I came across a video by the late theologian, well-known theologian, rc Sproul Sr. He was a PCA pastor and he said that he had a friend that was a psychiatrist and that at one time his psychiatrist friend seriously tried to get Dr Sproul to come work for his practice and Sproul didn't, of course. But when Sproul told his friend he didn't think he was qualified to deal with some of the things the psychiatrist friend dealt with every day. His psychiatrist buddy said oh, but you are. And Sproul says well, why is that? And his friend said to him this because the vast majority of the problems that I have to deal with as a psychiatrist are all bound up with guilt. Guilt and its consequences, guilt that is paralyzing, guilt that is unresolved. Most of the people I see don't need a psychiatrist. They need a priest, a pastor. They need to understand how to unlock this problem of guilt. I hope in our time together today, the Lord will show us that guilt is more than a mere psychological problem within ourselves. It is that, but it's more than that. It's more than a social problem in terms of it affecting our relationships with other people. Guilt at its most fundamental level is a theological problem. It impacts our relationship with God, and if our relationship with God's not right, our relationship with other things won't be right.

Speaker 1: 2:38

And I think that here, when I think about this forward in faith campaign, the most important thing that this church has that we can give the Northwest Tampa community is the gospel of the forgiveness of our sins. That will not only get people right with God, it will help them get right with other people and it will bring them peace within, psychologically, emotionally, and it will even have physical benefits as well. So I'm going to ask you to remain seated. I'm going to pray and then I'll ask you to join me in praying the Lord's Prayer in a moment. As we go along, let's ask God's help to understand today.

Speaker 1: 3:20

Heavenly Father, it's always a privilege to come and to be in your Word, together with brothers and sisters in the Lord, and I'm grateful, lord too, for the guests that are with us. And I pray that, as we hear your word today and think about these things, that your Holy Spirit would write your eternal truths upon our hearts and that you would help us to deal with this problem of guilt, which is also the problem of forgiveness. So, lord, we ask these things that Christ would be glorified and we'd be transformed, even as we pray the prayer that you taught us. Our Father, who art in heaven. Hallowed be your name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.

Speaker 1: 4:30

Well, anytime we come to a Bible verse in scripture, including this fifth petition of the Lord's Prayer. It's very important that we look at the context. The context helps us determine exactly what our Lord is getting at. And so here we are at this petition that deals with our debts and the forgiveness we need from God, even as it calls upon us to forgive others. It's important to notice that in this context, jesus is speaking to and teaching his disciples. That's the context. He's teaching people who know God as their father, because the prayer begins our father. So he's speaking to the children of God, people who have experienced the forgiveness of God, people who have saving faith. This in turn takes us back to the beginning of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount.

Speaker 1: 5:23

Here, in Matthew 6, you have the Lord's Prayer embedded within the Sermon on the Mount, and we go back to the very beginning of the sermon. We have the Beatitudes, and for us to be able to forgive others, to ask God to forgive us and then us to forgive others, we need to remember the spirit that God places within those he has saved in his children by grace. Blessed are the poor in spirit, jesus says, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. And so Jesus is teaching those here who are poor in spirit, those who have humbly admitted before God their great need for the forgiveness of their sins. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Jesus said so. Jesus is speaking here of people who mourn and grieve over their sins and over the sins of their family and their church and their nation and the world and so forth. And so Jesus is talking about the children of God, those who know the gospel.

Speaker 1: 6:27

And Jesus is teaching his disciples here to pray daily, not just for daily bread, because we do need nourishment for our physical bodies and we need shelter and so forth but he's also teaching us to pray for our souls, and fundamentally, the most fundamental need of our souls is the forgiveness of sins. Everything begins and flows out of that, and he's teaching us to pray, forgive us our debts, and so we're praying that God would forgive our personal sins, but we're also asking him to have mercy and work out the forgiveness for those in our family and those in our church, nation and world. We see that same spirit in Jesus. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. Those words in that prayer that he spoke while he was being crucified, but for our purposes.

Speaker 1: 7:21

This morning I'm going to focus more on the personal aspect of forgiveness. Now I want to make some important distinctions because it can be a little confusing when we come to this fifth petition of the Lord's Prayer, because someone might think well, you know, I thought when I came to the Lord in faith that I was forgiven of all of my sins, right then and there, my past sins, my present sins, even my future sins. I thought my whole life was covered in the forgiveness of my sins. When I came to know God by faith in Christ and it's true, when we come to know the Lord by faith alone, apart from our works, just by trusting in His mercy alone through faith in Christ, all of our sins, not in part, but the whole, alone through faith in Christ, all of our sins not in part, but the whole is nailed to the cross. Our past sins, our present sins, even our future sins, are covered and they're forgiven legally, in full, on the record books of heaven, legally in full, on the record books of heaven. And so when we come to faith in Christ, what does God, the Father, do? He declares us justified. That's the word, it's a legal declaration, it's taking care of the record books of heaven. And this full forgiveness lasts our entire life and on in throughout eternity. Aren't you glad? This is the heart of the gospel.

Speaker 1: 8:51

But for those who know God through Christ, god is not just our judge. Thank God when we look and think about the judgment of God. He's going to be our father. God is not just our judge who's dealt with all of our, dealt with our legal record. He is our father, who has adopted us into his family as his children. He has also sent his spirit and growing us more and more to be like Christ, our savior and our elder brother in the family of God. And so the Bible calls this sanctification, or the Christian life. And so we can distinguish between this legal declaration, which is called justification, and this dynamic relationship we have with God, which we call sanctification.

Speaker 1: 9:39

Justification is a one-time act. Sanctification is a process throughout the entire Christian life. So when we become God's children through faith, we don't just have a clean and perfect record, right, that's justification. God also gives us a change status. We're adopted as his children, and he also grants us, by his grace, a changed condition. Our hearts were now set apart and made holy practically by God, and we grow and grow more holy till the day he calls us home. Sometimes that's painfully slow, but nevertheless that's how he works. And so, even though God has given us a clean record in heaven at the moment, we put our faith in Christ and we know those sins will never be held against us again.

Speaker 1: 10:33

God is concerned with more than just our record. He's concerned with our relationship with him. Just like you as parents, you who have children, you're concerned with your relationship with your children. It's not enough that they're just legally viewed by the courts as your children. You're concerned with your relationship with your children. It's not enough that they're just legally viewed by the courts as your children and that they know that you're their parents. No, it's important that you have an intimate relationship with your children, and if you don't have that, you know the pain of that and how. That is not how it's supposed to be, and it's not how it's supposed to be with God, our Father, either, as His children. And so God's concerned with our relationship. He's also concerned that we remember our purpose in life, which is to glorify and enjoy him. You remember the first three petitions of the Lord's prayer, carry on through to the very end. And so what's the purpose of us being forgiven of our sins and us also then extending that forgiveness to others. It's that God's name would be hallowed, that people would see that King Jesus, the forgiving King, rules and reigns in our hearts and life and that we would be about doing the Father's will rather than our own stubborn will.

Speaker 1: 11:41

If one of my children sins against me, it doesn't change my love for them, it doesn't change their status. They don't get booted out of the family. No, that all remains. But it does affect the intimacy of our relationship. And until my child that has sinned against me confesses their sin and I extend that forgiveness of sin and there's then this relational reconciliation, the relationship won't be right. And it's the same with God, our Father. It is possible to be legally reconciled with God, to be a child of God, to have true faith in the living God. And yet at the present moment we're not relationally right with God at this particular time. Now his love for us doesn't change, our status with him does not change. We remain legally justified. Our record in heaven hasn't moved one inch. It's still forgiveness and righteousness because of what Christ has done. But something's not right with us and God. And God won't allow that to just remain that way. He loves us, he disciplines those he loves. And so I want to give you an example regarding this issue King David.

Speaker 1: 13:06

We can look back at Psalm 32, one of the great Psalms of the Psalter and King David. You remember he was God's chosen and anointed king. King David lived about a thousand years before the coming of Christ and you remember the Bible describes King David. He was a godly man, a man after God's own heart. The Bible says A man after God's own heart.

Speaker 1: 13:35

And yet this very godly King David, he fell into great sin. In his case it was the sin of adultery with Bathsheba. He had an affair with another man's wife, and then he abused his power and he ended up having an affair with her and she got pregnant, and then he wanted to try to get rid of her husband, uriah, and so he came up with a murderous scheme and Uriah was killed according to that murderous scheme. So he was guilty of adultery and murder A godly man. It's as if he lost his mind, the power of temptation, and these are obviously very wicked sins. But David here's the point he went on to live a lie. He went on to live life as a lie for a period, a lie of unconfessed sin for over a year God's chosen and anointed king living life as a lie, as a hypocrite, and tell what God had seen enough. So he sends Nathan the prophet to David. Nathan tells David a parable, a story. It convicts David of his sin and it brings about this sincere repentance and confession of sin by David. And then God very graciously restores the joy and intimacy in his relationship with King David.

Speaker 1: 14:58

Now we can read about David's confession and repentance in Psalm 51. David's confession and repentance in Psalm 51. That's where he prays for God to wash him thoroughly from his sins. He asked God create in me a clean heart, o God, and you remember that word. There in Psalm 51, create is used. Jews had more than one word for create. That one was used only of God. He was asking God do something to me I cannot do for myself. It's the same words that's used in Genesis, chapter 1, at the creation. Renew a right spirit in me, he asked God in Psalm 51. Restore the joy of your salvation in my heart and life, lord.

Speaker 1: 15:50

Well, psalm 32 is the answer to Psalm 51, where God restores the joy upon David's repentance of these heinous sins. David knows in a fresh and invigorating way now the blessing that comes with repentance and confession of our sin to God. Listen to the first two verses of Psalm 32. Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity. God is good, isn't he? But David adds, right at the end of verse 2, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. You see, blessed is the forgiven man. Blessed is the man who the Lord doesn't count as sin and in whose spirit there is no deceit.

Speaker 1: 16:33

You see, david had lived a lie. He was lying to himself and he was living a lie before other people, and he was lying in that sense, without confessing his sin, he's basically lying to God. So here's this chosen king of God, the king of Israel, a man after God's own heart, and somehow his life had devolved into a living lie, a life of a hypocrite, a life of unconfessed sin for over a year. Listen to David. Continue that prayer in Psalm 32 after his restoration. Verses 3 and four.

Speaker 1: 17:12

And when I kept silent, my bones wasted away. You see, he's talking about the silence of unconfessed sin, the price of not confessing our sins, the price we pay for not having our hearts right with God. For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. His life had become a misery For day and night. Your hand was heavy upon me. God loves David and therefore he's going to discipline him. And David could feel the weight of God's hand upon him during this time where he refused to confess his sin. My strength was dried up, as by the heat of summer. Of all people, we who live in Tampa, we can understand what he's talking about. Of all people, we who live in Tampa, we can understand what he's talking about.

Speaker 1: 18:13

I'm living every day, god, like I've just mowed 15 lawns in the heat, that summer heat the damage of unconfessed sin. You see, carl Minninger saw people in his clinics. Dr Sproul's friend saw people who didn't know what to do with this problem of guilt and it made them sick. It's not the only thing that makes people sick, but it's a major thing, it's a fundamental thing. And so David's unconfessed sin of adultery and murder.

Speaker 1: 18:54

I wonder if there's unconfessed sin in your life this morning, could there be someone here in the house today who knows in your heart of hearts I'm not living right? God, I love you. I know that you've forgiven me of my sins. I know I believe in Christ, I'm committed to you, but I'm not living right. God, I love you. I know that you've forgiven me of my sins. I know I believe in Christ, I'm committed to you, but I'm not living right and my relationship with you isn't right, and it's showing in my relationships with other people and it's showing in the fact that the joy has been sucked out of my life as it relates to Jesus' subject before us this morning. Could there be somebody here this morning whose heart is full of anger and bitterness and unforgiveness towards someone who has hurt you, betrayed you, maybe abused you in some way, mocked you, sinned against you, ignored you?

Speaker 1: 20:06

Jesus is teaching us how to pray and therefore he's teaching us how to live and how to give they're all bound up together how to live in joy and freedom. He's teaching us how to give forgiveness to others who have sinned against us, and perhaps terribly so. Our Father, forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. Have we the joy and freedom that comes through the repentance of our sin, the confession of sin to our Father? Listen to David again in the very next verse, verse 5 of Psalm 32. Listen, I acknowledged my sin to you and I did not cover my iniquity. I said I will confess my transgressions to the Lord and you forgave the iniquity of my sin.

Speaker 1: 21:13

God is good. He doesn't ask for our record. We don't have a record to give. He wants our repentance. He wants us to come clean and be honest and confess to him and seek his grace. Did David get kicked out of God's family and then let back in? No, absolutely not. God washed him anew by his cleansing grace. He assured David through his word, in this case through the prophet Nathan, of the forgiveness of his sins, and then he restored this great joy to David's soul and life in his relationship with the Lord. All's David did was he repented and cast himself onto the mercy of God in Psalm 51, asking God to do for him what he could not do for himself. And God answered his prayer. God is a God of mercy and forgiveness.

Speaker 1: 22:18

The last verse of Psalm 32 is interesting. Listen to David Be glad in the Lord and rejoice, o righteous, and shout for joy all you, upright in heart. You see, it's as if joy had come back to David and he now wants to celebrate with other people who know this blessedness of what it means to be forgiven of your sins. Do you know that blessedness this morning, that peace, that peace with God, that peace in your soul and your heart and mind, that peace with other people, even those who have hurt you? Could your joy be gone in the Lord this morning? Could the joy of your salvation be sapped dry? The joy of your salvation be sapped dry because you're angry and bitter and full of resentment and you've been unwilling to forgive someone who's hurt you? Each man examine his own heart and mind.

Speaker 1: 23:31

Father, forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. This can be a little unnerving, can it? Let's admit it, jesus' teaching can be unnerving at times, and this is one of those places. What's interesting is he doubles down after the Lord's prayer in the very next verses that follow it, in verses 14 and 15. Listen, for if you forgive others their trespasses, jesus says, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. Well, there's some smelling salts for us, isn't there? But it's important that we read this properly. I want to give a couple clarifications about this, a few quick points about these sobering words.

Speaker 1: 24:29

One what is Jesus most certainly not teaching us here. He's not teaching that. He's making a deal If you forgive other people of their sins, okay, I'll forgive you of your sins and that's how you get right with me in the beginning. He's not saying if you forgive other people their sins, then I'll give you a clean record in heaven. That's not what he's saying. That's not how we get right with God in a fundamental sense, in a legal way. So he's not talking about to his people here their record as it relates to justification. How do we know that you bring other scripture to bear upon it?

Speaker 1: 25:07

Ephesians 2,. For by grace you've been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing, not even you're forgiving other people. It's not your own doing. It's the gift of God, not a result of work, so that no one may boast. So you don't get right fundamentally with God by forgiving other people. In other words, we don't come into the family of God through forgiving others, and it's also not the basis of our staying in the family of God. So what's Jesus getting at when he says this here? I think the short answer is that if someone professes to be a Christian, they profess to be a follower of Jesus Christ. They profess to know the forgiveness of their sins through faith in Jesus, but they're holding on to this unforgiving spirit in their heart.

Speaker 1: 26:08

As far as I can tell, there's only two possibilities in this situation, and the first possibility is this that they really are a true child of God and God, our father. He loves his children and he shows us his love by disciplining his children. And sometimes God will withdraw his smile from us. He'll withdraw his shining face from us. The countenance of his face will turn away for a season. You see this with the psalmists from time to time. It's a situation that strips spiritual joy from one's life. It badly damages our intimacy with God, our Father, and it fails to hallow His forgiving name. It fails to do God's will in forgiving other people. It fails to show forth the kingdom of God, that King Jesus, this forgiving King, is truly ruling and reigning at this moment in my life, like it should. So somebody could be a child of God. That's one possibility, but they're just not right with God, like David. But there's a second possibility in this situation of the unforgiving person, and that that is they have professed to be a Christian, but the reality is they've never truly experienced the forgiveness of God in their own life through sincere faith in Christ and genuine repentance of their sins in their own life pattern of sin.

Speaker 1: 27:45

Let's go to Matthew 18 and think about the parable of the unforgiving servant. I could spend a lot more time on this this morning, but I just want to highlight some of the key things in it for us and hoping that Matthew 18 will give us some light on this fifth petition of the Lord's prayer. Jesus is speaking in both situations. We get much help from this parable of the unforgiving servant. It's interesting to me that Jesus tells us that this parable is told because Peter asked a question. Don't you love Peter's comments and questions? I want to talk to him when I get to glory.

Speaker 1: 28:25

He says to Jesus Lord, how often will my brother sin against me? And I forgive him as many as seven times. And so, peter, I think he thought that he was going to impress Jesus with this, because the rabbis at the time had taught that if somebody committed the same sin against you three times, you're obligated to forgive them, but once the fourth time hit, you're no longer obligated. And so by Jesus or by Peter throwing seven times out there, he probably thought man, I'm going to be sounding pretty spiritual about right now, but Jesus doesn't go along with the Jewish rabbis' misreading of the Old Testament. He says Jesus says back to Peter I do not say to you seven times, but 77 times. In fact it can be translated 70 times seven, which I like better because I think it helps us understand and feel the weight of what Jesus is saying here.

Speaker 1: 29:24

And then he tells the parable to explain the 70 times seven. And what he says is there's this king who desired to settle accounts with his servants, and one of the servants owed him 10,000 talents. Now a talent is roughly give or take about 20 years or so of wages, and so the debt of the servant was 200 years worth of wages 200 years worth of wages. He's got a problem, he can't get out of it and he'll never be able to pay it. And you see, what Jesus is starting to pin down is and help Peter see, is Peter's own unpayable sin debt. And he's helping us see our unpayable sin debt. And I wonder this morning if each one of us in this house has come to the place where we really do realize just how great a sin debt we have created. I mean really, really, there are people who will say I'm a sinner but I don't deserve to go to hell. Are you sure about that? Do we really have a good grasp of the Bible's teaching on the holiness of God and the depth and breadth of our sin?

Speaker 1: 31:02

I want you to listen to Pastor Terry Johnson. What he says it's very sobering. Every day we sin, and not once or twice, but repeatedly and constantly. Not even for a moment do we love God with all of our heart and with all of our mind and with all of our soul and with all of our strength? Have you ever thought about that? What 10 seconds did we do that? I want to make a little caveat. If you know the Lord, it doesn't mean your good works aren't worth anything. I want to make a little caveat If you know the Lord, it doesn't mean your good works aren't worth anything. Christ covers the difference and God honors the sincerity of our heart. I love my wife and I love her sincerely. I don't love her perfectly, far from it. God is pleased when His children serve Him sincerely, even in their imperfection. That's a little aside. Don't forget that. Keep doing good works, keep sincerely doing the best you can. But let's come back to reality. If it was not for Jesus Christ, how high would our sin debt be? Higher than Mount Everest, even when we're not outwardly sinning.

Speaker 1: 32:13

Think of all the sins lurking in our hearts spiritually pride, self-righteousness, hypocrisy, lust, hatred, covetousness, jealousy, envy and more. And we know that's in there because it comes out from time to time, doesn't it? Which means it was already lurking in there before. And then Johnson recalls the old EE, the evangelism explosion example. Some of you maybe heard this through the years. But imagine you only sin three times a day. That's pretty generous. Well, let's just say, take three times a day, we'll just keep it very round and simple. A thousand times a year, you live 70 years. That's 70,000 sins. You're standing before God at the judgment. How are we doing? And that's a very, very gracious accounting of our sins.

Speaker 1: 33:04

You see, people only feel good about themselves when they compare themselves to other people who are just, at least in their mind, not as good as they are. But when we stand before Almighty God under his blazing holiness, there's nowhere to hide and all comparison drops. And that's why, when you read scriptures, you see the godliest of saints, men like Moses and Isaiah the prophet and Peter the apostle and John the apostle and others. When God reveals his holiness to them, they just become completely undone and overwhelmed and fall on their face. There's not even a thought of comparing themselves to other people in that moment.

Speaker 1: 33:49

And since the servant in this parable could not pay the debt, the king ordered him to be sold, his wife and children to be sold and for him to get as much payment as he could get out of it. So the servant falls on his knees and he begs the king have patience with me. Have patience with me and I will pay everything he says. And I will pay everything, excuse me. Well, that wasn't a very bright thing for him to say. How's he going to pay everything? His debts are astronomical, he's got an unpayable debt.

Speaker 1: 34:25

And then the king, in his graciousness, forgives the guy, right. And so what happens? The guy goes out and he sees a servant who owes him some money. So the forgiven servant looks at the other guy who owes him 100 denarii. Now, a denarii is one day's wages, so that guy owes him between three and four months worth of wages. He's just been forgiven 200,000 years of wages. He begins to choke the other guy Pay up, pay up what you owe, have patience with me. The guy says, and I'll pay you. But the forgiven servant has him thrown in debtor's prison until he should pay his debt.

Speaker 1: 35:05

Well, the king hears about his actions and he says to the forgiven servant you, wicked servant, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. And should not? You have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you? And Jesus says the king sent the man to the jailers it's literally the torturers until he should pay all his debt. And then here's what Jesus comments so also my heavenly father will do to every one of you if you do not forgive your brother from the heart, sincerely, from the heart. Not just restrain outwardly, but from the heart. What's Jesus teaching us here? Forgiven people, forgive other people. And I want you to notice that the forgiven servant, who the king ends up calling wicked in this parable, he wasn't struggling to forgive, he did not imperfectly forgive, he wasn't praying. God, help me, cleanse my unforgiving heart. Give me a forgiving heart of Jesus toward my brother who's hurt me deeply. God's true children sometimes pray this way. We don't repent perfectly, we don't forgive perfectly, but we can forgive fundamentally and then continue to work through the process.

Speaker 1: 36:31

Notice what Jesus said in verse 30 to the man in Matthew 18, he refused to forgive. You see that he was set against it, and that's very telling to how hard his heart was. Now, why would he refuse to forgive? Because what did he say earlier? He never understood his debt properly. Did you hear him have patience with me and I'll pay you everything. How's he going to pay 200,000 years worth of wages? You see, he never understood his debt and so when it came to a guy that he sees it owed him even a little bit, his heart was hard and he was just ready to choke him. Unless we understand the depth of our sin, we will never be in a good place to forgive other people who have hurt us, and sometimes people have hurt us very, very deeply. What did the tax collector in Luke 18 say? Oh God, be merciful to me, a sinner. He just cast himself on the mercy of God. There was no, I'll pay you everything, just give me some time.

Speaker 1: 37:38

If you're a child of God this morning and you're still carrying around in your heart anger and bitterness and resentfulness, and this unforgiving spirit toward another Christian or maybe somebody else in your life, could be somebody outside the church. It's poisoning your soul, and God, your father, is not going to allow you to experience the joy of your salvation until you deal with it, and the longer it goes unconfessed, the heavier his hand will be upon you, because he loves you. It's not good for you. It will make you sick in every way, and God doesn't want that for you any more than he did for David. You see, it was his discipline that set David free, and that's God's heart. For you there's great expectations. Jesus said to whom much is given, much is expected. But Derek Thomas, one of my seminary professors, said he tweaked it a little bit To whom much is forgiven, much is expected. And that's true.

Speaker 1: 38:45

We have to remember who it is that's speaking to us in this parable and in this teaching and in the Lord's prayer. It's the Lord Jesus Christ himself. You might be thinking this morning, pastor, the person who did terrible things to me, that person deserves to burn in hell. I bet they do. I don't deny it for a second. But until you and I understand that we deserve to burn in hell too, we'll never be in a place to forgive somebody else that's done horrible things, and you will be in chains forever on this earth until you give it to God.

Speaker 1: 39:44

I'm not trying to simplify. It would take me a whole series to go through all the tentacles that come with forgiveness and dealing through process, and I'm not making light of trauma and abuse. Those are hard things. Sometimes you can't be reconciled with somebody, but you still have to do this. Sometimes people die and you never had a chance to reconcile. Sometimes the thing was so traumatic you can't see the perpetrator anymore.

Speaker 1: 40:10

Give it to God. He is going to make all things right in the end, aren't you glad? Don't carry it anymore. Give it to him, ask him, lord, give me that heart of Jesus as he was dying on the cross, experiencing the pit of hell for me, under your just wrath for my sins. Give me the heart that prays Father. Forgive them, for they know not what they do sins. Give me the heart that prays Father. Forgive them, for they know not what they do. That can only come from God, but God is great. Look at the beauty and loveliness of the heart of Jesus Christ and never, ever forget that there is infinitely more forgiveness in the heart of the Lord, jesus Christ and God, our Father, than there is sin in our hearts. And Christ came to save sinners, and that includes sinners who sinfully hold on to anger and bitterness and resentment because of the hurt and the pain in their life. Jesus was hurt too, but look at his heart. He drank the cup of hell for you and for me, to whom much is forgiven, much is expected. No-transcript.