The Fruit of Forgiveness

Jesus said, “I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; whoever insults his brother will be liable to the council; and whoever says, ‘You fool!’ will be liable to the hell of fire. So if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go. First be reconciled to your brother, and then come and offer your gift.”

Later on he also gave this instruction: “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.” Matthew‬ ‭5:22-24, 18:15-17‬

As the body of Christ it appears that we suck at following these instructions.

We take our grievances to everyone except the one who has wounded or offended us. We gossip and slander. We fail to give the benefit of the doubt. We most certainly don’t give the offender the opportunity to defend himself or make things right. And we now seem to be offended and wounded by just about anything and everything. This is not the way of Christ.

Jesus told the disciples, “The world will know you are my disciples by your love for one another.”

Peter said, “Love covers over a multitude of sins.”

John put it very simply: "We love because he first loved us."

Paul told the Corinthians that “love is not easily offended or provoked… Love keeps no record of wrongs.”

Love is not easily offended. But we are.

Love keeps no record of wrong. But we do.

Following Christ is often manifested in the things you no longer choose to partake in: sexual immorality, drunkenness, idolatry. Those are the "no-brainers." But it’s also about no longer partaking in slander, gossip, bitterness, resentment, and unforgiveness. Those are the hard ones! But that’s what the love of God demands.

Love has hard conversations.

Love realizes that pride is the enemy.

The invitation from Jesus is not, "Believe in me," but, "Come, follow me."

Some believe but don't follow. No one follows without believing.

Jesus said, "Go and make things right. Go and seek reconciliation. Go and extend the grace and mercy that you yourself have been extended." Leave your gift at the altar - save your songs for later - and go be reconciled to your brother. This is worship in the sight of the Lord.

The hard way is to "Go." The easy way is to leave.

Pride says, "I've been hurt and wounded and wronged. I'm out. I'm gone."

Humility says, "I will walk across fire to see the Lord restore me to my brother or sister."

Paul said, "Love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth." If we make assumptions and don't seek to know the truth, we are essentially rejoicing in wrongdoing. To use a better translation: We are delighting in evil. Ouch.

We must cast off and repent of our desire to curl up with our bitterness. It's not a warm blanket; it's an evil enticement. And it will eat us from the inside out and tear down the Body of Christ. To be clear: Unforgiveness is tearing down the Body of Christ!

We must do the hard work of going to our brother or sister, bearing our soul and confessing our wounds, and seeking reconciliation, restoration, and forgiveness.

We must cease just believing and actually start following the one who "bore our shame in his body on the tree." He doesn't demand we come. He invites us to follow. He's clear that the road is hard and narrow and runs completely counter to the instincts of our flesh. The road actually leads to death. Our death. Death that leads to new life. New life that bears the beautiful fruit of forgiveness.

I pray that you and I can taste that fruit today.

The Benefit of the Doubt

 I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt.

Have you thought about what this means anytime lately?

Have you exercised this judgment recently?

Have you considered this concept at all?

I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you have.

Let's talk about the meaning of this idiom.

benefit of the doubt : the state of accepting something/someone as honest or deserving of trust even though there are reasons for doubt.

To decide that you will believe someone, even though you are not sure that what the person is saying is true.

I’m pretty sure most of us understand the definition and meaning of this phrase. The greater issue today is that fewer people seem to be practicing it. If we hear that someone has said something we disagree with, we don’t go to the person; we simply pass judgment. If a decision is made that we disagree with, rather than seeking to understand why, we rush to condemn.

The well of our grace seems to have run dry.

If you’re a Christ-follower, there’s an enormous conflict with this. The one we claim to follow is full of never-ending grace toward us. His mercies are new every morning.  His well of grace never runs dry. In fact, it's overflowing.

In a previous post I wrote 9 years ago I pointed this out:

In Proverbs 18:17, Solomon writes, "Any story sounds true until someone sets the record straight." Hearing this wisdom, isn't it good practice - biblical practice and principle - to "set the record straight", get the facts, go straight to the source before we believe anything? Isn't this a courtesy that we want others to extend to us? Of course it is. We WANT the benefit of the doubt! But for some reason, we often seem to be a whole lot slower to extend it to everyone else.

In Acts 6, Luke writes: "Now in these days when the disciples were increasing in number, a complaint by the Hellenists arose against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution of food." People were getting saved. And because the early church in Jerusalem was not only rapidly growing, but also multicultural and multilingual, the conditions were ripe for someone to get overlooked. And someone did. The Hellenist widows. And so "...a complaint arose." We quickly discern this word "complaint" to be negative. Mainly because none of us like receiving complaints. But sometimes a complaint - someone pointing out where something isn't right - is necessary. This is one of those cases. But rather than badmouth the Apostles behind their back or gossip about the travesty of someone playing favorites, the Hellenists came straight to the Apostles.

You know what they did? They gave the benefit of the doubt.

They chose to believe something good about someone, rather than something bad, when they had the option of doing either. They chose to believe that the Apostles might not be aware of this oversight. They decided to look for a solution rather than just point out a problem. And if you go on reading (Acts 6:1-7) you find that the result of this instance of the benefit of the doubt resulted in the first deacons being affirmed in the church.

Let's ask the Lord to fill us today with as much grace as we've received.

Let's ask Him to grow those fruits of the Spirit in us like patience and kindness and gentleness.

Let's give others the benefit of the doubt. Lord knows, it's most certainly been extended to us.

We Have No Other King

I’m lying in bed, unable to sleep, praying for my country. What hits me hard is the realization that I am actually engaging in spiritual battle; engrossed in a war that has ultimately already been won, but is still being fought. It’s a war of kingdoms. Actually, a kingdom and an empire.

While I know I’m a Gentile, I’m quite certain that I very often live like an Israelite. I know this because in spite of the fact that I am a citizen of heaven, a follower of King Jesus, I’m still in the crowd demanding a king be anointed, crowned, empowered and enthroned. I have a heavenly Father...but my flesh wants a king.

This world is not my home. This kingdom is not where my first allegiance lies. So, as I lay here this morning in the silence I wonder how many others are asking themselves the same question: Which king am I going to serve? Which battle am I going to fight?

The battle I'm fighting is the evidence of which king I'm living for.

I think I often forget that this great country we live in is really still a pretty fresh experiment. That said, I believe it’s one of the greatest civil experiments in history. And yes, millions have fought and bled and died to keep this idea going. But it’s really not about a place. It’s about a principle: freedom. The experiment started because men and women refused to bow any longer to an earthly king. They sold all they had, left all they knew, and bravely broke those chains of bondage. Understanding this, it comes as an even greater shock that many of us have now unknowingly chained ourselves back to the earthly throne that ruled over us not so long ago. We have a heavenly Father, but our flesh still wants a king.

This is nothing new.

"But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to judge us.” And Samuel prayed to the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, “Obey the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them.... And "the people refused to obey the voice of Samuel. And they said, “No! But there shall be a king over us, that we also may be like all the nations, and that our king may judge us and go out before us and fight our battles.” And when Samuel had heard all the words of the people, he repeated them in the ears of the Lord. And the Lord said to Samuel, “Obey their voice and make them a king.” (1 Samuel 8:6-7, 19-22)

We fled a country with a king. Now...we seem to just call it by another name.

No matter what side of the fence or the aisle you sit or stand on, if your President is your king, then he is King Saul. It's not about who got your vote; it's about who or what gives you hope. If your hope in this world is in the democratic republic of the United States of America, then make no mistake: Saul is your king.

Yes, we have a duty, responsibility and privilege to vote, to participate, to listen, and to engage. That's what people fought and died for. That's the principle - not the place - that makes America what it is.

But we also have a calling and command to first seek the Kingdom of God - to first love our brothers and sisters as Christ loved us - to be ministers of reconciliation, not division and condemnation. That's what King Jesus lived, died, and resurrected for.

If you don't think there's a tension in the life of a Christ-follower in America, you need to think again. For instance...

As an American, someone fought and died for your right to protest.

As a Christian, our Savior says, "If you want to follow me, you must lay down your rights." Jesus lived and died that you might no longer be a slave to your "rights".

That sounds like tension. That sounds like there's a decision to be made.

Paul told the Ephesians: "We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places." This is the truth of who the people of God should be and what it is we should be doing. But we must understand: When we get consumed with the lusts and loves of this world and we begin to think our hope lies in King Saul, we ultimately wind up wrestling against flesh and blood. We wind up tearing each other down. When we wrestle against flesh and blood, the spiritual forces of evil have distracted us from realizing that the true enemy over this present darkness is getting just what he wants. He wants us to want King Saul. 

As Christ-followers, I exhort you that we should listen to Peter's letter to the persecuted and scattered believers as if he was writing directly to us: "Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation." (1 Peter 2:11-12)

This world is not our home. We have a Heavenly Father and a King Eternal. We fix our eyes not on what is temporary, but on those things that will not pass away. We are ministers of reconciliation. Jesus said, “The world will know that you are my disciples by your love for one another.”

Friends, the last year has been filled with one season of trial after another. We are all weary. May we all cry out to our King to give us strength, humility, and courage. May we bear one another’s burdens and carry one another during the weariness. 

May we always remember that our only hope is in our crucified and risen Savior.

And may the anthem ring through our hearts and from our lives: “Glory, glory, we have no other King but Jesus, Lord of all!”