DNA: God Is Forgiving

Our goal should be to become more like God. Since God is love, then we must take on the same attrib­utes of love that we see in 1 Cor 13 [show]1 Corinthians 13 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clang­ing cym­bal. [2]And if I have prophetic pow­ers, and under­stand all mys­ter­ies and all knowl­edge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove moun­tains, but have not love, I am noth­ing. [3]If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain noth­ing. [4]Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arro­gant [5]or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irri­ta­ble or resent­ful; [6]it does not rejoice at wrong­do­ing, but rejoices with the truth. [7]Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. [8]Love never ends. As for prophe­cies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowl­edge, it will pass away. [9]For we know in part and we proph­esy in part, [10]but when the per­fect comes, the par­tial will pass away. [11]When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I rea­soned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up child­ish ways. [12]For now we see in a mir­ror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. [13]So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the great­est of these is love. (ESV)
. This was the chal­lenge we had dur­ing Sunday ser­vice. Pastor Jeff focused on 1 Cor 13:5 [show]1 Corinthians 13:5 [5]or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irri­ta­ble or resent­ful; (ESV)
“Love is not eas­ily angered, it keeps no record of wrong.” (NIV) Unfortunately, right in the mid­dle of note tak­ing, some­one sent me an “urgent” text mes­sage and I lost most of my ser­mon notes because I wasn’t sav­ing well. But here are the highlights.

Several Scripture pas­sages mentioned

• Psalms 103:8–13 [show]Psalm 103:8–13 [8]The LORD is mer­ci­ful and gra­cious, slow to anger and abound­ing in stead­fast love. [9]He will not always chide, nor will he keep his anger for­ever. [10]He does not deal with us accord­ing to our sins, nor repay us accord­ing to our iniq­ui­ties. [11]For as high as the heav­ens are above the earth, so great is his stead­fast love toward those who fear him; [12]as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our trans­gres­sions from us. [13]As a father shows com­pas­sion to his chil­dren, so the LORD shows com­pas­sion to those who fear him.
  
• Parable of the prodi­gal son (Luke 15:11–32 [show]Luke 15:11–32 [11]And he said, “There was a man who had two sons. [12]And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of prop­erty that is com­ing to me.’ And he divided his prop­erty between them. [13]Not many days later, the younger son gath­ered all he had and took a jour­ney into a far coun­try, and there he squan­dered his prop­erty in reck­less liv­ing. [14]And when he had spent every­thing, a severe famine arose in that coun­try, and he began to be in need. [15]So he went and hired him­self out to one of the cit­i­zens of that coun­try, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. [16]And he was long­ing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him any­thing. [17]“But when he came to him­self, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired ser­vants have more than enough bread, but I per­ish here with hunger! [18]I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. [19]I am no longer wor­thy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired ser­vants.“‘ [20]And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt com­pas­sion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. [21]And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer wor­thy to be called your son.’ [22]But the father said to his ser­vants, ‘Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. [23]And bring the fat­tened calf and kill it, and let us eat and cel­e­brate. [24]For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to cel­e­brate. [25]“Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and danc­ing. [26]And he called one of the ser­vants and asked what these things meant. [27]And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fat­tened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.’ [28]But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, [29]but he answered his father, ‘Look, these many years I have served you, and I never dis­obeyed your com­mand, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might cel­e­brate with my friends. [30]But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your prop­erty with pros­ti­tutes, you killed the fat­tened calf for him!’ [31]And he said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. [32]It was fit­ting to cel­e­brate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.’” (ESV)
  )
• John 21 [show]John 21 After this Jesus revealed him­self again to the dis­ci­ples by the Sea of Tiberias, and he revealed him­self in this way. [2]Simon Peter, Thomas (called the Twin), Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two oth­ers of his dis­ci­ples were together. [3]Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fish­ing.” They said to him, “We will go with you.” They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught noth­ing. [4]Just as day was break­ing, Jesus stood on the shore; yet the dis­ci­ples did not know that it was Jesus. [5]Jesus said to them, “Children, do you have any fish?” They answered him, “No.” [6]He said to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in, because of the quan­tity of fish. [7]That dis­ci­ple whom Jesus loved there­fore said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer gar­ment, for he was stripped for work, and threw him­self into the sea. [8]The other dis­ci­ples came in the boat, drag­ging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, but about a hun­dred yards off. [9]When they got out on land, they saw a char­coal fire in place, with fish laid out on it, and bread. [10]Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” [11]So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, 153 of them. And although there were so many, the net was not torn. [12]Jesus said to them, “Come and have break­fast.” Now none of the dis­ci­ples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord. [13]Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and so with the fish. [14]This was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the dis­ci­ples after he was raised from the dead. [15]When they had fin­ished break­fast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Feed my lambs.” [16]He said to him a sec­ond time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Tend my sheep.” [17]He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” and he said to him, “Lord, you know every­thing; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep. [18]Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress your­self and walk wher­ever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.” [19](This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glo­rify God.) And after say­ing this he said to him, “Follow me.“ [20]Peter turned and saw the dis­ci­ple whom Jesus loved fol­low­ing them, the one who had been reclin­ing at table close to him and had said, “Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?” [21]When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, “Lord, what about this man?” [22]Jesus said to him, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? You fol­low me!” [23]So the say­ing spread abroad among the broth­ers that this dis­ci­ple was not to die; yet Jesus did not say to him that he was not to die, but, “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?“ [24]This is the dis­ci­ple who is bear­ing wit­ness about these things, and who has writ­ten these things, and we know that his tes­ti­mony is true. [25]Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be writ­ten, I sup­pose that the world itself could not con­tain the books that would be writ­ten. (ESV)
  — the for­give­ness of Peter (Mr Extreme). Jesus did not replay all of Peter’s wrongs, rather he repaired the relationship.
• 2 Cor 5:19 [show]2 Corinthians 5:19 [19]that is, in Christ God was rec­on­cil­ing the world to him­self, not count­ing their tres­passes against them, and entrust­ing to us the mes­sage of rec­on­cil­i­a­tion. (ESV)
  
• Matt 6:14–15 [show]Matthew 6:14–15 [14]For if you for­give oth­ers their tres­passes, your heav­enly Father will also for­give you, [15]but if you do not for­give oth­ers their tres­passes, nei­ther will your Father for­give your tres­passes. (ESV)
  

What has God for­given me for and has for­got­ten?
For what do I still need to ask God forgivenss?

The only one that gets hurt by anger and keep­ing track of wrongs is the one angry and keep­ing track. When we choose to not to for­give we close doors to abun­dant living.

Of course I got side tracked by some­thing pas­tor Jeff said, almost in pass­ing. God doesn’t do “acts of God”. We blame God for nat­ural dis­as­ters when God is not that kind of God. It really got me to think­ing. All too often we find it easy to blame God for all the bad and yet never give Him the praise and thanks for all the good. It is all wrong!

First of all, God has used nature to pun­ish the wicked. But those are rare and they have clear rea­sons (with prophets warn­ing of impend­ing doom and the like). To blame God for every bad thing that comes from a tor­nado, hur­ri­cane, earth­quake or flood is I sup­pose almost blasphemous.

Yes, all nature is of God. It was put into place by Him and by Him nature exists. But it is sin­ful man that has brought evil into this world. The bad things that hap­pen are a result of us being us. A tor­nado in and of itself is not evil, it has no thought or desire to bring mis­for­tune upon us. And God cer­tainly isn’t one to throw a hur­ri­cane at us just out of a whim, to see how we would react.

And I guess this brings us back to Pastor Jeff’s point. God is Love. He is for­giv­ing. He is not eas­ily angered nor does He keep a book of wrong doings that He holds over our heads at every lit­tle oppor­tu­nity. When God for­gives us, we are washed white as snow by the blood of His Son, Jesus. Our sins are forgotten.

Something Pastor didn’t say, actu­ally, he almost did the oppo­site, was to say that we need to for­give our­selves just as God for­gives us. How often do we keep a book of our own wrong doings and beat our­selves up with that book when God Himself has erased all?

God has a book. Interestingly, the only thing that seems to be in it is a list of names. It is the Lamb’s Book of Life (Rev 21:27 [show]Revelation 21:27 [27]But noth­ing unclean will ever enter it, nor any­one who does what is detestable or false, but only those who are writ­ten in the Lamb’s book of life. (ESV)
). There are no lists of wrong doings there, just for­give­ness. And so I ask you, is your name in that book?