“Living With People…”

You can be on the vacation of a lifetime and have it ruined by the people you are with, right? I’ve been out with people and within a few minutes I start hoping for an emergency phone call… Ever been there?

Today, we need to talk about how it looks for Christians to relate to other people. Not just Christians, but everyone. However, if there is a place where these virtues must be perfected, it is in the church.

1. Only one verse:

13 bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.

Bearing with one another: Ἀνέχω - to regard with tolerance, endure, bear with, put up with; to undergo something onerous or troublesome without giving in, endure^[1]

Complaint against another: Μομφή - blame, (cause for) complaint,^[2] [when they have done something that is complaint worthy - i.e. it is their fault.^[3]]

Forgive: Χαρίζομαι - to cancel a sum of money that is owed, cancel^[4]

“You can't forgive somebody without absorbing the cost. Either that person pays for it or you do. On the cross, God didn't just forgive us, he paid the cost himself.” (Tim Keller)

2. 3 Bible Teachers on this text:

“These virtues are at once given practical application: bear with each other—i.e. restrain your natural reaction towards odd or difficult people, let them be themselves—and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another, whether old feuds from pre-Christian days which might jeopardize the new-found fellowship, or problems and squabbles which might arise (Paul was a realist) within the new community itself. The underlying principle is clear, forgive as the Lord forgave you.

Paul here makes two points, echoing (perhaps intentionally) the parable of the Unforgiving Servant in Matthew 18:23–35. First, it is utterly inappropriate for one who knows the joy and release of being forgiven to refuse to share that blessing with another. Second, it is highly [inappropriate] to refuse to forgive one whom Christ himself has already forgiven.”^[5]

“Mutual forbearance, mutual tolerance, and mutual forgivingness should mark all their relations with one another. Did not Jesus himself inculcate the principle of unwearying and unceasing forgiveness, until “seventy times seven” (Matt. 18:22)? More than that, had they not received his forgiveness, in far greater measure than they were ever likely to have to emulate in forgiving others? For he taught the lesson of unlimited forgiveness by example and not only by precept. In his teaching, too, he made it clear that those who seek the forgiveness of God must be ready to forgive others. Not that human forgiveness is a work that earns the divine forgiveness—the initiative in forgiveness lies with God—but an unforgiving spirit is an effective barrier to the reception of his forgiveness. So, in the parallel passage in Eph. 4:32, the readers are directed to be kind and tenderhearted to one another, “forgiving one another, just as God in Christ forgave you.” In fact, Paul reproduces Jesus’ insistence on the close relation between God’s forgiveness of us and our forgiveness of others in a way that suggests he may have known the Lord’s Prayer.^[6]”

“The idea is, that if another one has given us just occasion of complaint, we are to forgive him; that is, we are:

(1) To harbor no malice against him;

(2) We are to be ready to do him good as if he had not given us occasion of complaint;

(3) We are to be willing to declare that we forgive him when be asks it; and,

(4) We are always afterward to treat him as kindly as if he had not injured us - as God treats us when he forgives us; see the notes at Mat 18:21.

Even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye - Learn here that Christ has power to forgive sin; compare the Mat 9:6 note; Act 5:31 note. Christ forgave us:

(1) Freely - he did not hesitate or delay when we asked him;

(2) Entirely - he pardoned all our offenses;

(3) Forever - he did it so as to remember our sins no more, and to treat us ever onward as if we had not sinned.

So we should forgive an offending brother.^[7]”

3. Takeaways:

1) When do we forgive? Right after they ask for it or indicate they want it.

2) What if they do it again? Mat 18:21-22  “Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.”

3) How do I open the door to forgiveness? A key to getting someone to seek forgiveness is when we tell them they have hurt us. Before God forgives a sinner he points out that the sinner has sinned against him.

4) What if the person refuses to repent, apologize etc? Then you cannot forgive them, you can be ready to forgive them, and you can treat them with love/respect. What you need to be on guard against is bitterness. But I have found that pointing out that someone has hurt me even if they don’t apologize, makes it easier for me to not be bitter. Bitterness produces malice and envy.

5) Make room for the uniqueness of people: not everyone is like you, and they don’t have to be nor can they be.

6) Jesus gives us the great teaching on this in Matthew 5:43-48

We have no excuse for not loving people even when we have issues with them.

~ Amen