New Testament Forgiveness - Rightly Dividing the Word
If we hold fast to an unforgiving spirit, we will not be forgiven by God. If we continue on in that way, then we will not go to heaven, because heaven is the dwelling place of forgiven people.
In examining New Testament forgiveness, it is necessary to understand that the Word of God must be cut straight or rightly divided. This statement was made by a prominent preacher/theologian and I pulled it from his website yesterday. If we believed and acted on his statement, our salvation and our final destiny would not rest on the finished redemptive work of Jesus Christ, but on the vagaries of our everyday life. Indeed, this statement conflicts with Romans 10:9 which says that if anyone believes that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead and confesses him as “Lord,” he shall be saved. It also contradicts Jesus’s own statement in John 3:3.
Jesus answered and said unto him, ‘Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. (KJV)
Does a man miss heaven because he held a grudge against someone?
Many times we misconstrue the Word and that leads to statements like this preacher’s. For example, in Romans 3:10, the Word says,
as it is written, ‘There is none righteous, no, not one.’ (KJV)
Many preachers have used that verse to describe all of mankind, heathen and Christian alike. Consequently, many Christians have left their churches believing that they continue to stand condemned before God. That doctrinal stance, as applied to Christians, however, contradicts I John 1:9 which reads,
If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (KJV)
If the Christian may be cleansed from all unrighteousness, what of that Romans verse?
Let me give another example. In Luke 11:1, the disciples approached Jesus and asked Him to teach them how to pray. Jesus, in turn, gave them what we today call the “Lord’s Prayer.” Preachers today all over the world instruct their congregations to pray the Lord’s Prayer. In fact, some years ago Larry Lea preached the idea that the Lord’s Prayer wasn’t actually supposed to be recited verbatim, but was an outline for us, New Testament believers, to use in our prayer life. Later in His ministry, however, Jesus told these very same disciples of a new era of prayer. In John 16:24, He said to them,
Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be fulfilled. (RV)
If the disciples were to continue to pray in the Church Age in the manner of the Lord’s Prayer, why did Jesus change it up? Why would He say to them that up to that period of time they hadn’t asked anything in prayer in His name, but now they were supposed to? Again, it falls to rightly dividing the Word.
The minister quoted above has taken Jesus’s statement found just after the Lord’s Prayer in Matthew, “For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you,” and has applied it without regard to the age it was spoken in, Jesus’s subsequent teachings, and the resurrection. When Jesus spoke about forgiveness in Matthew, He was speaking to Jews who were under the Law. Under the Law, men were only forgiven sins when they had forgiven sins. We, as New Testament believers, have a “better” covenant and our rules for exercising forgiveness are vastly different from those who lived under the Law. We do not forgive in order for our Father to forgive. We forgive because we have already been forgiven through redemption:
And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you. (Ephesians 4:32, KJV)
In future posts, I will explore the doctrinal bases and mechanics of New Testament forgiveness. It is one of the most wonderful spiritual exercises that we can employ in our Christian walk.