Forgiveness: Increase Our Faith

I admit that forgiveness is something that does not often occupy my thoughts—it can be an assumed duty as a Christian along with the commandment of “love one another,” but it can also be avoided as a method to rationalize our anger. The topic of forgiveness is sometimes brushed over within religious circles because as humans, we feel that our anger and bitterness is justified. It’s almost as if holding a grudge against someone who has wronged us can be qualified as “righteous anger”; after all, don’t they deserve to recognize their own sin and then ask us for forgiveness?


Photo Credit: Gerry Machen, Creative Commons

Luke 17 begins with Jesus speaking to his disciples; he tells them that, “Things that cause people to stumble are bound to come, but woe to anyone through whom they come.” Jesus is letting them know that we will encounter hurt and pain in this world, sometimes at the hand of others. We then read Jesus’s first shocking statement: “It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.” As Pastor Dirk explained, the millstone being referred to here is a large commercial stone used for grinding large amounts of grain or crops. In other words, it is better that someone drowns rather than causing a believer to stumble.

Jesus continues, “If your brother or sister sins against you, rebuke them; and if they repent, forgive them.” If we stop reading here, it might be easy to think that our assumptions about holding grudges and withholding forgiveness are correct. Do we really have the right to wait until a brother or sister repents before offering them forgiveness? That idea doesn’t quite line up with the rest of Jesus’s teachings, so we keep reading for more information: “Even if they sin against you seven times in a day and seven times come back to you saying ‘I repent,’ you must forgive them.”

In this case, Jesus is addressing forgiveness within the context of the cultural norm of the Pharisees. It was common practice to forgive each other with urgency, based on the belief that the priest could only offer forgiveness on the Day of Atonement if forgiveness was already extended amongst each other. In order to avoid getting taken advantage of in terms of forgiveness, the Pharisees said that you only need to forgive another three times, and that was considered generous. Jesus again disagrees with the Pharisees and calls his disciples to forgive unconditionally.

It is this type of forgiveness that Jesus illustrated when he died on the cross and extended his forgiveness to all of our sins. He asks us to offer this same kind of forgiveness—the kind that is given regardless of whether the person is deserving or not. It recognizes the humanity in each of us and allows us to look past sin as a defining characteristic and see each individual as a child of God. Rather than writing off forgiveness as an assumed Christian duty, we must intentionally seek to let go of our anger and bitterness toward those who have hurt us. As the disciples say in Luke 17, “Increase our faith” so that we might experience and offer true forgiveness just as Christ offered it to us on the cross. As Paul says in Ephesians 4:32, “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.”

For a song that reflects on this message, check out Losing by Tenth Avenue North.


[Megan Stephenson is a recent graduate of Grand Valley State University and works for a private education group in Grand Rapids as an Assistant Registrar. She loves spending time with her husband, Ben, trying out new breweries, restaurants, and local attractions. She also self-identifies as a crazy cat lady, despite owning no cats of her own, thanks to her loving and allergic husband.]