Truth of Forgiveness

 DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO LUKE

TRUTH OF FORGIVENESS

Luke 17:3-4

"If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him. 4 If he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times comes back to you and says, 'I repent,' forgive him." 

NIV

There is absolutely no reason whatsoever, and that is the gospel truth, for holding a grudge, having unforgiveness in our hearts toward our fellow believers who ask for our forgiveness because they offended us in some way, or as Jesus put is sinned against us. Even if they did it again and again asked for us to forgive them, we must forgive and let it go. That is where the truth if forgiveness lies. The three Greek words that give a greater clarity to this truth Jesus spoke about here, rebuke, repent, and forgive. It is very interesting that the word translated as rebuke, is epitimaoo, which its main or first meaning is to show honor to, to honor. It also is used to raise the price of, to adjudge, award, rate, and finally to chide, rebuke, reprove, censure severely. This rebuking is used in the context of what Paul instructed Timothy to preach the word to be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage with great patience and careful instruction. What we see here is that when a brother sins against us, which in essence means he has offended us, done something that hurts our feelings, or causes us some kind of mental anguish, or even perhaps does something physical against us, stealing from us, when we go to rebuke him, it is doing so not  looking  down or out of anger, but with honoring him, respecting him as a brother in Christ, correcting with encouragement. This means, not being judgmental, thinking ourselves better then him, looking at this brother with distain because he offended us. We think we should first understand the Greek word, hamartano which is translated as sin, has a direct meaning, to miss the mark, as so not share in the prize, to err, to sin. So then if a brother is not perfect, missing the mark of perfection, in his attitude or behavior toward us, and after with honor, grace, and love in our hearts go to him and reveal how he offended us, and he changes his mind, repents, seeking forgiveness, we have no choice but to forgive him, and even if he does it again and again and every times comes repenting, we are to constantly forgive. Here is where the rubber meets the road when we look into the Greek word translated forgive, forgiveness, forgiving or whatever form of forgive we can use. It is afieemi; and has two major meanings, to send away, to permit not to hinder. When we forgive, we send that offense away, we make it depart, yield it up, let it expire, let it go, let it alone, let it be, to disregard, leave not to discuss, to keep no longer, with the second meaning to permit or allow, not to hinder, to give up, to leave it go. This is the truth in forgiveness, which lies directly on our shoulders.