In a world that screams for justice and cherishes the grudge, how can the counter-cultural concept of Christian forgiveness help us point to Jesus?

By Young Adult Contributor, Philip Cartwright

In today’s society, it is unbelievably common to see and partake in all forms of hatred. I myself am no stranger to fighting people I deem to be worthy of hate over the internet. Often, we get so caught up in trying to prevent others from sinning against themselves or others that we forget to love them first and approach them where they are. When I get cut off in traffic and suddenly experience the fury of a thousand suns, it can be difficult to stop and give some grace to the person who may be running late. Although my initial human reaction is to step on the gas and run that moron off of the road, through the power Christ provides, I am able to maintain my composure and avoid falling into the costly habit of ramming every misguided driver I see off of the road. However, if I’m honest, I still find myself angry, wondering why that person didn’t treat me like their God and give them the right of way. Behind all that anger is a sense of pride and an inability to be humble and understand the other person’s situation.

God’s Forgiveness

“For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Romans 6:23, NASB1995

So what now? I’m sitting in my car eternally dammed because the wages of sin is death, right? I couldn’t contain my pride and made myself my own God, even if for just a second, and now I must face justice. Well obviously that’s silly, God is merciful and loving and is willing to FORGIVE unconditionally. Even though, in a proverbial sense, we have cut God off in traffic and put ourselves in front of him within our own lives over and over,, he doesn’t run us off the road (even though he has every right to). In fact, he gives us a whole new Car and puts us on a different highway where the destination is eternal life! 

God’s Grace

“He brought me up out of the pit of destruction, out of the miry clay, And He set my feet upon a rock making my footsteps firm.”

Psalm 40:2, NASB1995

That level of forgiveness is completely unheard of. The absolute best of us often find ourselves “forgiving” people without any form of reconciliation or change of feelings towards them. Instead of running them off the road, we just shout at them and hold resentment towards them and their bad driving. We laugh when we see them broken down on the side of the road after red lining their beat up Chevy. Is that forgiveness? Or is that doing the bare minimum to appear like the better person? 

Think about it: we ourselves put our own feet into the miry bog and leaped into the pit of destruction as acts of direct defiance of our creator. We literally claimed to be God, spit at the God were impersonating, then did exactly what he told us not to do. Oh and not just once, we did that and do that every single day, multiple times a day, for our entire life. And not only that, the best we can do through the grace of God and being taught by him the ways of his heart is to transition from constantly leaping into the canyon with a smile on our face to slipping and falling into the canyon and being upset about it. And yet, after all that, he still not only pulls us up out of the pit of destruction and out of the miry bog, but he offers eternal life and a place in his kingdom to us. THAT is what perfect grace and  forgiveness is. We cannot even begin to understand it, but we must strive to achieve even a fraction of it.     

“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.”

John 3:16, NASB1995

By God’s standards, it is most definitely the latter. God doesn’t give us a bare minimum pass by not immediately sending us to hell when we sin.  His forgiveness is on a completely different level! He doesn’t laugh at us when we break down after trying to do it our own way, he picks us up and puts us on the right path. 

What Now?

“1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin so that grace may increase? 2 May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it?”

Romans 6:1,2, NASB1995

“Okay, that’s great! Thanks God!” is what may come to mind as your first reaction. And yes, although we should absolutely praise God for his incredible glory and his perfect forgiveness, that’s not the point of what I’m saying. If I ended there, that would simply be a motivational speech to make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. In reality, what I’m trying to get at is this: as Christians, saved by God’s amazing grace toward us, we should seek to emulate that forgiveness to others.  But so often, why doesn’t our forgiveness look anything like God’s forgiveness? Sure, we’re not perfect (God doesn’t expect us to be), but we are called to reflect Christ (and therefore God) in our actions.

“Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.“

Ephesians 4:31, NASB1995

So how can we be more like God in our forgiveness? Isn’t that an impossible task? No, I don’t think it is. In fact, the Bible gives us some pretty good methods to do so. Firstly, we must be governed by humility.  Pride is the enemy of forgiveness and grace. How can we give grace to those we feel are below us? We must be quick to pray earnestly and work hard in an effort to remove resentment from our hearts. As the verse above commands, we must actively put away bitterness, anger and wrath when it comes.  An effective way to put this into practice is to become more familiar with the Word (and by proxy, become more familiar with the heart of God and his nature, our desperate state apart from Christ, and the radical call of Christ to love others, even when it’s at great cost to ourselves). 

Meditate on pieces of scripture like this often and apply them to everyday situations with humble joy and pleasure.  For example, after meditating on Ephesians 4:31, you may find joy in being kind to that extremely rude coworker of yours.Hebrews10:32-34 addresses the fact that although you may suffer, you may be fired for sharing the gospel at your place of work, you may be assaulted by those you have shown kindness to, and you may be arrested for loving Christ in the future, you can find joy in all those things because you have a greater reward: eternal heaven in Christ Jesus.    You may be able to show kindness to those who by no means deserve it. This is the first and, in my opinion, the most important step towards being more Christlike in our forgiveness.

Our Assignment

“44 But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.“

Matthew 5:44,45, NASB1995

Once, by God’s grace, bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and malice are put away from us, what further things can we do to strive to grow in our ability and eagerness to forgive? On the positive side, at least in one sense, the hardest part is done. Yes, the battle to conquer these sins is not a one time thing – we may even find bitterness or anger rising up in our heart more than once in any particular situation – but the question is, once we’ve committed to killing this sin, what else should we be doing?  

On the more difficult side of things, our forgiveness should actually overflow in a heart that longs to bring the Gospel to these people and pray for them in our newfound forgiveness. We must turn the other cheek when they aren’t receptive and are angry at us for caring, and we must walk the extra mile for them in order to show them the extent of God’s love for them. When people see this form of love, they often become curious as to where it comes from. This is a great opportunity to share the Gospel with them and watch God work in their life. It is our duty—not just an extra side quest or optional task—to share the Love God has for us to those who don’t “deserve” it. None of us share the Gospel as much as we should, and many of us don’t do it at all. THAT is what I am trying to tell you.

What you’re reading isn’t a statement on God’s ability to forgive (although in a more complex way, it actually is), but it’s a call to action! I’m saying that we all need to share God’s glory better in our lives, and especially in modeling the virtue of forgiveness .  The truth is, none of us are doing a good enough job at it. If you feel content with your current faith and place on earth as a Christian, you’re doing it incorrectly. If you’re looking for something to focus on and try to perfect, it’s this: perfect your ability to forgive, because it will perfect your ability to love. Because when someone is able to love in abundance, every other good virtue will come with it. Peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control all flow out from a place of love – and that Love flows from a Spirit-empowered understanding and embracing the Gospel.

Love and resentment are mutually exclusive – one cannot simultaneously love those they resent. If we loved fully and didn’t resent one another, the church would be whole, society would be brought up from the ashes, and God would be the sole focus of our life.

By God’s grace, and is his power, will you do your part in making that a reality in your own life – so that it may abound in the lives of those around you as well?

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About the Author

Philip was born into a Christian family in Jacksonville, FL, where he was raised at Monument Point Fellowship and baptized at the age of 8. Passionate about theology and ministry, Philip enjoys attending and serving at youth church camps during the summer, and never shies away from a good theological debate. Philip now lives in St Augustine, where he attends high school. Philip looks to attend college and dreams of founding a Christian school which would offer its students a more well rounded, broad and robust education that best prepares them for life and ministry.