Forgive them. - 2 Corinthians 2:5-11
One of the last things anyone wants to do when they have been hurt by someone is forgive them. Indeed, when you have been hurt by someone there are at least three things most of us would rather do than forgive them. The first thing that most of us would rather do is seek some sort of vengeance or retribution that causes them to hurt them the way they have hurt us. The second thing most of us might like to do to someone who has hurt us is hold a grudge or harbor a resentment against them, and possibly even share that grudge and spread that resentment to others so that more and more people feel the same way about the person who hurt us as we do. The third thing most of us might like to do to someone who has hurt us is shun and shut them out of our lives. What happens to them is of no concern to us. They may still draw breath but as far as we are concerned, they are dead to us.
There are at least three things that most of us would rather do to someone who has hurt us, but today our God calls upon us to do the last thing most of us want to do. Today our God calls upon us to forgive them.
In the congregation in Corinth there was a man who had hurt more than one person. In verse 5 Paul identifies the man as “anyone”. Paul writes, “5 If anyone has caused grief, he has not so much grieved me as he has grieved all of you, to some extent—not to put it too severely.” The sordid details of the man’s actions are recorded in Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians but since Paul does not see fit to re-mention them here, I will spare you the details. It is enough for us to know that the man had hurt people with his sinful actions. At first the man had no remorse for the hurt he had caused the people around him with his sinful actions. So, Paul instructed the congregation in Corinth to “5 hand this man over to Satan, so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord.” By instructing them to “hand the man over to Satan” Paul was telling the believers in Corinth to preach the law to the man whose sinful actions had hurt other people. The hope was that the man would realize that by his sinful actions he had placed himself outside of the grace of God and if he were to die in his sin and outside of God’s grace the man would go to hell. The intent of preaching the law with such brutal honesty was to scare the hell out of the man, literally. The intent was to show the man the seriousness of his sin so that he would understand the eternal punishment he deserved, regret his sinful actions and repent. And praise be to God, that is exactly what happened. The man who had hurt so many was penitent; he was sorry for his sin.
The question now was what should be done with the penitent man? He saw his sin. He regrated his sin. He repented of his sin… but that did not change the fact that he had hurt people. What should the people who had been hurt by this man do? Paul tells them to do the last thing that any of them wanted to do. Paul tells them, For the good of the penitent, for the good of you personally, for the good of the people of God, forgive him.
God, through the pen of Paul, instructs us to forgive the penitent people who have hurt us. In verses 6-8 Paul wrote, “6 The punishment inflicted on him by the majority is sufficient for him. 7 Now instead, you ought to forgive and comfort him, so that he will not be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. 8 I urge you, therefore, to reaffirm your love for him.” When God’s law is preached with brutal honesty it rightly fills a sinner with sorrow. Now, sorrow over sin is good. It drives the sinner to the foot of the cross where their Savior offers them forgiveness. However, along the way to the cross, it is easy for the sinner to get lost in their sorrow. It is easy for a sinner to see themselves so far outside of God’s grace that they imagine themselves a lost cause. Such excessive sorrow can be so overwhelming that the sinner never finds their way to the foot of the cross.
Now let me be clear, Jesus’ perfect life and sacrificial death is what forgives a penitent person, but often what keeps them from being overwhelmed by excessive sorrow is hearing the words, “you are forgiven”. Therefore, I urge you, Paul says to you and to me, reaffirm your love for the penitent person who has hurt you. Tell them, assure them, proclaim to them that they are forgiven. They need to hear it, even if it is hard for you to say it. They need to hear the words “you are forgiven”. Don’t tell them it’s O.K., Don’t pretend it never happened. Tell them, “I forgive you.”
They need to hear it as badly as you need to hear it. How would you like it if I changed the liturgy of the confession and absolution so that after you confessed that you had sinned against your God in your thoughts words and actions and confessed that you deserved punishment both now and in eternity because of those sin, I said to you, it’s O.K. or forget about it. Most of you would not like it, many of you would be calling me on the phone, a few of you would let me have it on your way out of church. You don’t want to be told it’s O.K., you don’t want to pretend like it never happened you want, you NEED to be told you are forgiven. So do they!!! So do the penitent people who have hurt you. Like all penitent sinners they struggle with the overwhelming effects of excessive sorrow. For the good of the penitent, forgive them.
If forgiveness were only for the good of the penitent, it would be reason enough for us to forgive. However, God pushed the pen of Paul to write a bit more so that we might also understand how forgiveness is good for us personally. In verse 9 Paul wrote, “9 The reason I wrote you was to see if you would stand the test and be obedient in everything.” When Paul writes about “standing the test” he is talking about the genuineness of your faith. When a penitent person stands before you, seeking forgiveness, you have an opportunity to demonstrate the genuineness of your faith by your actions.
Refusing to forgive people who have hurt us is not a demonstration of our faith it is a demonstration of our desire to play God. We like to pretend we have the right to get even with those who have hurt us and imagine ourselves to be judge jury and executioner. But in Deuteronomy 32:25 we are reminded the part of judge jury and executioner doesn’t belong to us; it belongs to God. “It is mine to avenge; I will repay.” Says the LORD. Further, we act as if our God is a senile old man who might forget the transgressions of those who have hurt us. So, we meticulously record every one of their transgressions in our own personal ledger. Forgetting that on judgement day it will not be our list of grievances that will be consulted but the LORD’s book of life.[1] Finally, by callously shutting people out of our lives and turning our backs on them we are in effect telling Jesus to stop acting like crybaby as He weeps over the lost and cries out for them to “Turn! Turn from your evil ways!”[2]
When we refuse to forgive the people who have hurt us, we play the part of a false petty god. But the true God is not eager to see people suffer, He does not keep grudges and the last thing He wants is to shut people out. Thankfully, for our sake as much if not more than anyone else’s sake, our God is a forgiving God. Our God reveals Himself to us as a “compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin.”[3] And forgiving you and forgiving me even for our sinful failure to forgive others.
Our sinful nature tempts us to play the part of God. However, It is when we forgive others that we most closely resemble our God. When you seek restoration instead of revenge you resemble your God. When you give up your grudge and choose to remember someone’ sins no more, you resemble your God. When you turn to sinners with a warm heart instead of a cold shoulder you resemble your God. When you forgive people who hurt you, you demonstrate the genuineness of your faith, which is why forgiving them is personally good for you.
Through Paul God has shown us how forgiveness is good for the penitent and is personally good for us, but God pushes the pen of Paul a bit further to show us forgiveness is also good for the people of God. In verses 10-11 Paul wrote, “10 If you forgive anyone, I also forgive him. And what I have forgiven—if there was anything to forgive—I have forgiven in the sight of Christ for your sake, 11 in order that Satan might not outwit us. For we are not unaware of his schemes.” It may be that every member of the congregation does not need to know the dirty details of the sin that grieved the saints. But the sin must be identified as sin. Part of the problem in Corinth was the believers at first tolerated the sin perhaps ignored it in the hopes that it would just go away. But that is not how sin works. When Satan discovers that a sin is being tolerated, he uses that sin to tear a congregation apart. Sin must be identified as sin, but it must not be used by a congregation to manipulate behavior or coerce conduct. When Satan finds out that sin is being used to manipulate or coerce, he uses that sin to tear a congregation apart.
Satan wants us to outwit us, he wants us to either tolerate or weaponize sin so that he can tear us apart. But when the people of God bring a sinner to repentance and then proclaim that sinner to be fully and freely forgiven in the sight of Christ and His congregation the devil’s schemes are undone. It is not just the angels in heaven who rejoice over one sinner who repents, we, the Saints militant, also rejoice, for in forgiveness we individual sinners are united into one body. We forgive them when they hurt us because forgiveness is good for the people of God.
When someone hurts you the last thing you might want to do is forgive them, but that is the first thing your God calls you to do. Your God calls upon you to forgive those who have hurt you because it is good for the penitent, it is personally good for you, and it is good for the people of God. I know it isn’t easy to forgive the people who have hurt you, but today the God who has forgiven you has equipped you to forgive them. Amen.
[1] Revelation 20:15
[2] Ezekiel 33:11
[3] Exodus 34:6