SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/20/2023 9:50 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
“The Inquiry About Forgiveness”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference:
Matthew 18:21
Message of the
verse: “21
Then Peter came up and said to him, "Lord, how often will my brother sin
against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?’”
It is true that Peter at times opened his mouth but
on many occasions he put his foot into it, but some of the questions that he
had asked Jesus truly help us in learning some very important things, and this
surely is one of those occasions.
I have to believe that Peter knew
human nature and how many times people need forgiveness, and often for the same
offence. A person can sin against
another person, seek forgiveness, and then a little while later do the same
thing and need forgiveness again.
MacArthur writes: “In light of Jesus’ teaching about discipline
in the church, Peter wondered how many times Christians as a body and as
individuals were obliged to forgive fellow believers who persisted in
wrongdoing. How many times should they
be allowed to repent and be restored to fellowship?” We will get the answer to this question as we
continue looking at this section of Scripture.
We
learned in the previous sections about discipline, and this included both
direct and indirect offenses. Believers
are to rebuke a sinning brother or sister for any sin, and I think that this
has much to do with consistent offenses against a brother or sister. We learned the process, or steps of what to
do when this happens in the section on discipline, and so I will not go over
them again. It is good to remember that
every sin a person commits is a sin against God. Let me give you a verse from David’s writing
of Psalm 51, a Psalm that was penned after his sin against Bathsheba, and her
husband. “4 Against You, You only, I
have sinned And done what is evil in Your sight, So that You are justified when
You speak And blameless when You judge.” Now I want to give two verses that our
Lord said: “3 “Be on your guard! If your
brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. 4 "And if he
sins against you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, ‘I
repent,’ forgive him.’” MacArthur adds “The commands to rebuke and to
forgive cover any sin a fellow believer may commit, not just those committed
directly against us.”
Peter
personalized Jesus’ teaching, and his primary concern at this time was about his
own responsibility, as he then asked, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin
against me and I forgive him?”
MacArthur writes “Throughout the discourse of
chapter 18, Jesus was speaking about believers, whom He refers to as little
ones, children, sheep, and brothers (vv. 3-6, 10, 12, 14, 15). From his reference to my brother, it is clear
that Peter also was thinking about a believer, represented by himself,
forgiving other believers.” This is an
important point that MacArthur brings up for us to know.
In
the beginning I wrote about Peter’s questions and stated that because of his
questions we can learn many things from the Lord, whom he was asking these
questions. I believe it is true that God
blesses those who ask sincere questions of Him, because He blesses those who
sincerely seek to know Him and His truth. Jeremiah wrote about this in 29:13 “You
will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.”
Perhaps the question that Peter was asking, which
was “Does forgiveness have a limit?” is a question that we may have ask on
occasions when believers have sinned against us on different occasions, and in
my opinion this happens in our families many times.
It
seems that when Peter said “seven times” that he thought that he was being
generous and perhaps thought that Jesus would be surprised at this number of
times he would be willing to forgive a brother.
In Jewish tradition three times was the number of times a person would
forgive another, and so Peter was actually doubling it and adding one
more. There are a number of verses in
the book of Amos to see this and one also related to this in Job. (Amos 1:3, 6, 9, 11, 13; and Job 33:29 are the
verses, and I will leave it up to you to look them up.) MacArthur writes that “the rabbis had taken a
repeated statement by God against neighboring enemies of Israel and made it
into a universal rule for limiting God’s forgiveness and, by extension, also
man’s. If God forgives men only three
times, they spuriously reasoned, it is unnecessary and even presumptuous for
men to forgive each other more times than that.
Rabbi Jose ben Hanina, for instance, said, ‘He who begs forgiveness from
his neighbor must not do so more than three times.’ Rabbi Jose ben Jehuda said, ‘If a man commits
an offense once, they forgive him; if he commits an offense a second time, they
forgive him; if he commits an offense a third time, they forgive him; the fourth
time they do not forgive him.’”
From
this paragraph we just quoted from we can see where Peter must have gotten his information
from, and as stated he probably thought that he was being generous in doubling
it and adding one more.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: “23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try
me and know my anxious thoughts; 24 And see if there be any hurtful way in me,
And lead me in the everlasting way” (Ps. 139:23-24).
My Steps of Faith for Today: Stay very close to the Lord each and every
day in order that I don’t sin against anyone.
1/20/2023 10:36 AM
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