Like a Broken Record

“Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you” (Ephesians 4:32).

Anyone who has known me for very long knows that my heart beats for the Body of Christ. I, like the Apostle Paul, long to see Christ’s Church be all that she was designed to be when she was birthed in that Jerusalem upper room on the first Pentecost following Jesus’ death, burial, and resurrection. On the day of her birth, He gave the Church a wonderful gift that would empower her and equip her to be all that God created her to be and to do all that God created her to do. That gift was the Holy Spirit.

Many years ago, God brought to my attention twenty-nine “one another” admonitions found throughout the New Testament. Since then, my message has been like a broken record: the “one another” admonitions have preoccupied my thinking, my preaching, and my writing. Of those twenty-nine admonitions, only two have an accompanying caveat: love one another, just as Christ has loved you (John 13:34), and forgive one another, just as God in Christ has forgiven you (Ephesians 4:32).

When the Apostle Paul wrote to the church in Corinth, he said that he had heard rumors of division and dissension in their midst. That division not only pitted brothers and sisters in Christ against one another but also destroyed their public witness.

I constantly stand in awe at how completely God has forgiven me. I have been forgiven of all my sins and transgressions through the atoning blood of Christ (Hebrews 10:19–22). Not only have I been forgiven, but God has also blotted out my transgressions and remembers them no more: “I, I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins” (Isaiah 43:25).

What does this look like in its practical application? It looks like this: should I ever go back to God and dig up a past transgression for which He has forgiven me, His response might be, “My child, I don’t know what you are talking about. I promised never to bring that up again, and neither should you.”

This example illustrates how we are called to forgive others. Remember, we are called to forgive others just as Christ has forgiven us—totally, absolutely, and irrevocably. When I forgive another in this manner, from my side of the fence, that means I will never mention this transgression again. You are now free. If it ever comes up again in conversation, you will be the one who brings it up, not me, because I want to do for you as God in Christ has done for me. Our expressions of forgiveness are to flow out of an awareness of and a sense of gratitude for the forgiveness we have received from Christ, coupled with our willingness to obey God’s command to forgive.

Is there someone you need to forgive? As a recipient of God’s forgiveness in Christ, you are called to forgive as He has forgiven you. Is that easy? No, it is not. But it is possible through the power of the Holy Spirit who lives inside of you. Remember, the Holy Spirit is the very Spirit of Jesus. “I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may be with you forever. … I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you” (John 14:16–18).

Also, we do not forgive because we feel like it or because it is easy. We forgive out of obedience to God’s command, following the example modeled for us in Christ. This I have found in my own life: when I choose to forgive, He can and will make the feelings follow.

Forgiveness is the subject of chapter two of my book The One Another Project. That chapter ends with this paragraph: “When you forgive in the manner that Christ has commanded you to forgive, you will find that a captive has been set free, and much to your surprise, you will find that the captive is you.”