SUSTAINING FORGIVENSS (FORGIVENESS Series 20)
Retribution for wrongdoing must be swiftly and surely applied if greater problems are to be prevented. – I Ching.
Conditional Forgiveness
Any gift abused can be forfeited, even forGIVEness. We find a case in the parable of the unforgiving servant in Matthew 18:30-35. That servant was granted forgiveness, but he lost it entirely when he failed certain inherent conditions in the gift that he had received; he lost it when he failed to dispense to another the same forgiveness that he had been given generously. He got sent back into jail “until…”; he got sent back again for the same charges that he had previously received forgiveness for; he got sent back to the same jail by the same king who had freely forgiven him only a while before.
The implication is that forgiveness could be conditional. Despite having been forgiven, when the inherent forgiveness-conditions were broken by the unforgiving servant, the pardon was promptly revoked. The way to maintain forgiveness, therefore, is by maintaining the conditions in the ‘forgiveness package,’ even where those conditions might not have been expressly itemised. Even with God, forgiveness is not absolute, not perpetual, not irreversible. One who was forgiven today, if they should turn back to their evil ways tomorrow, would still be lost in hell for their later sins, in spite of the past forgiveness for previous sins (Ezekiel 18:24; Acts 1:17-20).
Jesus said to a mob-condemned woman purported to have been caught in the act of adultery, “go and sin no more” (John 8:11; 5:14). That was not a congratulatory message. Jesus was implicitly attaching a commandment (or a condition) to the new status of forgiveness that she had received. That statement could also have read, “Go free, but sin no more as you go.” Forgiveness does not give license to the trespasser to go and repeat their offence; it merely grants them another chance to go and not continue in the old ways. To relapse into ‘the sin’ after receiving forgiveness is to forfeit the forgiveness. Even where a slip might repeat, the heart of the fallen should be penitent enough to show seven times that the fresh trespass was not intended (Luke 17:4), and that it is an ongoing battle with the self to overcome the inherent weakness that results in the offence. Many an offended good person will not only forgive this repeating trespasser but join hands with them in the sincere battle to fight the weakness. What the heart says or shows is important in such recurrent relational conflicts.
Post-Forgiveness Precautions
Some are of the very pious opinion that if forgiveness be really true, it should be ‘total’ and ‘without conditions.’ No. Even Jesus gave conditions, as in John 8:11 above: “Go and sin no more.” Forgiveness that is so naïvely holy as to fail to pay attention to those factors that often provoke the offence, will sooner be vexed back to the negotiation table to retake the failed exam. If both confessor and forgiver would agree to take note of how the offences have often come, they will more easily prevent reoccurrence. Any intermediating priest or feuding party who says to cover up ‘old wounds’ with the holy plaster of ‘forgiveness’ without dressing the smarting sores, is a fake physician in unconscious league with Satan to ulcerate the sores so badly until that part of the body will have to be amputated to save the threatened life of the wounded who had been ‘treated’ sadly ineptly in the past. King David might have exploited the principle of conditions in forgiveness in his dealings with the trespassers whose files he passed on to his son and successor, but he showed nonetheless an awareness of the fact of conditions to forgiveness, some forgiveness (1 Kings 2:5-9, 36-46).
The woman of whom we read in John 8:11 was not the only one to whom Jesus gave forgiveness with conditions. In John 5:1-14, He had healed a man that He later found in the temple. Promptly, Jesus sounded the warning that even though he had been “made whole,” a “worse” crisis could still come upon him if he thought that he had been forgiven so thoroughly and lavishly that he could afford thereafter to live as he pleased. “Sin no more” was an assurance that the past records had been cleared, but “sin no more” was also a warning to not put new sins into the clean file.
Afterward Jesus findeth him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art made whole: sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee (John 5:14).
What did Jesus mean by “lest” in that statement? Why didn’t He simply say, “Go,” or merely, “Go and sin no more…”? What was the implication of the ‘lest’ clause? Jesus was highlighting post-forgiveness precautions and conditions. Jesus was revealing that, dramatic and historic as the man’s healing and forgiveness had been, there were ‘conditions’ attached, and there would be serious consequences if those conditions should be breached.
Anyone seeking forgiveness for the past but unwilling to commit to future harmony is not sincere about peacemaking. To audaciously continue the offensive lifestyle after having been forgiven is to forfeit the forgiveness and relapse into a previous or worse state of sickness; to so take forgiveness for granted is to abort the recovery process and cause a fresh degeneration in the relationship between the parties (Matthew 12:43-45). Taking people for granted because they will forgive after all, sometimes shapes those good people into shockingly ruthless personalities that they had never been known to be (Judges 10:10-14).
Steal no More
Let him that stole steal no more: but rather let him labour, working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth (Ephesians 4:28).
According to Ephesians 4:28 above, forgiveness frees the trespasser from past deeds, not from future sins, therefore “him that stole” (in the past) is admonished to not fall back into the former ways; he is admonished to “steal no more” in the future. Note: If the past forgiveness covered also for future sins, that caution would have been unnecessary. If future trespasses counted nothing at all because of a past forgiveness, then the Apostle had been wasting words by admonishing the forgiven thief to not continue in the old ways. For those who will hear, Apostle Paul was making the point that grace may forgive the past, but it does not also cover for future faults.
Also note the word “labour” in that exhortation. Maintaining the state of forgiveness could sometimes be conscious hard labour. If I used to be a drunk before grace saved me from the alcohol joint, I must not take ‘grace’ for granted but work on myself to not visit such places carelessly, thus opening up to temptation. If I used to have a weakness with sexual promiscuity, it behoves me to ‘labour’ on myself to not put myself in those tempting paths. If I have a weakness with temper, which I have often blamed on everybody else, I should acknowledge that weakness and put deliberate deterrents in my way. In all cases, maintaining the new boundaries could truly be labour. In summary, sustaining or maintaining forgiveness could involve:
- giving to others the same forgiveness that one has received,
- working on oneself (or labouring) to not repeat the lifestyle that brings or brought about the initial offence(s) and repercussions,
- respecting the mutual ‘terms’ of the forgiveness, even where those ‘terms’ might not have been explicitly read out like a riot act.
Culled from the book, Forgiveness, by The Preacher, chapter 11, pp. 169-175
