Up to Seventy Times Seven
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April 06, 2014 |
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 "Then Peter came and said to Him, 'Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to seven times?' Jesus said to him, 'I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven'" (Matthew 18:21-22).
Senior Pastor Dr. Jaerock Lee
In general when people talk about those who are evil they might say things like, "No matter how hard I try to understand him I can't understand him at all." or "I really try hard to forgive him, but he's just unforgiveable."
However, if we have the love of God in our hearts, we can understand evil people in goodness and embrace them with love. We will not say, "I like this person for this reason, but I don't like that person because…" We must not hate anybody. We should not become discomforted because of others, much less ever feeling enmity toward anyone.
Then, what should we do as God's children in order to embrace all people with love?
1. The God of endless forgiveness and love
When Peter said to Jesus, "Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to seven times?" he thought that it was great mercy to forgive his brother who sinned against him up to seven times.
Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven." Was He telling us to forgive others up to seventy times seven, that is, 490 times? No, He wasn't. He was talking about endless forgiveness. In other words, the number '7' is the one of perfectness, so 'seventy times seven' has the meaning of 'endless and perfect forgiveness'.
If God had forgiven us of our sins only 490 times, how many people could have been saved? God has endured with us for a long time and He has repeatedly forgiven us of our sins with His boundless love. That is why we can receive salvation and enter Heaven. 1 John 1:7 reads, "But if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin."
If we repent before God and practice the Word of God who is the Light, we can be cleansed from all our sins. This good God is our Father. So, we should resemble Him and endure even people whose sin was committed against us. We should forgive them and give love to them.
2. God wants to give opportunities to repent
Genesis 18 and 19 describe the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. The people there committed grave sins and evil so they had no choice but to receive judgment. But God didn't destroy them immediately. Rather, He sent His angels and had them search throughout the cities to find anything by which they might be saved.
Abraham knew this heart of God better than anyone, so several times over he asked to save Sodom and Gomorrah. He asked God not to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah if he could find just fifty righteous men there, then forty, and thirty. Eventually he received a definitive answer from God that He would not destroy the cities if just ten righteous men were found. However, there were not ten righteous men in the cities and they fell.
Jeremiah 18:7-8 reads, "At one moment I might speak concerning a nation or concerning a kingdom to uproot, to pull down, or to destroy it; if that nation against which I have spoken turns from its evil, I will relent concerning the calamity I planned to bring on it." If people in Sodom and Gomorrah had turned away from sins, God would not have destroyed them. However, they were greatly stained with sin and evil such that their evil already went beyond the limit. So, God could do nothing else but demolish the cities.
However, the people of Nineveh were different. The city was also so full of sin and evil that judgment was inevitable. God sent Jonah to the people and warned them. When Jonah said, "Yet forty days and Nineveh will be overthrown", the King, all people, and even beasts fasted and they repented. Then, God forgave them and had mercy on them.
Ezekiel 33:14-15 says, "But when I say to the wicked, 'You will surely die,' and he turns from his sin and practices justice and righteousness, if a wicked man restores a pledge, pays back what he has taken by robbery, walks by the statutes which ensure life without committing iniquity, he shall surely live; he shall not die."
Even though a person is evil, God wants to give him a chance to repent and save him. We should feel the true love of God who will remove our transgression from us as far as east is from west if we repent.
3. Jesus forgave people with the love of the cross
Jesus interceded for people with love even though they were the ones who were mere creatures that despised, persecuted, and crucified Him. He prayed on the cros, "Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing" (Luke 23:34).
Here, 'they' refers to not just those who at the time were persecuting, crucifying, and despising Jesus, but 'they' also includes all people who haven't accepted Jesus as their Savior and continue to dwell and act in darkness even after He completed the providence of salvation for them.
Because those who belong to darkness hate light and truth, they couldn't recognize Jesus who came to the earth to redeem all men from their sins and they crucified Him. However, He asked God with love to forgive them since they had sinned due to ignorance of the truth.
Though he had committed no sin, Deacon Stephen also interceded for people who were stoning him saying, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them!" (Acts 7:60) Today it is very hard to find someone who prays for those who persecute him and loves even his enemy.
When we try to act in the Light, Satan manipulates evil people into persecuting us and disturbing our works. Even if somebody gives us a hard time for no reason and persecutes us, we should have the love to have mercy on them and even ask God to extend His forgiveness to them just as Jesus and Deacon Stephen did.
Here, we must be aware that while there are forgivable sins there are unforgivable sins against God. In 1 John 5:16, God says that we should make no request for forgiveness of non-remissible sins leading to death.
Hebrews 6:4-6 reads, "For in the case of those who have once been enlightened and have tasted of the heavenly gift and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God and the powers of the age to come, and then have fallen away, it is impossible to renew them again to repentance, since they again crucify to themselves the Son of God and put Him to open shame." Hebrews 10:26-27 also says, "For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries."
Then, what should we do as God's children? We must hate sin but we must not hate the person. We should forgive with love and lead to salvation those who persecute us and trouble us as well as those who do good to us and treat us well.
Our hearts should resemble the heart of God who wants to give boundless forgiveness and love and save people. We should also take after Jesus who told us to forgive others up to seventy times seven and interceded with love for people who crucified Him.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, Psalm 130:3 reads, "If You, LORD, should mark iniquities, O LORD, who could stand?" If God hadn't had mercy on us and judged all within justice, nobody could have stood before Him. However, He has forgiven people who couldn't have been forgiven within the justice. We have received such love and forgiveness as this. Therefore, I pray in the name of the Lord that you will forgive and love even those who do harm to you.
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