By Pastor Kyle Smith
As we consider the fifth petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us,” it can often be the petition that is the hardest to pray honestly. We all want to be forgiven when we wrong someone, don’t we? And yet, sometimes it’s hard to forgive other people when they have wronged us. It’s true, holding on to anger and bitterness is significantly easier and more natural than forgiving someone. Why pray this petition if it’s so hard?
We pray the fifth petition, first of all, because we are all in need of God’s forgiveness. We are by nature sinful and unclean, and our sin separates us from God, as we see in Isaiah 59:2, “Your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden His face from you so that He does not hear.” God has no desire to be separated from us, which is why He sent His Son, Jesus, to make all things new and bring us back to Him.
Forgiveness ends the separation we had from God and also frees us by giving us peace with God. Taking a look at Romans 8:7-8, we see the position we have with God while still living in our sin, “For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.” Being hostile to God? Not being able to please God? That’s pretty serious. This is where the beauty of Romans 5:1 comes in, “Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Like a seemingly healthy person who doesn’t realize they are sick, sometimes we don’t want to admit our sinfulness, but we see in 1 John 1:8-10 a warning against this temptation, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.” We are all in need of God’s forgiveness, and He offers it to us and promises to forgive us and end the separation between us and God - how wonderful!
The second reason it’s important to pray the fifth petition is that it changes the way we interact with other people. Have you ever met a Christian who seems to look down on others for their sin? I know I’ve met those Christians. I’ve even been that Christian. But when we pray the fifth petition we are reminded of our own need for God’s forgiveness because we all fall short of God’s glory, as we see in Romans 3:23-24, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by His grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.” We all sin, but sometimes the sins we struggle with are different sins than someone else. But whatever the sin is, we are all equal before the cross, equal in that we are sinners, and equal in that we are offered God’s grace through the redemption of Jesus.
And because of this grace through the redemption of Jesus, the Holy Spirit enables us to forgive others who have sinned against us. We are commanded to forgive others, such as in Matthew 18:21-22, “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?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.’” Does this mean that forgiveness from God depends on our ability to forgive others? Thankfully not!
There are two complementary truths at work in the fifth petition. The first is that, since we are by nature sinful and unclean, there will be times when it will be hard to forgive someone who wrongs us, but we should desire to forgive them, even when it’s difficult. We are even commanded to forgive, and when we refuse to forgive someone, we are rejecting God’s forgiveness for ourselves. Second, God’s grace through Jesus is not earned. God freely shows us His grace and mercy and forgives us solely based on Christ’s work in His life, death, and resurrection. There is a tension in these two complementary truths, but it’s a healthy tension laid out in Scripture, so we hold to both.
As we consider the fifth petition of the Lord’s Prayer, “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us,” we often struggle, and that’s normal! Holding on to anger and bitterness is natural, while forgiveness is not. And yet we know that we are all in need of forgiveness, not only those who have wronged us, but we need forgiveness as well.
Our sin separates us from God, while God’s forgiveness through Jesus ends that separation and we can once again have a right standing before God our Father thanks to the work of Jesus. It is because of this work of forgiveness freely given to us, over time the Holy Spirit works in us and gives us the desire to forgive others. We don’t forgive others to earn our forgiveness, but because we ourselves have been forgiven.