21 Then Peter approached him and asked, “Lord, how many times must I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? As many as seven times?”
22 “I tell you, not as many as seven,” Jesus replied, “but seventy times seven. (Matthew 18:21-22 CSB)
How hard is it for us to forgive someone else even once? How about seven times? Seventy? Seventy times seven?
Yea, for the majority of us even the first time is hard. We tend to then discard people who continually wrong us. It is easy to say that we must draw a line. But would we want God to draw a line with us? I sure do not.
Forgiveness is a divine act. It requires the Spirit within to work against our fallen nature and look beyond the act to the love we have for others. IF we truly have love for others.
It is that last statement that we must ponder today. Do we really have love for others. I mean a love that goes beyond transgressions and beyond our petty pride. And make no mistake it is pride that keeps us from forgiving others. When we feel wronged we want some form of justice. But that is in God’s hands not our own.
It is here where I must preach to myself the most. It is easy to be aggressive with others when I feel wronged. It is when I stop to spend some time in prayer and thinking about how I really am, my basal nature, that rocks me back upon my heels. It is here where God gives me a solid dose of humbling of my nature.
Thus, consider seventy times seven each day. We want to be faithful to produce a crop 100 fold but we cannot do this when our simple math does not hold up.
