February 20 2025

Thursday February 20

“As We Also Forgive Everyone…”

Luke 11:1-4

1 Now it came to pass, as He was praying in a certain place, when He ceased, that one of His disciples said to Him, "Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples." 2 So He said to them, "When you pray, say: Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name. Your kingdom come. Your will be done On earth as it is in heaven. 3 Give us day by day our daily bread. 4 And forgive us our sins, For we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And do not lead us into temptation, But deliver us from the evil one." 

To the best of my understanding, here in Luke 11, when the disciples asked the Lord to teach them how to pray, this was toward the end of His first three years of ministry mostly in the region of Galilee. But you might also remember in Matthew 6, on an earlier occasion at the beginning of His ministry, as Jesus was giving one of His first recorded sermons, called the “Sermon on the Mount” or the “Beatitudes”, He also taught this model prayer both to the multitude and His disciples. So, this would be the second time that they heard it.

In the Matthew passage, the Lord gave even more instructions along with this prayer. On both occasions Jesus taught that we are to ask for forgiveness for our sins, which also called our debts or our trespasses, from our Father in heaven. I believe this model prayer is primarily given for those who have already been saved. We have been born again, we have been redeemed, we are in the family of God and that is why we begin the prayer with “Our Father”.

Now in this prayer, as believers, we are told to keep short accounts for those who have sinned against or have offended us. And just as we have received the Father’s forgiveness, “for we also forgive everyone who is indebted to us.” If you go back to the Matthew 6 passage you will find that the Lord also added the instruction: “For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (Matthew 6:14-15).

It becomes clear that we as believers are to keep short accounts of those who sinned against us by forgiving them and no longer holding their sin or offence against them. We are able to do this because we have experienced our Father’s forgiveness. We find this also in Ephesians 4:32; “And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God in Christ forgave you.”  A similar passage in Colossians 3:13 reads: “Bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do.”

Again, I repeat that this is primarily for believers who have already experienced salvation and forgiveness of their sins. We should never make this a condition for a lost sinner to get saved. I’ve never told someone I’m witnessing to, that before they can pray the sinners prayer and receive Jesus Christ as their Savior that they need to make a list of everyone who has wronged them and forgive them before they can get saved. It is only after we have been forgiven by the grace of God and His mercy through the blood of Jesus Christ, and experienced His resurrection power into a new life, that we have the ability and grace to then forgive others.

Matthew 18:23-35 gives us a great message on this subject after Peter asked the Lord how many times he had to forgive a brother who had sinned against him. Peter thought he was doing pretty good by saying that seven times was probably enough. But the Lord responded by saying that that is not enough but you will need to forgive him seventy-times seven. That is 490 times!!!! In other words, you would lose count after the first number of times and every time you think or experience the pain of the hurt of the offence you must forgive again. You remove the offence from their account and not hold it against them.

In Matthew 18:35, Jesus concluded the story of the servant, who after he had been forgiven an unpayable debt by his master, and then refused to forgive a fellow servant a very small account, and was sent to prison to be tortured, with these power words: “So My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses." 

My friend, this is only possible by God’s grace, and the reality of your experience of forgiveness in Christ. The fact that we can forgive others, which is never an easy thing to do, is proof and evidence that we have experienced God’s forgiveness for all our sins and have the perfect peace of God in our hearts.

God bless!