Dangerous Reflection
“Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.” Luke 17:3
Be On Your Guard – Forgiveness is a painful, risky business. I suppose that only Jesus is actually capable of unsullied forgiveness – and that ability came at tremendous cost. Most of us practice deflected forgiveness. We excuse the offending party, but we hang on to the hurt and allow it to shape our assessments and future interactions. Imagine if Jesus did this! Oh, what wretchedness we would bear if every time we came to Him for forgiveness, He granted it but took one step further away from intimacy with us.
Jesus knew just how difficult it would be to truly forgive. That’s why He opens this lesson on forgiveness with the words, “Be on your guard!” In Greek, the verb is prosecho. It means, “to hold in mind, to pay attention.” Here it is used reflexively, that is, it returns back to the subject. Jesus tells us to watch ourselves.
That changes the sense of this command, doesn’t it? Jesus is not telling us to be on guard against the sin of others. He is telling us to watch ourselves that we do not refuse to fully forgive. We are the ones who are at risk here. The offender must be confronted, but when he is and he repents, then the burden of moral action shifts to us. We are to forgive – without qualification. Jesus knows all too well how excruciatingly difficult this is for us. So, He sounds a warning. Be careful! Watch what you are doing! You might have been offended, but now, at the moment when you are to take on God’s heart, you teeter on the edge of offending yourself. If you don’t really forgive, you mock God’s compassion for the sinner. There is a great danger here. Be on your guard!
The purpose of forgiveness is restoration. God’s consistent plan is always to bring us to repentance in order that we might be restored to His full delight. God never forgives with restraint. When the prodigal returns, the Father expresses exuberant joy. The sin is cast into the deepest sea. How hard it is for us to reflect God’s plan of forgiveness! We are far more likely to smooth the edges but keep the middle ruffled. We are far more likely to let the enemy slip a wedge into the relationship, destroying the joy of forgiveness with a sliver of rejection. Thanks be to God that He is not subject to our fractured forgiveness.
Perhaps there is someone who deserves joyful acceptance in spite of previous offenses. Actually, the greater exhibition of God’s love will be shown to the one who does not deserve joyful acceptance. When we stood before the crucified God, we did not deserve anything, especially forgiveness, but God gave it anyway. Can we not do the same?
