Forgiveness in an Unforgiving Age

It will soon be Thanksgiving, traditionally a time of family and sharing. But of late, things have gotten a little strained and there will be few empty places at the table. Liberal children, who disagree with their parents, do not deign to grace their abode with their presence. Note that it is the tolerant left that seems to be the most intolerant and unforgiving.

For a Christian, forgiveness is not an option. Ephesians 4:32 tells us that we must forgive one another, as Christ has forgiven us. As Corrie Ten Boom discovered, forgiveness is an act of the will, not a feeling.

Early on, she was a Christian in name only (something I can relate to). For her, hiding Jews during the Nazi occupation was an adventure, not a calling. She and her family were eventually caught and sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp where her father and her sister, Betsie, died. She recounted that it wasn't until her sister died that she was broken and the love of God could come in and fill her heart. She was eventually released, which was a miracle resulting from a foul-up in paper work.

After the war she talked to many church groups. One night, after speaking about God's forgiveness, a stranger stepped up to her. She recognized him as one of the cruelest guards at the concentration camp. He introduced himself and said he had become a Christian. He knew that God had forgiven him. He extended his hand and asked if she will forgive him, which ironically is what she had been talking about.

Everything in her wanted not to return his hand, but she knew forgiveness is an act of the will and not an emotional response. She prayed that when she raised her hand that the Lord would do the rest. The moment she took his hand, she felt an overwhelming surge of healing warmth, divine love, and grace flood through her body, allowing her to say: "I forgive you, brother! With all my heart!"

She gave her unforgiveness to the Lord and the Lord did the rest.

Anther example is from the TV mini-series, "Manhunt"^[1], based on the memories of Chief Inspector Collin Sutton. It opens with the murder of a young French woman in England. As the case unfolds, it is discovered that the perpetrator had committed many assaults/murders of young women.

Then, the officer in charge of a similar case realized that a procedural error had occurred, and that if it were not for that, the young French woman would still probably be alive. The senior officer in charge felt incumbent to visit the family in France and explain that the police had made an error, and that if they had not, their daughter would probably still be alive. The father replied:

"It is a shame. It is a great shame. But we are where we are. It has happened and we cannot change the past as much we would like to. What I mean is that mistakes get made. We are human. But thank you for telling us. Thank you for your honesty. But what is important to us is that you carry on and you bring this evil man to justice."

I don't know if the father was Christian or not, but his sentiment echoes Paul's in his letter to the Philippians:

Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, ¹⁴I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Philippians 3:13-14,

We Christians are not to wallow in our past failings, reflecting of our unworthiness. That is a trick of the Devil to enslave us by constantly reminding us of our past sins. Paul tells to keep moving forward in newness of life, pressing on to all that God has laid up for us.

He also tells us that if one has fallen and repents, he is to be restored in fellowship. As the father of the murdered girl said, “We are human”. Mistakes get made. It is God who picks us up, dusts us off and sets us off again.

Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Galatians 6:1

An example of restoration can be found in the ministry of Jimmy Swaggart. He was a televangelist with a very successful ministry. When the Jim Bakker (Praise the Lord) scandal broke in 1987, he was very critical of Jim Bakker. Then his own scandals broke in 1988 and 1991, at which point his ministry crashed and burned. A few years later he returned to media with SonLifeRadio network and a new core doctrine called "The Message of the Cross".

He said that during prayer and daily study—particularly while working through the Book of Romans--the Holy Spirit imparted the revelation that the complete answer to Christian living, redemption, and victory over sin is found directly in Christ and Him crucified (the finished work of the cross). It appears, that like Corrie Ten Boom, God had to break Jimmy Swaggart before he could receive this new revelation.

Early in my walk with the Lord, I knew that there were two Bible believing groups: Evangelicals and Pentecostals. I wondered why they were separate, and then I found out. Both were half a Bible believing church. The Evangelicals, Baptists, believe in the sanctifying power of the Holy Spirit to transform lives, but they are cessationists, believing that the age of signs and gifts ceased with the Apostles. The Pentecostals believe that you are saved by the Spirit, that you move and operate in the gifts of the Spirit, but that you are sanctified by keeping to a set of rules, essentially by keeping law.

This difference was highlighted one night by Paul Crouch of Trinity Broadcasting Network. He was talking to another pastor and the following encounter ensued:

"I consider we Pentecostals to be the Cadillac of faiths because we move and operate in the gifts of the Spirit. Why then is it that our Baptist brothers are better at winning the lost?"

"It's because they focus on the fruit of the Spirit and not the gifts."

This is the gift that God gave Jimmy Swaggart, the bringing together of the Evangelical focus on the fruit of the Spirit with the Pentecostal focus on the gifts of the Spirit producing a church not seen since the first century. Others came close like Count Zinzendorf’s Moravian church, which was very successful sending missionaries all over the world. They believed in the gifts of the Spirit, but not with the abandon of the Pentecostal movement, which raised up healers like Catherine Kuhlman and Oral Roberts, and evangelists like Reinhard Bonnke and Morris Cerullo who preached to millions in third world countries with innumerable signs and wonders following, even in one case, raising a man from the dead^[2].

As we leave, let us join the Swaggarts and the singers, and bask in the presence of God, as we enter into His "Throne Room"^[3].

“The veil is torn, the door swings wide, I see glory as I run inside the Throne Room, before You I bow.”

References

1. “Manhunt”, TV mini-series, Buffalo Pictures, ITV, Air date: 2019.
2. Pat Robertson and Reinhard Bonnke, “Reinhard Bonnke Tells of Nigerian Man Raised from the Dead”, 700 Club.
3. May Angeles, Ryan Kennedy, Steven Musso, "Throne Room", 2021, as performed by Family Worship Center Singers.