The Forgiveness Series - Scripture Readings (12 of 12)

Well, we're going to be doing something a little different in our service this morning. It's something we do from time to time when we complete a study on a particular topic or a book of the, of the Bible. and we just recently last Sunday completed our study on the subject of forgiveness. We spent 11 messages on, that, topic and so in a way today is the 12th and final installment in the forgiveness, series, and what we're going to do today is we're going to be reading through the scriptures.

We've looked at a number of passages of scripture over the course of the 11 weeks of studying this topic and what we want to do, this morning is to just put most of, most all of those scriptures together. And just open our hearts to the Lord and give those passages from the Bible one final pass and one fell swoop into our hearts to bring a lot of the themes of what we have covered, together. And so we'll be doing that in just, just a moment. I, there should have been on everybody's seat a a thing called forgiveness resolutions.

Is there anybody that does not have a copy of this? All right, great job, guys. All right, this is basically the entire series summed up on the front and backside of a of a piece of paper here in the form of resolutions in terms of how, we would respond to what we have learned. This is the essence of what I would dream that we would all be saying essentially in our hearts as we respond to the truth of what God has showed us about His forgiveness of us and all that we learn at the cross and how we can go about showing that grace and forgiveness to other people.

So even if you have not been with us over the length of all of those weeks, this gives you a good idea of what we have learned. in the, the, the past few months. We don't have time to go through this or read through it this morning, because what we're going to do instead is we're going to be reading through the passages of scripture. We'll be interspersing, songs of worship, throughout.

So we'll be responding to the Lord as he is speaking, to us. And just a quick encouragement, what's going to happen today is really powerful. You're going to have a personal encounter with the living God as he speaks to you through His word. The Bible tells us that the word of God is living.

It's powerful, it's sharper than any two-edged sword. It can pierce. To the dividing asunder of soul and spirit and of the joints and the marrow and as a discerner of the thoughts and the intentions of the heart and all things are laid open and bare before the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. God's word has a way of just exposing us before the eyes of God and making us aware of that.

And just going deep into us and helping us to see things that we ought to see, I really want to encourage you as the passages from the Bible are read this morning, open your heart to God. I've been so blessed by the stories that many of you have been sharing over the last several weeks about how God has touched your life as we've studied the subject of forgiveness. I had a young man come up to me after the first service and say, I've been running from the Lord for years. and I've done two tours in the military and have seen some awful things, and I've been filled with bitterness and anger, but God has used a number of things including the series to break me down, and I want you to know this week I cried out to God and confessing my sin to Him and choosing a life of grace and forgiveness.

That, that stuff makes my day. That's the power of God's word, and I, so I know God's been doing a work in many of your hearts, but I, I'm sure that there's probably some that, maybe you have felt resistance, and you've wished for this series to end sooner than it did, and you may even be in here this morning still holding on. and I just want to beg of you to just surrender to the Lord, open your heart to Him and say, what, God, as these scriptures make one final pass, all in one fell swoop through my heart and mine, please do whatever you please in me.

And so we're going to begin with prayer.

We're going to sing Speak, O Lord, which will be our prayer to God in just a second, but let me begin that by beginning that prayer. So let's go to the Lord in prayer and ask His guidance, His blessing, His presence and power with us as we encounter His word this morning. Lord, we just come to you thankful for your word, for the power of it, the beauty of it, the way that it speaks to us in our deepest needs. Everyone in this room, Lord, represented by every person here, are 100 stories of difficulties and brokenness, where we need what you're going to speak into us today.

And so we surrender to you, Lord, and invite you to to speak and to have your way with us. That we would go forth from here, a changed people full of your grace to give to others and thereby mirror the beauty and the glory of the gospel. And we commit ourselves to You, Lord, in Jesus' name, and we say to you, speak, speak. O Lord, S Lord, as we come.

come to you. To. Your plan. might be.

to In And S Teach us, Lord. Star of Nice to see. As for I And As you Or with your Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.

Therefore, I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship, and do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. So that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good, and acceptable and perfect. For through the grace given to me, I say to every one among you not to think more highly of himself than he ought to think. But to think so as to have sound judgment.

As God has allotted to each a measure of faith. For just as we have many members in one body, and all the members do not have the same function, so we, who are many are one body in Christ. And individually members one of another. Since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, each of us is to exercise them accordingly.

If prophecy according to the proportion of his faith, if service in his serving, or he who teaches in his teaching, or he who exhorts in his exhortation, he who gives with liberality, he who leads with diligence. He who shows mercy with cheerfulness. Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhor what is evil.

Cling to what is good. Be devoted to another in brotherly love. Give preference to one another in honor. Not lagging behind in diligence, be fervent in spirit, serving the Lord, rejoicing in hope, persevering in tribulation.

Devoted to prayer, contributing to the needs of the saints, practicing hospitality. Bless those who persecute you. Bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep.

Be of the same mind toward one another. Do not be haughty in mind, but associate with the lowly. Do not be wise in your own estimation. Never pay back evil for evil to anyone.

Respect what is right in the sight of all men. If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, Vengeance is mine. I will repay, says the Lord.

But if your enemy is hungry, feed him. And if he is thirsty, give him a drink, for in so doing you will heap burning coals on his head. Do not be overcome by evil. But overcome evil with good.

B the cross. Jesus, I The place to stand. And Has that should discard me. tell me A cross the cross of Jesus.

Jesus. I my just chasing selfish dreams. To that you the cross of Jesus. Jesus.

by God. Father in. Oh. I The joy for us.

the Jesus Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us. And let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross. Despising the shame. And has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

For consider him who has endured such hostility by sinners against himself. So that you will not grow weary and lose heart. When they came to the place called the skull, there they crucified Jesus and the criminals, one on the right and the other on the left. But Jesus was saying, Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they're doing.

And they cast lots, dividing up his garments among themselves. And the people stood by looking on. And even the rulers were sneering at him, saying, he saved others. Let him save himself if this is the Christ of God, His chosen one.

The soldiers also mocked him, coming up to him, offering him sour wine, and saying, If you are the king of the Jews, save yourself. Now there was also an inscription above him, which read, This is the king of the Jews. One of the criminals hanging there was hurling abuse at him, saying, Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us.

But the other answered, and rebuking him said, Do you not even fear God? Since you are under the same sentence of condemnation, We indeed are suffering justly, for we are receiving what we deserve for our deeds. But this man has done nothing wrong. For this finds favor if for the sake of conscience toward God a person bears up under sorrow when suffering unjustly.

For what credit is there if when you sin and are harshly treated you endure it with patience? But if when you do what is right and suffer for it, you patiently endure it, this finds favor with God. For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in his steps, who committed no. Nor was any deceit found in his mouth, and while being reviled, he did not revile in return.

While suffering, he uttered no. But kept entrusting himself to him who judges righteously. And he himself bore our sins in his body on the. So that we might die to sin and live to righteousness, for by his wounds, you were healed.

Let us love and Let us praise the Savior's name. He has hushed the law. He has quenched Mount Sinai's flame. Let us love who Pity the swing.

me Called us by His grace and gave us tears and gave us sighs. He has washed us with. Washed us with. He has washed us with his blood.

I time hard to bear. Washed us with His blood. He who washed us with his blood. He watched us with.

So Just wonder, grace and justice and point to mercy. grace in Christ our trust is justice. He washed us with his blood. Washed us with His blood.

He washed us with. Our way to God. He has lost us. He has washed us with His love.

He has washed us with Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have obtained our introduction by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we exult in hope of the glory of God. And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance and perseverance proven character and proven character hope, and hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

For while we were still helpless at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man, though perhaps for the good man some one would dare even to die.

But God demonstrates His own love toward us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren. And these whom he predestined, he also called, and these whom he called, he also justified.

And these whom he justified, he also glorified. What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who is against us? He who did not spare His own Son but delivered him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?

Who will bring a charge against God's elect? God is the one who justifies. Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is he who died, yes, rather, who was raised, who's at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.

Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword Just as it is written, for your sake we are being put to death all day long. We were considered as sheep to be slaughtered. But in all these things, we overwhelmingly conquer through Him who loved us.

So as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving each other whoever has a complaint against any one. Just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you. Beyond all these things, put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body.

And be thankful Let all bitterness and wrath and anger And clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you. Oh I love you. my I that All the The his It's In the Then Peter came and said to Jesus, Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him?

Up to 7 times. Jesus said to him, I do not say to you up to 7 times, but up to 70 times 7. For this reason, the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his slaves. When he had begun to settle them, one who owed him 10,000 talents was brought to him.

But since he did not have the means to repay, his lord commanded him to be sold along with his wife and children and all that he had and repayment to be made. So the slave fell to the ground and prostrated himself before him, saying, Have patience with me, and I will repay you everything. And the lord of that slave felt compassion and released him and forgave him the debt. But that slave went out and found one of his fellow slaves who owed him 100 denari, and he seized him and began to choke him, saying, Pay back what you owe.

So his fellow slave fell to the ground and began to plead with him, saying, Have patience with me, and I will repay you. But he was unwilling and went and threw him in prison until he should pay back what was owed. So when his fellow slaves saw what had happened, They were deeply grieved and came and reported to their Lord all that had happened. Then summoning him, his lord said to him, You wicked slave, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me.

Should you not also have had mercy on your fellow slave in the same way that I had mercy on you? And his lord, moved with anger, handed him over to the torturers until he should repay all that was owed him. And so shall my Heavenly Father also do to you if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart. You have heard that it was said you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.

But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. So that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. For he causes his son to rise on the evil and the good. And sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.

For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?

Therefore, you are to be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect. Pray then in this way. Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come.

Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors. And do not lead us into temptation but deliver us from evil, for yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

Amen. For if you forgive others for their transgressions, your Heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, then your father will not forgive your transgressions. Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.

Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you. Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children and walk in love just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma. A grace.

How sweet. that the wretch. that Amazing grace, how sweet the sound that sing. wretch like me.

was lost, but now I'm was. Bye. I see. Do not verbally assault an older man, but rather come alongside and speak to him as a father.

To the younger men as brothers, to the older women as mothers, and to the younger women as sisters in all purity. Confess your sins to one another. And pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.

Elijah was a man with a nature like ours. And he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the earth for 3 years and 6 months. Then he prayed again, and the sky poured rain, and the earth produced its fruit. And Jesus also told this parable to some people who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and viewed others with contempt.

Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself, God, I thank you that I am not like other people swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I pay twice of all that I get, but the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, God, be merciful to me, the sinner.

I tell you this man went to his house justified rather than the other, for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted. If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clinging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing.

Love is patient. Love is kind and is not jealous. Love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly. It does not seek its own.

is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered. does not rejoice in unrighteousness but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.

Let all bitterness and wrath and anger And clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice. Be kind to one another. tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also. Has forgiven you And all God's people said, Amen.

Well, if you're here today and you have never Experience the joy of having your sins forgiven. I think you've heard enough through the passages that have been read to know what you need to do. Just a few moments ago, we learned about the tax collector who was so weighed down by his failures and his sins and his brokenness that he couldn't even lift up his eyes to heaven. But he just cried out to God and said, God be merciful to me, the sinner.

And Jesus said, that man, that man went to his house, righteous, justified. And if, if you've never Come to Jesus and said to him, You are the savior for me. It is through you that I can have my sins forgiven, and it is you that I believe in, and it is to you and you alone that I cry out. And I abandon all other hopes, all other things that I may have trusted in, and I deposit all of my trust in you.

If you do that, That's exactly what God would want from you and your brokenness and bankruptcy to cry out to Him. And receive salvation through Him. All of us that are in this room that are members of Cornerstone, that's all we've done. We're no better than anybody else.

We are broken people who've come to Jesus with all of our mess, and we have believed in Him, and we have cried out to him and received forgiveness for all of our sins through Him. And if you have never done that yourself, we would urge you, even right now where you're seated to cry out to Jesus, and look to Him as your Lord and Savior. For those of us that are believers, May God give us the grace. To live out the very ethic of what we have seen portrayed through the scriptures this morning and may Cornerstone be a church.

That mirrors and displays the beauty of the grace of God. Through the forgiveness that we grant to those that wrong us. Let's pray together. Lord, your grace is amazing.

We've focused a little bit in some of the verses we've read on what we're supposed to do, but we've spent a lot of time pondering what you have done for us. That's where the power comes from through your Spirit. The motivation and the shape of our obedience comes from pondering these things that you have done for us. You have forgiven us.

You've given us grace that we did not deserve. And now you call us to turn around and to mirror that grace to those that have wronged us. We would all wish that we could live our lives in a way that's free of anyone ever crossing our path or wrong, wronging us. And yet you tell us those are the prime opportunities to put my grace on display and to show the world what grace really looks like.

Make us a congregation of people, Lord, that are full of your grace, walking with our chins held high, confident in your gracious forgiveness of us, that we are your sons and daughters justified and righteous before you. And in that confidence, Lord, may we turn to others who have wronged us. And show them the same grace that you lavish upon us each day. And in the process may a light go forth from this church that will bring direction.

and warmth and healing. To not only the people of this congregation, but the people of this community who desperately need to see another way to live than the way that they see all about them. Lord, we thank you for this opportunity to give of our offerings to you this morning. You have given us the most amazing gift, the most costly of gifts.

And it is through Jesus, the gift of your Son, that we are saved. And now we have an opportunity to give of what you have blessed us with a portion of that, Lord, to support your work and the spread of the gospel in this community and around the world. So receive these funds, Lord. And do much with them for the glory of Jesus and the spread of this very message we've been relishing this morning.

It's in His name we pray, and all God's people said. Amen.