When Is The Right Time To Forgive?

A core fundamental blessing of being a Christian is to be forgiven by God.  All true Christians have been blessed to be forgiven by God. The Lord, likewise, wants us to pass on the blessing to others.  So when is the right time to forgive another brother or sister?

The first thing we need to understand is that biblical forgiveness falls into two parts:  Private and Public.

Private Forgiveness

When Jesus was crucified on the cross for committing no crime at all, but simply being hated as the Son of God He claimed to be, He spoke privately these words:  “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). 

This was Jesus’ private prayer to His Father.  Jesus was not asking the Father to forgive in a salvific sense, i.e. save them no matter what the conditions of their hearts are, even if they don’t repent. No. Jesus was asking His Father to spare their lives physically, for some of them may come around later and see the folly of what they had done and turn to Christ in repentance and forgiveness.  After all, this is precisely what occurred with a centurion soldier (Luke 23:47-48). 

Another Scriptural example of private forgiveness is seen in the words of Peter in 1 Peter 2:22-23:  “He never sinned, nor ever deceived anyone. ²³ He did not retaliate when he was insulted, nor threaten revenge when he suffered. He left his case in the hands of God, who always judges fairly.”

Jesus privately forgave His accusers, leaving the results and circumstances in the hands of His Father, who judges all matters fairly.

Private forgiveness is between the heart of the person wronged or offended and God. Private forgiveness is not a prayer that requests that the offender be removed from all responsibility and justice. It is not a prayer to undue the offender’s need to repent. It is a prayer that helps the offended from becoming bitter with God and others.

Private forgiveness is something ALL Christians must engage in whenever they are wrongly offended, accused or mistreated.  But remember this: Biblical forgiveness always requires at least three parties:

Party 1 – God

Party 2 – The Offended

Party 3 – The Offender

Private forgiveness actively occurs only between Parties 1 and 2. Party 3 is given over to God for His righteous evaluation and justice.

Public Forgiveness

Now private forgiveness is always VERTICAL (between God and the one mistreated).  Public forgiveness is more HORIZONAL (between the one mistreated and the one who is the offender).

A good example of this is found in 1 Corinthians 5.  The Corinthian church had a moral problem. The church was tolerating a man who was sleeping with his stepmother (v. 1).  Paul states that they had become arrogant and had not mourned this sin which was being tolerated in the church.

Let’s stop here and talk about “toleration.” So many Christians say to me, “Pastor Rich, we should not judge.  We should be forgiving and loving to the offender.  After all, God forgave and loved us for our sins.”

And I politely say, “No.  We are not to tolerate sin and call it love and forgiveness.  It is far from it. God did love us “while we were yet sinners” (Rom. 5:8), but His love for us did not grant unto us His forgiveness and acceptance until we first repented from our sins” (Acts 2:38). 

Two things we must learn to rightly separate:

First, love and acceptance – to love someone does not mean that you always have to accept him.  “For God so loved the world. . .” (John 3:16), but does that mean He accepts the world? No, love is an act of giving, but not always an act of accepting. 

Second, tolerance and forgiveness – When you are tolerant of someone, it does not mean you are exercising biblical forgiveness.  Paul told the Corinthians that their tolerance of this man who was sleeping with his stepmom was evidence of their arrogance, not forgiveness. 

Furthermore, by being people who are ready to forgive others who repent does not mean that are going to tolerate bad behavior. If I tolerate bad behavior and call it forgiveness, I am simply being arrogant.

So what was Paul’s counsel to this church? Verse 13:  “Remove the wicked man from among yourselves.”   Again in verse 11: “Do not associate with a so-called brother who is living an immoral life. . .” Verse 9 – Do not associate with immoral people.”

Why the removal?   Here it is – verse 6:  “Do you not know that a little leaven (toleration of sin) leavens the whole lump of dough?”  In other words, now get this – The issue is not you being tolerate of someone else’s sin, but you ought to be protective of the spiritual welfare of others who can possibly become contaminated by your toleration of the leaven (sin).  So Paul begins verse 6 by saying, “Your boasting (in that you are tolerating sin) is not good.”  The Corinthians were tolerating this man’s sin and calling it true forgiveness. Paul said, “No, it’s not forgiveness.  It is boasting. It is pride.  It is wrong.”

In fact, Paul was so passionate about the removal of this man from the assembly, he said in verse 5: “I have decided to deliver such a person unto Satan for the destruction of his flesh. . .”   That’s how serious Paul was.  Did you notice any signs of “tolerance?”

2 Corinthians 2

After Paul wrote his first letter to the Corinthians, he got word that there were still some things that needed to be addressed.   So he wrote a second letter.  This was within a few months time frame.

In 2 Corinthians 2, Paul brings up the matter of the man who was sleeping with his stepmother that he had discussed months ago in 1 Corinthians 5. Paul received word that the offender had REPENTED.  His sin had caused much sorrow to the church (v. 4).  So the church took Paul’s advice and carried out the discipline which was “inflicted by the majority” (v. 6). 

But here’s what happened.  The discipline of moving the offender from the church worked! He repented. But when he did repent, the church still afflicted punishment on him. They said, “You’re not coming back.  We’re still not going to associate with you.” Paul said, “Enough! Forgive and comfort him” (v. 7).  And “reaffirmed your love for him” (v. 8).

In verse 10, Paul tells the Corinthians, “I have already forgiven the offender.” Apparently, when Paul encouraged the Corinthians to put the wicked person out from the church, Paul’s authority was attacked. The offender did not want to leave the church quietly but must have made a fuss. He probably tried to split the church, pitting Paul against the Corinthians. When the offender repented, of both his incest and his attack on Paul, the apostle said, “I have already forgiven him for what his attack on me, and you should also do the same for his sin in the church causing you much sorrow.”

Then Paul closes with these words: “In order that no advantage is taken of us by Satan; for we are not ignorant of his schemes.” (v. 11).

What are Satan’s schemes? He has an arsenal at his disposal. But in this context, Satan’s schemes are:

1.   To try to get believers to accept that once you have done something awful, you cannot be forgiven and restored.  You are done, you are a has-been, you are failure for life.

2.   To try to get believers to over-emphasize the punishment and to under-emphasize forgiveness.

3.   To try to get the church to operate under extreme law with no regard for love.

4.   To tolerate sin and think of it as being forgiving

5.   To think that love and discipline are mutually exclusive.

6.   To permanently damage relationships among believers

7.   To break the bond between church leaders and the members of the church.

Conclusion:  Forgiveness is an incredibly important ingredient for Christians to display. There is private forgiveness that is done between the offended and God and public forgiveness that is done between the offended and the perpetrator.

Forgiveness is given by the one mistreated only when repentance by the offender has been done. Forgiveness on this basis should be swift. A reaffirmation of love and acceptance ought to be granted by those offended to the repented offender. In this case, the matter is dropped and never to be revisited again, unless it happens to appear again.

Tolerance of sin is not displaying forgiveness, but arrogance. The issue is not on being tolerant, but on preserving the spiritual well-being of others.