Exodus 5:22-7:25, Matthew 18:21-19:12, Psalms 23:1-6, Proverbs 5:22-23
Today is January 28th, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian it’s great to be here with you today. Looking at the number, January 28th and just realizing we’ve only got a few more days in this month and I’m still scratching my head about where the weeks have gone because I know I just celebrated Christmas but…but I don't…and…and that happens every year and I don’t know why I can’t finally get my…I mean, I’m at this every single day. So, I should be able to mark my days but then I get to the end of January and I’m like, how did that happen so quickly? Anyway, how are you? How’s your day going? You’re probably just like right where you need to be. You’re right centered in the here and now, January 28th, you’re not wondering where the month went. You lived it fully. And that’s great. I want to grow up to be like you. And, so, that’s why I read the Bible every day to us. And I let’s get to it. We’re in the book of Exodus. We have begun to…to get to know Moses who is a major character in the Bible, and we’ll be journeying with Moses for…for a while as I’ve mentioned. So, we’ll get to know him. He has reluctantly obeyed God and gone back to Egypt and confronted Pharaoh who has essentially laughed him out of the palace and made things much more difficult for the Hebrew people. And we can already tell a pretty big showdown is gonna happen at some point. So, let’s take the next step forward. We’re reading from Evangelical Heritage Version this week. Exodus chapter 5 verse 22 through 7 verse 25.
Commentary:
Okay. So, in the book of Matthew Jesus brought up a subject that He has already brought up and He was even more direct and forceful with it this time than…than the first time we encountered it because it is, according to Jesus, an irreplaceable component of God’s kingdom, and it’s a word that…I mean…it can…it can be a tricky work, forgiveness. It’s kind of a funny thing because we like the concept of it. We just…we just don’t want to have to do it. We want everybody else to have to do it, but we don’t have to let go. So, the way that this goes down is that Peter’s just asking like, “okay. I see forgiveness is a part of this story. How many times…like define this for me. If…if somebody sins against me, how many times, seven? Like do I forgive them 7 times.” Jesus is like, “no, like 77,” right? So, like if you forgive somebody 77 times and you’re counting it up and you get to offense number 78 and you tell that person, “I don’t forgive you because I’ve forgive you 77 times” then you probably haven’t forgiven them 77 times. Jesus tells a story - a master and a servant. A servant, who…who owes a great deal, an amount he can’t pay. He falls to his knees and begs for forgiveness. He begs for mercy. He begs for more time. The master forgives him completely and sends him on his way. But then that person will not forgive his brother, his fellow servant who owes them significantly less. He won’t forgive that debt. He throws him into prison. So, just imagine this for a minute. Imagine God saying to you, “you wicked servant. I forgave you all that debt when you bagged me to. Should you not have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had mercy on you?” I do not ever, ever, ever want to hear those words from my Father but I’m quoting Jesus here. “This is what my heavenly Father will also do to you, unless each one of you forgives his brother from his heart.” Like that…that’s pretty hard to navigate around. Like, that’s pretty hard to set aside and say, “well it doesn’t really mean what…it’s…it’s not…that’s not what it means” because Jesus has taken away the ability to sort like fake it. He said, “from the heart.” So, it’s like…it’s got to be real and genuine. And this…this can bring up all kinds of things inside of us, because we immediately…you know when we start thinking about forgiveness we have to begin to think about the wounds of our lives and some of them have been fairly significant. Like, none of us…none of us gets out of here without getting hurt in some way and some of us have been hurt pretty bad. And, so, just to even go there at all is a pretty…pretty difficult journey. But to think of forgiveness, you know, it’s really easy to be like, “you just don’t understand. Like you don’t know happened to me, the trauma. Like you just don’t understand. I…I…the guy with the microphone…I…I wouldn't…I’ve been through my own traumas…I wouldn't…but normally we’re not trying to say this to somebody else, we’re trying to say to God, “like I can’t do what you’re asking me to do because it broke me and I’m fragmented and I don’t even know how…how to approach forgiveness when something so wicked has happened. And, so, we can be angry that God would even think about asking us or forcing us into this kind of posture, but let's…let’s just pause for second…and understand like, we’re 19 chapters into the book of Matthew and Matthew is the first of the Gospels and for this year anyway, this is first accounting of Jesus ministry and so we’re getting to know Jesus for this year as we go through the Gospels. And we noticed right away there was something different. Like, we saw right from the get-go, and we began to realize is that we’re looking at somebody who is different because they are whole. Their…their heart and their mind and their bodies are not all detached and living in separate realities. Wholeness, the lack of separation any longer inside of ourselves and from God, this is the message of the gospel. And, so, this is what Jesus is revealing in His ministry as He reveals the kingdom of God. And you could be like, “I am tracking with you there. What has that got to do with forgiveness?” Forgiveness can bring wholeness. Forgiveness isn’t saying, “alright. I guess it was okay that that happened to me. I forgive them for what they did. I guess I have to do that. It’s gotta be okay.” That’s not what forgiveness is. And forgiveness isn’t. “Okay. I’m not gonna talk about that anymore, that wound anymore. I’m not gonna…I’m gonna forget it. Like, I’m gonna…I’m gonna suppress it down and never visit it again.” That’s not it either. Forgiveness is saying, “injustice in some way was done to me. It happened. It shattered to me in some way. I’m broken because of it. There’s poison inside of me like seeping through my veins. It affects my life and it has affected the way my life has gone, and I cannot do this anymore and I cannot get free of this by myself. I’ve tried to medicate. I’ve tried everything. I can’t do it. And, so, I release this to You God. You are the judge. I release this to You. You handle this. I release them to You. God, I can’t handle this anymore. I release them to You. I unchain myself from that person or event and I give it to you.” Forgiveness is one of these things, at least in the ministry of Jesus that is very direct because it’s very important because forgiveness sets us free and unforgiveness does the opposite. And Jesus came to set us free. So, we can hold onto those wounds as if they’ve become a part of our identity. We can hold onto those attachments or things that have hurt us as if we wouldn’t even know how to be ourselves without carrying that around anymore, or we can understand this is part of the process of walking the narrow path that leads to life and wholeness. And I realize I’m…I mean I’m talking to lots and lots of people and there lots and lots of stories. There are plenty of things to release. There are plenty of things to let go of. There are…I mean the posture of forgiveness isn’t a one-off, it’s a lifestyle, it’s always on and never off. And at least in my experience, some of the deepest roots of bitterness and awfulness and frank…frankly darkness and evil happen between spouses. Like that’s ground zero. Like that is your ultimate union with another person and that union then represents your greater union with God. And the thing that will destroy that out right straightaway is unforgiveness. And we all know it. Unforgiveness leads to bitterness, anger, resentment, you name it, and none of that will bring us to God.
Prayer:
Father, it is to You that we want to be led. It is a growing awareness of Your presence in and around and among and through and in all things, including our lives and our relationships and our marriages. And one of the things that flows through all of that in Your kingdom is the ability to let go, the ability to release, the ability to forgive. And all we have to do is look at our own lives and we can find the places that we’ve been bound up because of bitterness and unforgiveness. We were talking about our marriages a minute ago Father and all we have to do is look there really to find places that have been walled off and places that have become battle lines and we might count 7 times or we might count 77 times and then we’re done with it. And, so, we begin the slow, steady, methodical process of dismantling and disintegrating our relationships through this unforgiveness. And You’ve been very clear, very clear in the Scriptures that that is leading nowhere. And, so, Father help us to learn to forgive. Help us to learn to release and let go. And help us to be willing to ask to be forgiven because in one way or another we’re in need of it. Father, it’s our desire to dwell in Your presence in Your kingdom and to reveal it in this world and one of the ways that we will do that is that we walk in forgiveness. Come Holy Spirit we pray into this because it’s a big thing for us. We ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Song:
Sara Groves - It’s Me
Well, it came and caught us
off our guard
We were just laughing, feeling alright
Had such a great time just last night
We walked into a minefield undetected
You took a tone and I took offense
Anger replacing all common sense
Oh, run for your life, all
tenderness is gone
In the blink of an eye all goodwill has withdrawn
We mark out our paces and stare out from our faces
Baby, you and I are gone, gone, gone
Incomprehensible layers of
isolation
Now you’re the man with a heart of stone
Making me pay by being alone
Soon you will justify righteous indignation
Now I’m a woman who holds all her pain
Looking for somebody else to blame
Oh, run for your life, all
tenderness is gone
In the blink of an eye all goodwill has withdrawn
We mark out our paces and stare out from our faces
But baby, you and I are gone, gone, gone
We hold all the keys to our
undoing
Cutting me down in small degrees
You know my worst insecurities
I’m making no effort to understand
No one can hurt you like I can
Deep down inside the girl’s
waking up
She’s going out to the boy she loves
It’s me, oh, baby, it’s me
How in the world can
tenderness be gone
In the blink of an eye?
Oh, how in the world can tenderness be gone
In the blink of an eye?
And the girl in me, she’s
calling out
Oh, the girl in me, she’s calling out
To the boy in you, to the boy in you
And the girl in me, she’s calling out
Oh, the girl in me, she’s calling out
To the boy in you
Baby, come back, baby, come
back to me
Baby, come back, baby, come back