September 4, 2005 

FORGIVE US OUR TRESPASSES

 (Matthew 18:15-20)

A Sermon by Gordon E. Simmons, Pastor

Reformation Lutheran Church

     When you first learned the Lord’s Prayer, which was probably when you were very young, you learned this line about trespasses:  “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”  “Trespasses” is a pretty big word for a little kid.  When you trespass, it means you go somewhere you aren’t supposed to be.  In the Lord’s Prayer, a trespass is a sin.  It’s when we act in ways that we know God doesn’t want us to act; it’s when we don’t do things that we know God wants us to do.  We pray, “Forgive us our trespasses.”  Forgiveness is one of the great marks of the Christian church.  We couldn’t get along without it.

      There are two great liturgical points in our lives when we receive forgiveness.  They are called the Sacraments. One is Baptism.  When we are washed in the waters of God, God makes a promise to us.  God says, “I forgive you, and I will always forgive you.”  Baptism is a once-in-a-lifetime experience – you don’t need it more than once because God does it and it lasts forever – baptism is a once-in-a-lifetime-experience, and what it gives us is forgiveness.  This week I’ve had a wonderful time with some of the children from our church who are going to be taking their first communion today.  They came here every morning this week, and first they learned about their baptisms.  In 1999, there were seven babies baptized here at Reformation, and today those seven babies have grown up a little, and they are all here to receive their first communion.  There’s Kira Taylor, who was baptized on March 21.  That’s her baptism birthday.  Also,  Jerome Brown, who was baptized on May 11.  Anthony Cann, on September 26.  Carolyn Choates, on June 20.   Gianna Graham, on August 15.  Tyreke Matthews, on May 2.   Amy Ouattara, on October 31.  In baptism, we use water, and water is a sign of God’s forgiveness. 

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      And the other great time of forgiveness in our lives -- hopefully it is something that we experience every week -- is the Sacrament of Holy Communion.  That’s what these children have been learning about this week.   Holy Communion.  It is a meal of forgiveness.  In the bread and wine we receive Jesus, his body and blood, they come inside of us, and you know when you get close to somebody like this, when all the barriers get broken down, well, that’s what forgiveness is.  We ask God to forgive us, and the bread and the wine tell us that that’s exactly what happens.  We are a forgiven people.  That’s what it means to be the church.  God has forgiven us.  God keeps on forgiving us.  We pray, “Forgive us our trespasses…” and God does!  It’s a miracle!  It keeps happening over and over again!  It’s incredible!  What’s that little song we sing?  “By grace, by grace, by grace you have been saved.”  We are a forgiven people.  Turn to somebody next to you and say, “I’m sure glad I’ve been forgiven.”  Turn to the other side and say, “I’ve been saved by the mercy of God.”  This is what it is all about.  We are a forgiven people.

      Now there is a second part to this little petition in the Lord’s Prayer.  It says “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”    This says that we want to forgive others, just like God has forgiven us.  I know what you are thinking to yourself.  This sounds a little harder.  Actually, it’s not.  It’s not harder for us to forgive others than it was for God to forgive us.  God gave a son to die on a cross to give us forgiveness.  So don’t think that was easy; it wasn’t.  But when we get into the part about us being forgiving, well, it seems hard because we think we keep running into so many people who seem  unforgivable.  Did I tell you what she said about me?  Do you know what he did?

      We all like to be forgiven.  It’s the “being forgiving” that is the hard part for us.  “Forgive us our trespasses” – that’s the part we like.  “As we forgive those who trespass against us” – well, that’s more difficult.  I talked to somebody once who told me that he just didn’t say that line in the Lord’s Prayer.  He just leaves it out.  I don’t think that makes any difference.  God expects us to be forgiving of others.  God wants us to take the forgiveness we have received and to share it.

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      This is especially true within the church.  Forgiveness is more important than ever within the church, among believers, with the people you sit with in church every Sunday, well,.  How are you going to eat with people from whom you are estranged?  How are you going to eat from the same loaf and drink from the same cup with people you aren’t talking to?   We are brothers and sisters in Christ – that’s what the Church is – and the brothers and the sisters have to be able to talk to each other, and, when there is estrangement, they have to be able to forgive.

      Our Gospel lesson for today, from Matthew (18), lays out a very specific formula for what to do when some other member of the church has sinned against you.  There are three points to this formula, but I’ll tell you the truth, if you do point #1 and do it right, about 95% of the time you’re not going to have to worry about points #2 and #3.  Let’s look at what it says.  Verse 15:  “If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone.  If the member listens to you, you have regained that one”.  What the Word of God says is that if you’ve got a problem with another person, go and talk to him or her about it!

      Now you know that this is not what we normally do.  Most of the time, the person we are mad at is the last person we talk to.  Instead, we talk to every one else.  We spend hours, weeks, months, talking to other people about somebody else’s problem, and we never talk to the person from whom we are estranged.   The barriers get bigger.  They get still harder to overcome.  Years go by.  People die and the estrangement is never resolved; the forgiveness is never offered.

      A pastor was counseling a man who was telling him about how estranged he was from his neighbor.  They lived right next door to each other, but it had been years since they had talked.  They had been mad at each other for so long that the man had even forgotten what the argument was about, but he knew he was still mad.  The pastor went right to the Bible.  Matthew 18:15.  He told the man, “You’ve got to go and talk to your neighbor.”  “This is hard,” the man said.  “I’ll tell you want to do,” the pastor told him.  “I want you to go over to his house right away and knock on his door.  And all the way over there, I want you to pray.”  Well, the man left the church, and came back in about an hour and he had a big smile on his face.  And the pastor said, “How did it go?”  “Great,” the man said, still smiling, “all the way over there I prayed that the guy wouldn’t be home, and he wasn’t!”  This is hard!

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      But the words of the Bible are very direct.  They say, Go to the other person.  Go and talk alone so that everybody else doesn’t have to hear about it.  Seek out the other person and offer forgiveness.  That’s what you prayed about, didn’t you?  Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.  You can take care of the problem if you just go to the other person and offer forgiveness.

      I want everybody to get a partner.  It can be somebody you’re sitting next to.  You may be sitting next to someone this morning with whom you get along with very well, or you may be sitting next to someone with whom you have a problem.  I don’t know.  Only God knows.  But I want you to do this just as a practice, so that when you really have the opportunity to say this to somebody, it won’t be the first time.  I want you to look the other person in the eye and say – you can both say it at the same time – “I forgive you, and I will forget about the past.”  Now that wasn’t so hard, was it?  Your tongue didn’t burn off, did it?  There may be somebody in your life to whom you need to speak these words.  Go to the other person.  Everybody else doesn’t have to know about it.  Go to the other person and offer forgiveness.

      There’s one other thing you need to remember.  Sometimes you assume that the other person was 100% wrong and you were 100% right.   Let’s be honest.  Sometimes that’s not exactly the way it was.   Sometimes you not only need to offer forgiveness; sometime you need to ask for it.  And don’t play this “I’ll forgive you if you forgive me” kind of game.  The forgiveness you give should be real and given whether that person gives it back or not.  So don’t be afraid to admit your fault in the matter.  When you go and speak with the other person, in private, express the responsibility you have had in the brokenness.  Maybe you need forgiveness too.

      Today is a special day in our church because out communion table gets a little bigger.  Some new children will be receiving communion for the first time.  And it’s good that our lessons for today speak of forgiveness, because that is what communion is all about.  There is a community around the communion table, and communities don’t happen without forgiveness.  Forgiveness breaks down barriers, and that’s important because we want to gather around this table with people among whom barriers have been broken down.  And forgiveness is something that we receive – we hold out our hands to take the bread and wine – we hold out our hearts to take what God is giving us.  Forgiveness is a sign of what the Church of Jesus Christ is all about.  We want it to be a sign especially of our life together here at the Welcome Place, because it is a great gift from God.  Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.  This is Good News!  Thanks be to God!

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