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“If you forgive others their transgressions, your heavenly Father
will forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, neither will
your Father forgive your transgressions.” Matthew 6:14–15
It’s truly amazing how often our Lord exhorts us to forgive. Much
of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, from which we have been reading all
week, continually calls us to offer mercy and forgiveness to
others. And in the passage above from the end of today’s Gospel,
Jesus offers us the consequences of not heeding His
exhortations.
This passage is a sort of addendum to the “Our Father” prayer which
immediately precedes it. The Our Father prayer gives us seven
petitions, one of them being “forgive us our trespasses, as we
forgive those who trespass against us.” It’s interesting to note
that as soon as Jesus taught us this prayer with its seven
petitions, He then re-emphasised one of those petitions by stating
it again as is seen in the passage quoted above. This added
emphasis should assure us of the seriousness of this
petition.
At first, Jesus simply tells us to pray for forgiveness “as we
forgive.” But He then makes it clear that if we fail to do so, we
will not be forgiven ourselves. This should highly motivate us to
make every effort possible to completely forgive others from the
deepest depths of our hearts.
Who do you need to forgive? Forgiveness can be a confusing endeavor
at times. The act of forgiveness gets confusing when our feelings
do not reflect the choice we make in our will. It is a common
experience that when we make the interior choice to forgive
another, we still feel anger toward them. But these disordered
feelings should not deter us nor should we allow them to cause
doubt in what we need to do. Forgiveness is first an act of the
will. It’s a prayerful choice to say to another that you do not
hold their sin against them. Forgiveness does not pretend that no
sin was committed. On the contrary, if there were no sin committed,
then there would be no need for forgiveness. So the very act of
forgiving is also an acknowledgment of the sin that needs to be
forgiven.
When you make the choice to forgive another, and if your feelings
do not immediately follow after, keep forgiving them in your heart.
Pray for them. Try to change the way you think about them. Do not
dwell upon the hurt that they have inflicted. Think, instead, about
their dignity as a person, the love God has for them and the love
you must continue to foster for them. Forgive, forgive and forgive
again. Never stop and never tire of this act of mercy. If you do
this, you may even discover that your feelings and passions
eventually align with the choice you have made.
Reflect, today, upon any lingering feelings of anger you
experience. Address those feelings by the free and total choice to
forgive the person with whom you are angry. Do so now, later today,
tomorrow and on and on. Go on the offensive against anger and
bitterness by overwhelming it with your personal act of forgiveness
and you will find that God will begin to free you of the heavy
burden that a lack of forgiveness imposes.
My forgiving Lord, You offer the perfection of forgiveness to me
and call me to do the same toward others. I pray for Your
forgiveness in my life. I am sorry for my sin and beg for Your
mercy. In exchange for this holy gift, I pledge to You today to
forgive everyone who has sinned against me. I especially forgive
those with whom I remain angry. Free me from this anger, dear Lord,
so that I may reap the full benefits of Your mercy in my life.
Jesus, I trust in You.
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