For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.“For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you:For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
8 sermons cite this verse
… is clearly one of those things that will hinder God from working on your behalf. Here's number eight. Y'all not going to like this one. Unforgiveness. Unforgiveness. Matthew chapter six, verses 14 and 15. Unforgiveness. If you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your father forgive your trespasses. Wow. You probably didn't know that this attitude that you got against somebody who did something wrong to you is prohibiting God from working on your behalf. Now, I don't know where y'all are, but here's where I am in my life. I'm not going to let my anger, my frustration, my unforgiveness with another person hinder me from getting what God has in my life. Amen. I hate to tell you this, but you ain't worth me missing out on what God has for me. Go ahead, tell your neighbor, they ain't worth me losing out. They ain't worth it missing miracles. I'm not going to let what they did cause God not to reward me, for God not to respond to me, for God not to answer my prayer. I refuse to let another person hinder my walk with God. …
… just as God in Christ has forgiven you. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 6.14? If you forgive others, Jesus said, My heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, neither will my heavenly Father forgive you. It's pretty clear, isn't it? Forgiveness isn't optional. It's essential for anyone who wants God's forgiveness. Number five, how do you deal with anger in your life? How do you keep from allowing anger to get out of control, either through wrath or malice? Number five, don't associate with angry people. Now remember this, if you associate with angry people, you're going to become angry as well. I'm going to give you the best piece of advice you're going to hear this week. If you are single and thinking about getting married at some point in your life, don't date and certainly don't marry someone who is habitually angry. Don't marry or even date somebody who has a problem with his or her temper. That's what Solomon said in Proverbs 22 verses 24 and 25. Do not associate with a man given to anger or go with a hot-tempered man, lest you learn his ways and find a snare for yourself. Now, if it's somebody who acknowledges he has an anger problem and he or she is dealing with it positively, that's one thing. But a person who is continually blowing up all of the time, if you marry that person, you're going to be miserable and you're going to be the object of his or her anger at some point. Now, we've talked …
Jesus offers a kind of dire warning, if we're being honest, in Matthew 6, 14 and 15. For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your heavenly Father forgive your trespasses. In other words, how can you receive what you refuse to give? How can you expect me to forgive you when you choose to not forgive those who have hurt you? It's a tough question that we got to wrestle with. And as I've been wrestling with this topic of unforgiveness, just this week, even frankly, looking at the unforgiveness that I realized I still had in my heart, and as I pour over the New Testament, I am left with the conviction that forgiveness is not optional for the Christian. That is not something that we get to pick and choose whether we forgive or not. It is not an option. It is required. So what I'm calling our study tonight is, what's your excuse? …
… I wanna read the context of what he's writing together in Matthew 6, verses one through 18. We'll start with verse one here. Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. Otherwise you have no reward with your father in heaven. So, whenever you give to the poor, don't sound a trumpet before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets to be applauded by people. But truly, I tell you, they have their reward. But when you give to the poor, don't let your left hand know what your right hand is doing so that your giving may be in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. Whenever you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites because they love to pray standing in synagogues on the street corner to be seen by people. But truly I tell you, they've received their reward. But when you pray, go into your private room, shut your door, that's our word, and pray to your father who's in secret and your father who sees in secret will reward you. …
… Verse 14, if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. Now the picture here is not, the picture here is one who comes to God already in relationship with him as father, as a son or daughter, confessing sin. Not so they can remain in the family. Now follow this. When my sons have disobeyed me, it's happened two or three times, maybe four. When my sons... That's obviously a lie. So, when my sons disobey me and they come to confess, ask for forgiveness, this is not about whether or not they can stay in the family. It's not a fear there. they are confessing that not so they can stay my sons they are confessing that so they can restore intimacy with their father and this is why as Christians we walk in continual confession the closer we get to God the more we see our need for his grace we are constantly crying not so we can be made right with God that was sealed in Christ but so we can have intimacy with the father and walk with him oh child of God do not let sin go unconfessed before him the foolishness and some of you are doing it right now some of you in this room I know are trying to hide your sin from God are living like God doesn't know what's going on you are a fool he knows not only are you a fool to think you can hide it from him …
… For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others, neither will your heavenly father forgive your trespasses. So trespass happens there. And the word trespass in Greek means to slip off the path. So to sin means to stray or to miss the mark. To trespass means to stray from the path. It's just get off track. And so every time I've gotten off track, Lord, please bring me back on track, forgive me. And when somebody has gotten off track in my life and my relationships, you know, help me, oh Lord, to forgive their trespasses. And you know the word, no trespassing. Like you, you know, you see the sign, but then if you actually wander onto that property, you're on somebody's property, you shouldn't have been there. And in forgiving your trespasses, I forgive you for the times you stepped in places, did things that you shouldn't have done. I just wanna ask this question. …
… Read it on the screen. For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you of your trespasses. But if you do not forgive men of their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive you of your trespasses. So I have to choose to make the choice to forgive. And this is, do you realize how much forgiveness I require from Pastor Julia? Every day I'm asking. So stupid, right? I was wrong. I'm forgiven. I'm restored. What do I restore? I restore trust. I restore communication. I restore respect. The foundation of all relationships are trust, respect, and communication. I was wrong. I'm forgiven. And now, what's the third one? I build back respect. And the more that you do that, the more you walk in the power of that practice, you will see God do great things in your life. You will watch God do great things through your life. I choose to be generous and I choose to bring great forgiveness in my relationship with my spouse. …
… through you Tom Rainer says walking with a humble heart toward God helps us see our need for forgiveness Matthew 6 14 15 check this out for if you forgive people for their wrongdoing your heavenly God your heavenly father will forgive you as well but if you don't forgive people your father will not forgive you i don't know if church folk believe this i'm not so convinced that we actually believe if i forgive a person god actually forgives me based on my ability to forgive i believe that's in the model prayer uh the prayer that jesus taught his disciples we call it the lowest prayer is really the disciples prayer because they asked him teach us how to pray and he said well when you pray say our father which art in heaven hallowed be thy name that kingdom come that will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us this day our daily bread forgive us come here our debts as we forgive our debtors and depending on what tradition you're from forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us and that's in the prayer so you telling god lord forgive me based on how i forgive others how you walking around with malice and resentment and bitterness and you praying in the prayer lord forgive me based upon my ability to forgive others so you're telling god i'm giving you permission if i don't forgive god please don't forgive me now who in this world who listening to me tonight can afford for god to stop forgiving you …