the words of this Life

Scripture Lessons

Acts 5:12-32

Psalm 148:1-14

Revelation 1:4-18

John 20:19-31

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

I wonder how many of you are carrying a grudge against somebody. How many of you have resentment toward another person. Perhaps it has built up over time or perhaps it came suddenly with a particular offense. The gospel lesson today is all about forgiveness. It’s about God’s forgiveness toward each of you. How the Church is entrusted with the office of the keys, that is the duty to bind and release sinners. How forgiveness is delivered and received. And it’s about your forgiveness of others.

In my own experience I have had coworkers who really didn’t seem to like me. For some reason they resented me. I still don’t know what I did to offend them, but it was something. Whether it was deserved or not, and I don’t think it was, their resentment hurt them more than it hurt me. An unforgiving spirit, grudge-holding, is to be expected in the world. Unbelievers have nowhere to place their sins (either the ones they commit, or the ones committed against them). So, they naturally will put their sins on someone else. If they feel guilt, they will blame someone else and then carry a grudge.

But within the Church it is not so. We have Christ. We confess that He has taken our sins and the sins of the entire world on Himself. “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” 2 Corinthians 5:21. Sin belongs at the cross. That’s where we place our sins and God forgets them. God said, “For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” Jeremiah 31:34, Hebrews 8:12, 10:17. And yet, although forgiveness should reign supreme within the Church, your sinful flesh may just cause you to withhold forgiveness. Examine yourself according to God’s law. Colossians 3:13 says, “forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive.” Are you forgiving each other as God in Christ has forgiven you? We pray the Lord’s prayer often and recall the words, “forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” This applies to your forgiveness toward all people, both inside and outside the Church. Examine yourself. Do you forgive others, as you have been forgiven?

Here's another question to ponder for self-examination. Have you offended another believer? You know that they need to forgive as God has commanded…are you helping to make that forgiveness possible? Do you demonstrate contrition, do you express regret toward someone you sinned against? It’s a lot easier to forgive someone when they show repentance.

You may wonder, “is this a problem in our local parish? We all seem to get along fine.” Yes we do all get along thanks be to God. However, wherever there are people, there is sin. So we must be on guard that lack of forgiveness does not creep up on us. Moreover, the Church (capital C) is larger than just our local parish and when we talk about forgiveness within the Church we are thinking on broader terms than just our own congregation.

Have you been in a church before where there were different factions. Can’t we just be civil toward each other and agree to disagree? why is this so important?” Can’t we just get along by being civil toward one another? Let’s see if 1 John 3:16 will help answer this question. “By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.” Is “being civil” in some way equivalent to this calling of life within the church in which, “we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers?” The love that Christ bore for us is the love that we are called to bear toward one another. So, no, “being civil” is not enough.

I realize that life is messy and this is not easy. Forgiveness is not something that sinful humans are prone to do. God knows that too. Listen to the words of Ephesians 4:32 which are similar to the Colossians passage, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.” The basis of your ability to forgive others is the forgiveness that you have received. That’s why we must examine ourselves. The small catechism says, “Consider your place in life according to the Ten Commandments.” Examine yourself against the law of God. You will soon realize that you have fallen short, that you have failed to obey God, to honor your mother, to protect your neighbor’s reputation, to deal kindly with all people. Now in light of your sins, here the word of God from John 20, the sedes doctrinae (seat of doctrine) for the office of the keys.

Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.”

Jesus has given to the Church the duty to exercise the office of the keys. That is to bind an unrepentant person in their sin and to loose a repentant person from their sin. We begin every service with a confession of sin…and the absolution, that is the forgiveness of sins. Not merely a proclamation of forgiveness or “assurance of pardon” or some other weak-sauce equivalent. The words, “I therefore forgive you all your sins,” are the words of God Himself spoken to you. When we utilize the service of corporate confession (Ash Wednesday, Easter Vigil) the pastor asks, “Do you believe that the forgiveness I speak is not my forgiveness but God’s?” The reason that we all reply “yes,” is because of this passage from John 20. Jesus gave these keys to the Church to exercise and the Church must faithfully exercise them.

Faithful exercise means both giving and withholding. To the unrepentant person, forgiveness must be withheld. This is done with the goal of repentance and subsequent forgiveness. The primary goal is always to forgive sins. It is a trick of the devil to withhold forgiveness from the penitent. For this reason, we will not establish some necessary preconditions (i.e. penance). I’m not giving you a list of things to do to prove your repentance or worse, to merit your forgiveness. As a called and ordained servant of the Word, I am bound to absolve the penitent from their sins plain and simple.

Now, coming back to the issue of forgiving one another. The overarching principle is that we are to live in peace and unity with one another because in fact we are unified in Christ Jesus. Since we are in fact unified, let our outward lives reflect that true inward unity. When you fail, confess. When others fail you, speak to them. When forgiveness is needed, ask for it. When forgiveness is owed, give it as God in Christ has given it to you.

Finally, let me point out that the pastor has been called to hear your confessions (which are sealed without exception, “We must obey God rather than man.”) and to speak the beautiful words of absolution to the troubled conscience. Every divine service includes public confession and absolution. Private confession and absolution is also available and you need only ask me. But your pastor is not the only one who speaks absolution. Not only are each of you called to forgive the sins of those who trespass against you. You also are called to speak the words of God’s forgiveness to anyone who expresses a troubled conscience. Jesus died for their sins. Let them know that! For Christ’s sake, God forgives sins! Let them know that! Our gospel lesson ended with, “³⁰ Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; ³¹ but these are written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.” Peter and the apostles were told by the angel, “Go and stand in the temple and speak to the people all the words of this Life.” Remember that when you bring the word of God to the ears of another, you too are speaking life into them. It is a joy to speak life and to speak forgiveness, to each other within this parish, to all Christians, and to all people.

Alleluia! Christ is risen! He is risen indeed! Alleluia!

The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.