It may be the most frightening command in all of Scripture. We are told by our Lord to pray, and to pray these words, “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” If you fail to pray this way, you invite the judgment of God for your disobedience in prayer. If you succeed in praying this way, you invite the judgment of God for your disobedience in forgiveness. Now you’re stuck between a rock and a hot place.
What we need is some context. This prayer, after all, isn’t given universally to the human race. It is given instead to the children of God. We begin with “Our Father, who art in heaven…” Only the redeemed have any business praying this prayer. And only the redeemed can pray this with confidence. The relationship between forgiving and being forgiven, in God’s economy, works backwards. That is, Jesus isn’t teaching a doctrine of justification by forgiving alone. We are not forgiven because we forgive. Instead, we forgive because we are forgiven. If we are His children, we became such because we were, by the sovereign power of His Spirit, made aware of our sins. We confessed our sins. We clung to the cross of Christ. We come out the other side of this process not just forgiven, but changed.
We know what we were. We know something of the cost it took that we might be forgiven. Now, how can we do anything else but forgive others? We don’t forgive others out of fear of being not forgiven ourselves. We forgive others out of joy at being forgiven ourselves. This, in turn, is how the world knows that we are His. Our love one for another is the sweet fruit of forgiveness. Saints and sinners alike not only sin, but sin against each other. The difference is two-fold. Saints repent, and saints forgive. Pray boldly, and keep going back to the heart of the matter.
It’s about forgiveness, forgiveness.