Sermon CLII.
Forgive And Be Forgiven.
"Bearing with one another
and forgiving one another,
if any have a complaint against another.
Even as the Lord hath forgiven you,
so you also."
—Colossians iii. 13.
This, my dear brethren, is the law of Christ. It is a law we are bound to keep. We cannot save our souls unless we do keep it. There is no possible way to escape its requirements, for our Lord himself declares positively: "But if you will not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive you your offences" (Matthew vi. 15). Therefore, there is no way to save our souls, no way to be true Christians in life, unless we forgive all and every one, without exception, every injury they have done us.
But one may say: I do forgive all who have injured me if they repent, say they are sorry, and ask pardon! My dear brethren, this won't do. You must forgive whether they repent or not. Nothing less will satisfy the Lord. The best reason is that since the Lord has forgiven us, so we also are bound to forgive all. A true lover of the Lord doesn't want a better reason. A greater or a better cannot be given. Our Lord himself has set the example. He has taken our sins upon himself, and caused the Eternal Father to forgive us our sins for his sake beforehand, before we have even repented or shown by a single sign that we want to belong to God and to hate sin. Do we not receive in our baptism, as infants, the grace that destroys original sin? Original sin placed us under the power of the devil, and made us unworthy to be called the sons of God, but our Christian baptism made us again the sons of God. Does not God forgive us also our mortal sins, giving us time to repent, and even waiting patiently for our repentance? Remember, these sins after baptism are all the greater because after being made innocent we again become guilty.
But some try to excuse themselves and say: It is hard to have to do this; I can't do it. The sin against me is too great; it ought not to be forgiven. This is not true. There is nothing we can't forgive, nothing we are permitted to leave unforgiven. We can forgive any sin against us if we will. If it is hard, pray and it will become easy. Sincere prayer for him who is our enemy is sure to remove very soon all feeling against him. This is certain: that it will, without fail, prevent the malice and revenge in our hearts from overcoming us and causing us to sin grievously against charity. Remember that everything we do well for our Lord is hard at first, but is made easy by prayer and faithful, persevering effort.
Again, some object: I try to pray but cannot, because when I pray I think of my wrongs and begin to hate my enemy, so that my prayer is insincere or stops on my lips! Then pray for all poor sinners, and don't mean to leave your enemy out of your prayers. This is a good beginning, and keeps you from mortal sin, for pray we must for our enemies. This is a fundamental law of the Christian life. If we intentionally leave out one single soul when we pray for all poor sinners, we sin in the very presence of God, and our prayers are rejected; nor shall they be accepted until we include that soul also.
Let us remember, my dear brethren, that we are called by our Lord to show to the world that being the friends of God means that he puts into our souls his loving, merciful, long-suffering Spirit, and thus makes us like to himself. Does any one want to be God-like? Then let him forgive from his heart every injury and all who injure him.