Wednesday 7 February 2018

Faith and Forgiveness

and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, saying, 'I repent,' you must forgive him." The apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith!" Luke 17:4-5 ESV
Faith is often understood as the ability to believe for some personal blessing that is to come from the Lord. Whilst this does naturally flow from the nature of God as our good and loving father, I think to see faith only as a means of obtaining personal blessings is a distortion.
The context here, where the disciples ask for more faith, is not the ability to receive but the ability to forgive. The life of faith is primarily about right relationship. Firstly right relationship with God on the basis of the forgiveness offered to us in the cross of Jesus. Then right relationship with each other on the basis that we forgive others in the same way as we have been forgiven. Neither of these can be obtained by the flesh but only by faith.
Faith is no so much about relocating mountains, but relocating the hearts of men.

[Originally posted on Facebook 03/01/18]

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