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Can We Forgive? - Part 2 - God's Math

by Jerry Ousley  
7/27/2012 / Christian Living

I have never claimed to be a mathematician. While I am average at adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing, the advanced mathematics totally escaped me. I understand the squared concept and I know what a number to the power of itself means; but when you get beyond that I'm lost.

You get into trigonometry and you might as well be referring to trickonometry as far as I'm concerned. I don't know much about it and frankly don't care for it. Geometry is okay if you're talking about shapes but how to calculate those shapes might pose a problem. I can figure out square footage most of the time but I'm probably not going to be able to tell you how much liquid from a square container will fit into a round container. "Let's just pour it in and see" seems like the easiest solution to me. And Calculus? Well, let's just not even go there.

We've been talking about forgiveness. In Matthew 18 Jesus gave some pretty point blank words about this subject. Just after He had talked about two or three being together and involved in a forgiveness issue, we see Peter showing up on the scene asking what many were probably thinking, "Just how many times should we forgive?" Perhaps he was in a situation where he had forgiven several times and he was getting tired of it. That may sound a little familiar to some of us. He even suggested an answer along with his question; "Seven times?" The Bible doesn't record this but it makes one to think that maybe he had forgiven his offender seven times and he was done with it.

Jesus looked Peter straight in the eye and said, "I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven." Four hundred and ninety times (see I told you I was okay at multiplication) that's a lot of times. Some have speculated that Jesus was meaning four hundred and ninety times in a single day. While the Bible doesn't openly say this, either way that's a lot of times even for a lifetime with a single person. That's not just four hundred and ninety times of mouthing the words, "I forgive you," but four hundred and ninety times of actual true heartfelt forgiveness. That isn't an easy chore for most of us. Once is hard enough.

I can imagine Peter standing there with his mouth gaping open as Jesus told him this. Why would our Lord even put such a huge number on us? Was He trying to drive us crazy? How could anyone forgive another person that many times?

I believe that this was our Lord's point exactly. You see, it would require a very meticulous individual to keep track that closely of how many times they had truly forgiven each and every person who had offended him. Most of us would lose count pretty quickly. Besides, I wonder if someone who was keeping those kinds of records was really expressing their forgiveness or if they were just waiting to get to the four hundred and ninetieth time so that they could say, "Okay, I don't have to forgive you anymore."

What Jesus knew was that if we forgive each and every person who offends us that many times we probably have developed the art of forgiveness to the point that we no longer have to keep track of anything. Forgiveness will become second nature. It will develop our character to the point that how many times we've done it doesn't even matter anymore.

I wonder how many times Jesus has forgiven us? Since He is God in the flesh I'd bet that He knows. But I certainly hope that He isn't keeping track until He reaches four hundred and ninety times on my behalf because if He's not getting close I'd be really surprised, and I hope that He isn't keeping track because I might be in real trouble. How about you?

Jerry D. Ousley is the author of ?Soul Challenge?, ?Soul Journey?, ?Ordeal?, ?The Spirit Bread Daily Devotional and his first novel ?The Shoe Tree.? Visit our website at spiritbread.com to download these and more completely free of charge.

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