Jesus on God's Forgiveness (The Meaning of Matthew 6:14-15)

In Matthew 6:14-15, Jesus says, “For if you forgive people their transgressions, your Father in the skies will also forgive you. But if you will not forgive people, then neither will your Father forgive your transgressions” (BibleProject Translation). Forgiving the person who accidentally bumped into us or the rude customer who scolded us may come easily. But what about those who’ve caused devastating wounds—the friend who stabbed us in the back, the spouse who cheated, the parent who abused, the drunk driver who killed, the assailant who attacked?

From Jesus’ words, it may sound like God refuses to forgive us until we forgive those who have most deeply harmed us. But is Jesus saying that? Is he suggesting that God remains unforgiving in some cases? The short answer is no. And a more careful examination of Jesus’ words in context will help us discover the longer answer—that approaching relationships with an unforgiving posture suggests we have not yet opened ourselves up to receive and experience God's forgiveness.

Offering forgiveness requires honest acknowledgment of our raw feelings. And it’s a process that takes time. God doesn’t expect us to immediately forgive the people who shatter our world. But he knows that forgiveness is a key ingredient for true healing. When we forgive, it frees us from the crippling power of resentment and opens the door for the possibility of repairing the relationship.

Jesus aims to create a new way of relating that seeks healing by drawing attention to the way offenses break relationships and threaten community life. To illustrate this, he uses an Old Testament metaphor of sin as a debt that requires repayment.

In Matthew 18:23-35, Jesus explains what the Kingdom of God is like by telling the story of a servant who owes his king something like 60 million days’ wages. ¹ Since the servant has no way to pay this impossible sum, the king orders that he and his family be sold into debt slavery. But when the servant pleads for more time, the king shows great compassion. Instead of merely granting the servant’s request to extend the loan, he cancels it completely.

No actual king would forgive such a massive debt or even allow his servant to become so indebted in the first place. Jesus paints this exaggerated picture for rhetorical effect—to spark our imagination about how it would feel to be freed from the crushing weight of such an unpayable debt.

We would expect the king’s extravagant compassion to change the servant’s heart, so that he would also express compassion for others. He ought to celebrate his good fortune and invite others to share in it. But when the servant immediately encounters someone who owes him only 100 days’ wages, ² he ignores his pleas for mercy and callously throws him in prison. The servant’s heart remains untouched and stingy, despite the king’s astonishing forgiveness. The king then rebukes the servant for failing to express the same compassion he just received.

The same is true with us, Jesus explains. Since we all contribute to the corruption of God's creation, we each owe an immeasurable debt for the damage. As one who experienced imprisonment for political dissidence, Russian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn says, “The line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being.” ³ Nobody gets to claim pure innocence or accuse others of being pure evil. We’re all mixed up in this world, all doing harm and all suffering from harm.

But with great mercy, God fixes his compassionate gaze on us and generously cancels the debts we incur. God does not passively ignore or blindly overlook our offenses, but he does not hold them against us either. Our word “forgive” stems from the Greek verb aphiemi, which means “let go.” To hold something against another is unforgiving; to let it go is to forgive. Out of his deep love for us, God lets our offenses go. As theologian Miroslav Volf says, “To forgive is to condemn the fault but to spare the doer.” ⁴

As Jesus frees us from the impossible sum of our debts, he invites us to allow God’s compassion to soften our hearts toward those who have wronged us, and to free them from the debts they owe us. Only then can we begin to heal the fractures that tear us and our communities apart.

Jesus calls us to forgive not only for the health of our community, but for our own benefit as well. When unforgiveness takes root, it produces resentment. And as the old saying goes, “Resentment is like drinking poison and waiting for the other person to die.” We may think resentment works like a weapon to protect us from our enemy, but it ends up destroying us instead. As resentment sprouts, it quickly entangles and ultimately imprisons us in a cage of bitterness. Trapped and haunted, we can no longer experience the love and light of healthy relationships.

Recent research shows that unforgiveness can also negatively impact our physical health. It increases our physiological stress responses, such as a heightened heart rate and blood pressure, which can lead to long-term health problems. And it can also contribute to depression and interfere with our ability to sleep. ⁵ When someone harms us, the choice to forgive releases the hold they have on us. Forgiveness frees us from our cage of bitterness and calms our minds and bodies. Almost like breathing, in order to take in and benefit from God’s forgiveness, we have to also be in the habit of giving it out.

Sometimes we can quickly choose forgiveness and put an offense behind us once and for all. At other times, we may need to wrestle with God until we’re ready (or able) to forgive. And freedom may involve a lengthy process of letting go again, and again, as God slowly heals our wounds. We may also find that we can’t always forgive on our own. We might need a trusted mentor, a group of friends, or a counselor to help us work through the pain.

But the more we practice forgiving, the more it becomes a way of life, impacting all of our relationships. We become more understanding when people cut us off in traffic, wondering if they’ve had a difficult day rather than angrily laying on our horn. We display more patience toward our children, addressing their misbehaviors without harshly condemning them. We’re less reactive with our friends and coworkers, rarely taking offense and calmly working through conflict. We’re able to accept people with all their flaws and failings, recognizing that, in the words of lawyer and activist Bryan Stevenson, “Each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.” ⁶ And every person we encounter is a miraculous creature of inestimable worth, created in the image of God and capable of acting in life-giving ways.

Becoming a forgiving person allows us to navigate a world full of relational hurt with freedom and joy. And it empowers us to follow in the way of Jesus by bringing healing to the world around us.

But forgiveness doesn’t automatically lead to reconciliation. For serious offenses, true reconciliation requires that forgiveness be offered and that it be received by the offender. To receive forgiveness involves acknowledging wrongdoing and working to repair what was broken.

Failing to adequately address the behavior is like trying to heal a gunshot wound with gauze. The bandage may conceal things and even offer some protection, but it cannot deliver true healing and will likely leave the wound vulnerable to infection. Similarly, seeking reconciliation without transformation will only conceal the harm, allowing it to become infected. Relational gangrene ensues, and pretty soon friends, family members, and neighbors are getting cut off. Genuine restoration is impossible when we try to just “move on” without adequately addressing the offense. This cheap reconciliation denies the truth, declaring,“‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.” ⁷

Jesus addresses this issue in Matthew 18:15, saying, “If your brother or sister sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If you are listened to, you have regained that one.” (NRSV) ⁸ In other words, he encourages us to lovingly confront people when they cause us significant harm. This is an act of love. If they acknowledge the offense and work to change their behavior, then the relationship is on the way to restoration.

But Jesus goes on to say that if they don’t listen, then we should bring one or two more trusted people into the conversation. If they’re still unmoved, then involve the larger community. And if the offender adamantly refuses to address the behavior, then we should treat them like a “gentile” or a “tax collector.” ⁹ At first, it might sound like Jesus is encouraging some kind of discipline or exclusion. But Jesus himself consistently loves and cares for gentiles and tax collectors, joining them in table fellowship. He’s not talking about kicking people out; he’s talking about the kind of forgiveness that he offers them. He approaches all people with love and invitation, desiring to form a good relationship and forgiving their offenses.

When people who deeply hurt us refuse to recognize their actions or the impact of their behavior, we may no longer trust that we can be vulnerable with them. But following Jesus’ example, we can still forgive and continue to show them love, hoping that one day true restoration may be possible.

Our first reaction when someone harms us is often to retaliate or demand justice, not to pursue the hard work of forgiveness. After all, God is just and loves justice. But remember that God’s justice is most fully displayed on the cross. When Jesus forgives, he is not doing something unjust; forgiveness and justice never oppose one another when they’re compelled by love. Volf observes that “Consistent enforcement of justice would wreak havoc in a world shot through with transgression. It may rid the world of evil, but at the cost of the world’s destruction.” ¹⁰ And God’s work is to renew the world, not destroy it.

So Jesus calls us to seek restoration through forgiveness. “Forgiveness does not mean condoning what has been done,” South African theologian Desmond Tutu explains. “It means taking what happened seriously and not minimizing it; drawing out the sting in the memory that threatens to poison our entire existence.” ¹¹

When we practice forgiveness, we allow God’s Spirit to cleanse us from the toxic power of resentment. We find new strength and healing. And we participate with God in creating and restoring vibrant, peaceful, intimately connected communities rooted in real love.

1. See Craig S. Keener, IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2014), 92.
2. See Keener, IVP Bible Background Commentary, 92.
3. Aleksandr I. Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago 1918–1956: An Experiment in Literary Investigation I–II, trans. Thomas P. Whitney (New York: Harper & Row, 1974), 168.
4. Miroslav Volf, Free of Charge: Giving and Forgiving in a Culture Stripped of Grace (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005), 141.
5. See further Loren Toussaint, Everett Worthington, and David R. Williams, eds., Forgiveness and Health: Scientific Evidence and Theories Relating Forgiveness to Better Health (New York: Springer, 2015).
6. Bryan Stevenson, Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption (New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2014), 17–18.
7. Jeremiah 6:14 NRSV.
8. NRSV. Some of the earliest manuscripts don't have "against you," but many interpreters see it as original to the verse.
9. Matthew 18:16–17.
10. Volf, Free of Charge, 160.
11. Desmond Tutu, No Future Without Forgiveness (New York: Doubleday, 1999), 271.