You are listening to a message from Southwood Presbyterian Church in Huntsville, Alabama.
Our passion is to experience and express grace.
Join us.
Amen.
What a great song.
We love those songs from the Behold the Lamb Christmas program.
Y'all like those songs?
We should sing them here more often, shouldn't we?
You want to sing those more often, James?
How about Thursday, December 14th at 7 p.m., we could sing these songs together here?
Here.
In this sanctuary?
With the gentleman and scholar who wrote them, composed them on his own, Mr. Andrew Peterson.
Yeah.
So.
Can we bring our friends and the rest of Huntsville?
Yes.
Yeah, yeah.
Most of them will fit in here.
I'll say this and then I'll leave.
He's gotten really popular.
And so we're telling you this now so that you all can get tickets.
Before everybody else does and then there's not any left for us.
So.
There you go.
I think you have the rest of it.
They will sell out quickly.
Southwood.org slash Behold the Lamb.
You can buy them today.
I encourage you to buy them today and buy some for friends you're inviting with you or whatever.
We do anticipate them going quickly and we're really excited.
It's been six years since they've been here to celebrate Christmas with us.
Thursday, December 14th.
They'll be back.
We have been talking about prayer as we make our way through the Gospel of Luke and have made it to the Lord's Prayer.
As we get back into that this morning, I just wanted to remind you in our guest center, there are a couple of really good books about prayer.
This one is Paul Miller's prayer.
Really good theologically, but especially good practically.
If you're looking for something like that.
This one is Tim Keller's book called Prayer.
When you're Tim Keller, all you have to do is title it Prayer.
Experiencing awe and intimacy with God.
It is really good practically.
It's especially good theologically.
If you're more bent in that direction.
Both of these are available in the guest center.
I just, I tell you that to encourage you that as we study this together, one thing you might want to do is take advantage of where God has us corporately.
As he's teaching us to pray and to study further on your own.
If you've ever wanted to do that, these books would be good tools for you to follow up more with that.
That said, let me read Luke chapter 11.
The first four verses for us.
And then we'll study God's Word together.
This is God's holy, inerrant, infallible Word given to us.
Luke 11 at verse 1.
Now Jesus was praying in a certain place.
And when he finished, one of his disciples said to him,
Lord, teach us to pray as John taught his disciples.
And he said to them, when you pray, say,
Father, hallowed be your name.
Your kingdom come.
Give us each day our daily bread.
And forgive us our sins.
For we ourselves forgive everyone who is indebted to us.
And lead us not into temptation.
This is God's Word.
Let's pray and ask him to teach us as we look at it together.
Father, we do give you thanks for your Word.
Jesus, we thank you for teaching us to pray.
For showing us how we can relate to our Father.
And so we ask you again this morning that you would teach us to pray.
Teach us to trust our Father.
Might we see you as great and glorious as we've come into your presence,
worshiping you this morning.
And might it drive us to bring all of our needs before you.
Teach us as we look at your Word.
We ask in Jesus' name.
Amen.
How many of you have eaten at G's Country Kitchen on Oakwood?
Yeah, ooh, that was some excited hands going up.
Yeah, if you've eaten there, you've probably eaten fried chicken,
mac and cheese, black-eyed peas, collard greens,
things commonly referred to as soul food.
And for many of us, comfort food.
And I'm going to stop talking about it because if the sermon goes too long now,
you're all going to start leaving for lunch.
So we love those things.
We enjoy eating them.
But Jesus is teaching us today about a different kind of soul food.
And that's forgiveness.
Father, forgive us our sins, Jesus tells us to pray.
And it strikes me that Jesus in this model prayer is telling us things we can always pray for.
That there's no reason ever to say,
I just don't have anything that I could pray for.
He starts with God-centered priorities about God's name and God's kingdom.
And then he turns to praying for things that I need.
And he says, pray for your daily bread.
For the things you need today, you always need to eat, right?
Is there anything else you always know you need?
Forgiveness.
I always need to eat.
I always need to be forgiven.
It's soul food for us.
Absolutely essential for me spiritually.
Without it, I die.
Why?
Andrew Murray said it this way.
As bread is the first need of the body,
so forgiveness for the soul.
And the provision for the one is as sure as for the other.
That's good stuff, isn't it?
The provision for one is as sure as for the other.
We talked last week about God's fatherly care and provision for us.
That he meets all of our needs.
That we can trust him in everything.
The same is true with the forgiveness that we need.
Jesus says, pray for daily bread and ask your father for forgiveness.
I want us simply to look first at the focus of the petition that we need to be forgiven.
And then we'll notice briefly the comment attached to it that we also need to be forgiving.
First, let me ask you, are any of y'all friends with Mavis Wanzik?
Anybody?
Nobody?
That's too bad.
Mavis lives in Massachusetts and this week she bought the winning Powerball lottery ticket for $758 million.
And it just struck me, I was thinking about this, that maybe if you're friends of hers and you didn't mind getting lottery money,
which of course the Bible would have a few things to say about,
but theoretically she could probably wipe out your student loan debt.
Probably handle your credit card debt.
Probably handle most of our mortgage debts.
And it would cost her something, but I think she could handle it now.
When the Bible speaks of forgiveness, it uses a number of different images.
We've celebrated some of them this morning.
Cleansing, covering in the sacrifices, releasing.
But in particular in this passage, it's the idea of being set free from debt that is featured.
The words used for forgive and indebted in the second line of this petition bring those legal monetary pictures into play.
So we're asking God to release us from the debt that we owe to Him.
What are we really asking when we pray that?
And maybe you gloss over this petition in the Lord's Prayer sometime as though it were no big deal.
Yes, God, forgive me my sins.
I know I'm not perfect.
I always ask for forgiveness.
Yes.
But let me tell you, it's a bigger deal than we often stop to calculate.
Even Mavis and her $758 million can't touch this debt for you.
Stop and think, what do we owe God?
God created us to live in relationship with Him.
A relationship where we desire His glory all the time.
Where we trust Him, obey Him, enjoy Him, and therefore perfectly reflect His image in all His creation all the time.
In other words, we owe Him lives of consistent, unfailing perfection for the sake of His glory all the time.
He has told us we're to love Him with all our heart and soul and mind and strength.
So we owe Him our emotions and our affections too, not just our actions.
He's told us to love our neighbors as ourselves.
So we are to take advantage of every opportunity to demonstrate His kingdom and His grace to everyone we could possibly tell and show it to.
Now sometimes we rack up debt by specific violations of God's law.
Those are probably the easy ones to think of.
We lie.
We covet.
We worship idols.
We harbor bitterness towards our kids.
We lust.
We lose our tempers with our spouse.
And we could keep going on and on and naming things you know are our sins.
If we had calculators and memories good enough, we could add up a big debt.
But when we think of all that we owe God, much of our debt is actually what I was talking about a moment ago.
We often overlook it, but it's those sins of omission.
It's our failures to speak when we should have spoken, to act when we had the opportunity,
to reflect God's perfect image to everyone around us all the time.
We start adding those in and our tab is ridiculously high, isn't it?
We can never pay it, which is the point of a parable that Jesus tells where God ends up forgiving a debt
that is absolutely unpayable.
No one ever could live long enough to work hard enough to pay it off.
Have you stopped to reckon your account before God?
To consider what you owe Him?
Have you considered not merely the sinful actions and attitudes you have,
but just as certainly the times you failed to act?
Neglected to pray?
Failed to trust?
Neglected to speak?
And you might have thought this petition was smaller than,
hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come.
Those were the big things.
No way.
This is a huge request.
Every time we ask it, every single one of those sins has earned us eternal death.
We have a debt we can never repay.
We say we're spiritually bankrupt.
That's the truth of who we are.
And that's where the good news, the glory of Jesus, meets us.
We've already been celebrating that this morning, what He's done.
And we've seen it through the Gospel of Luke.
Remember, as we've gone through Luke,
Jesus is promised as the one who is coming to forgive sins.
He's going to bring forgiveness and freedom.
He's forgiven the sins of a paralyzed man in one encounter.
He's forgiven the sins of a sinful woman in another story.
He has told us recently that He has set intensely on going to the cross
where He will purchase the forgiveness of sins,
and that's a priority for Him.
That's where He's headed.
So the one who teaches us to pray this way
is the one who Himself provides the forgiveness
that our souls so desperately need.
He says, ask for it, and I'm going to purchase it for you.
It's why we sing, Jesus paid it all, right?
All to Him I owe.
He paid for the whole debt.
All the things we just talked about.
Specifically, first, He paid for the penalty
of all those sins we committed when we violated God's holy law.
Colossians 2 talks about Jesus' death on the cross in these terms.
You were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh,
but God made you alive together with Christ,
having forgiven us all our trespasses.
How did He forgive us all of those?
By canceling the record of debt
that stood against us with its legal demands,
this He set aside,
nailing it to the cross.
That record of debt would have been a legal document,
a piece of paper that you would have had
that showed what you owed to someone in this day.
And Jesus takes that record of our debt
and it is nailed to the cross.
Jesus on the cross is famous for saying many things.
One of the ones that is sweetest
is that Jesus on the cross says,
it is finished.
Tetelestai, He cries out.
That's actually a legal accounting term.
It is finished.
Paid in full.
Stamped on your document,
the record of your debt to God.
What's the sin that you think you could never pay for?
What's the sin that you think about it
and you feel guilty
and you think this keeps me at a distance from God.
He couldn't possibly love me because of this.
Jesus says,
paid in full.
It is finished.
God no longer demands payment from you
for that sin that Jesus pays for fully.
The debt is forgiven by the death of Jesus.
That's why we're saying,
what mighty sum paid all my debt
when I a bondman stood
and has my soul at freedom set
to His Jesus' precious blood?
But what else do I owe God?
We've said it's actually more than those violations of His law, right?
I need a perfect record of righteousness,
perfect obedience,
perfect reflecting of God's image
for all the times I've failed.
I can't go back and redo them all.
I can't make my record perfect
and I'm required to have that.
I owe it to God.
And 2 Corinthians 5 says,
God made Him who knew no sin
to be sin for our sake
so that in Him, in Jesus,
we might become what?
The righteousness of God.
Romans 4 talks about God crediting to our account
righteousness that is not ours originally.
The righteousness of Jesus credited into our account.
Jesus pays this part of my debt too, right?
The need for righteousness.
Every year I go online
and I transfer some funds
from my savings account
into my daughter's college accounts.
And we've been doing that for a few years.
Hope to continue to do that.
I haven't started the wedding fund
for three girls
because that's a little scary
and intimidating to me.
But here's how this college fund
is supposed to work.
Many of you are living in this right now.
You understand this.
You make the payments in
and then if Caitlin goes to college,
she'll rack up a tuition debt
and that debt that she owes,
this money will come out of this fund
and pay that tuition debt, right?
Let me keep dreaming for a minute.
Then there's gonna be some left.
And that just brings her up to zero.
She just doesn't owe them for tuition
but she's gotta live, right?
While she's in college.
And so in this dream world that I'm in
where all this money has accumulated,
she says, dad, I need books
and I need to eat
and I need something to wear
and I go in and I click transfer
and a thousand dollars shows up
in Caitlin's account
and she can live.
And she didn't contribute a dime
to this account.
It's only hers
because she's connected to me, right?
Because she's my daughter,
she gets these benefits coming to her.
Debts forgiven.
Even.
Active righteousness,
what she needs to live provided for.
That's what Jesus does
when we're connected to him.
He pays the penalty
for losing my temper,
for lusting over someone else's family
or home or body,
for lying about my homework.
Jesus pays that penalty
and at great cost to himself
brings my account to zero.
I'm back even.
Then he makes the righteousness transfer.
Speaking God's truth to my neighbors
as I'm called to.
Quoting scripture to resist
the temptation of the devil.
Humbly trusting God in pain.
And those things start showing up
in my account.
Who did those?
Jesus.
They start showing up in my account.
Things that I need.
And that's the full picture
of what my soul needs.
The forgiveness for the debt
and the righteousness credited.
I need both
and Jesus has provided them for me.
So why does he tell me
to keep praying about it?
This is not just Jesus talking about forgiveness.
This is Jesus teaching us to pray
and he says,
when you pray,
pray,
Father,
forgive us our sins.
It's another thing
that Jesus has already accomplished.
It's already secure
that he tells us to pray for
in this prayer.
You know by now why,
don't you?
Why does Jesus keep telling us
to pray for things
that are secure already?
What's prayer about?
It's about the relationship,
isn't it?
The relationship
with the one we're praying to.
We've said it over and over.
Our Father wants relationship with us
and forgiveness
is the very basis
of that relationship.
As we come to pray to him,
when I come to talk with my Father,
I'm remembering that I do so
only through the blood of Christ
that pays my debts
and brings me into relationship
with God.
It's absolutely essential
or otherwise I can't pray to him.
I can't talk and have relationship
with him.
Forgiveness is needed
for my every sin
and my every failure.
See, this is an ongoing prayer
for Christians,
isn't it?
Not just some of y'all
need to pray this once.
This is how Jesus teaches
his followers to pray.
Always praying for forgiveness.
Always remembering our need
for forgiveness
and laying hold
of what Jesus has done.
God knows we're still sinners.
And the full debt for our sins
has been fully paid by Jesus.
So what's this?
This prayer is another chance
for us to experience
his grace personally.
Every day.
To experience in our lives
that account transfer.
Transfer.
The funds are there
from an account
that will last
well beyond any account
Mavis ever has.
It will never run out.
They've been credited to me
by faith.
But when I pray this,
I'm laying hold
of that reality
practically for me.
For my specific debts.
debts.
I'm opening my account page
and recognizing again
where my righteousness
comes from.
That's experiencing grace.
It's for me personally.
It's why someone once said
that Jesus died on the cross
is history.
That Jesus died for sin
is theology.
That Jesus died for my sin
is Christianity.
I need to remember
and revel in Jesus
paying for my debt
over and over.
Just as surely as I see
God provide my daily needs
one day after another.
Remember the provision
for this need
in my relationship with God
is just as certain.
This forgiveness
is soul food for me
in my relationship with God.
I'm at peace with him.
And forgiveness works
the same way
in other relationships too.
It's soul food for others
in my relationship with them.
This is the second part
of the petition.
Not only do we pray
about being forgiven,
but also we pray
about being forgiving.
See, the kingdom of God
is one characterized
by this lavish grace.
forgiveness full and free
where Jesus pays
a high price
and I am released
from my debts.
And if the kingdom
is going to come
in my life,
it also,
my life also,
must be characterized
by lavish grace.
Forgiveness full and free
where I in turn
pay a high price
and release others
from their debts
to me.
That's why we talk
at Southwood
about our mission
being to experience
and express grace.
We can't forgive
others' debts
unless our account
is paid up
and full of credit.
But once it is,
and as it is continually
in our experience of it,
we're to be passing
that blessing along
with the same lavish generosity,
I might add.
Over and over,
the money transfers in.
We experience grace
and over and over
we're told to express
that grace to others.
In this case,
the grace of forgiveness.
For we ourselves
forgive everyone
who is indebted to us.
Wonderful.
God, I've got a great idea.
You forgive me
at the same rate
I forgive everybody else
in my life.
Be as generous
in my account
as I am in theirs.
You good with that?
That cool?
You comfortable?
Feeling good
about the forgiveness
you need for this?
You know how we are.
I mean,
really gracious
if you like them
and a bit stingy
on the days
they're really getting
under your skin.
full pardon
for the little things
but breaking off
the relationship
altogether
when they really hurt you.
Immediate release
from the debt
sometimes
if they're really sorry
but probation
for a while
if you're not sure
they're really
going to change.
Right?
Sounds like forgiveness
to me.
Just doesn't
sound like
Jesus' forgiveness.
forgiveness.
Forgiving others
is hard
isn't it?
The reason for that
is that forgiveness
is costly.
Someone has to
absorb the cost
when a debt
is forgiven.
Ken Sandy
of Peacemakers
says it this way
forgiveness can be
a costly activity.
When you cancel a debt
it does not just
simply disappear
instead
you absorb
a liability
that someone else
deserves to pay.
Similarly
forgiveness requires
that you absorb
certain effects
of another person's sins
and you release
that person
from liability
to punishment.
That's hard.
You have to choose
to absorb
the cost.
But that's the essence
of forgiveness.
Right?
Absorbing the cost
of someone else's
debt.
The payback
you could have
demanded
rightfully.
The weeks
of housework
you could have
held over your husband.
The weeks
of cold shoulder
you could have
used to make
your wife pay.
The weeks
of favors
you could have
demanded
from your friend.
Whatever it is
you're
forgiving
that
debt.
Now to be clear
forgiveness
doesn't always
remove all
consequences.
You may forgive
and still need
physical separation
for your own
protection.
You may forgive
and still take
the person to rehab
for their own
good at the same
time.
But forgiveness
means you absorb
the cost that the
offender owes
to you.
And that is so
hard to do
because it is so
much easier to be
bitter
and distant
or hateful
in your heart.
Isn't it?
Who are you
thinking of
right now
when you think
of forgiving
others?
It's so hard
to absorb
the cost
of those
debts
but it's
so Christian.
Sandy
concludes
this way
this is
precisely
what Christ
accomplished
on Calvary.
The absorbing
certain effects
of another
person's sin
to release
them
from
punishment.
It's exactly
what Jesus
did for us.
He set us
free
from our
debt
at great
cost
to himself
right?
It hurt.
It wasn't
easy.
And that's
how he has
forgiven us.
And so
Jesus is now
saying
that forgiven
people
forgive
people.
It's not
that you're
forgiving
others
earns
your right
to be
forgiven
by God
but rather
if you
don't
forgive
others
you
evidence
the
reality
that
you
have
not
received
the
greater
gracious
forgiveness
of God.
This is
why it's
so important
regularly
to calculate
our debt
to God
the unpayable
debt
that cost
him
his only
son
because
no debt
anyone owes
us
is that
great.
And what
does the
gospel say?
that
unpayable
debt
has been
forgiven
us
by God.
No holds
barred
no strings
attached
running
off the
porch
counter
cultural
throwing
your arms
around
the
prodigal
son
kissing
him
kind
of
forgiveness
that we've
received
right?
That's how
God forgives
us.
He's not
waiting
to see
how well
we perform.
He's not
hedging his
bets on
how sincere
we are.
He's
running
to forgive
us.
And then
he tells
us
that's how
you forgive
others.
It's the
very essence
of Christianity
of our
relationship
with our
heavenly
father
that he
loves
and delights
in us
the way
that father
delights
in the
son who
has deeply
sinned
against
him.
Do those
who've
offended
you who
are indebted
to you
feel that
kind
of
love
from
you?
And if
they did
imagine
that they
begin to
feel that
from you
wouldn't it
transform
your
relationship?
Wouldn't
forgiveness
like that
make your
relationship
with them
entirely
different?
Couldn't
it transform
even a
seemingly
hopeless
marriage?
Couldn't
it transform
even a
community
with diverse
people
and a
lot of
wounds?
Couldn't
it transform
our fractured
world
these days?
Ten years
ago in
Lancaster,
Pennsylvania
Charles Carl
Roberts
broke into
an Amish
schoolhouse
and out
of anger
at God
took hostage
several
elementary
aged
schoolgirls
and shot
and killed
five of
them before
killing
himself.
It was a
horrific
event,
you may
remember it
from the
news.
For that
Amish
community
the grief
was intense.
A quiet
old fashioned
Christian
community
broken
into
by the
evil
of murder.
But as
intense as
their grief
was,
their grace
was equally
intense.
By the
afternoon of
the shooting
members of
that community
were praying
and crying
with the
widow of
the shooter
and her
family.
They began
to make
public
pronouncements
of their
forgiveness
of the
shooter.
And they
demonstrated
tangible
reality of
that forgiveness
by inviting
the widow
as one of
the few
outsiders to
the funeral
of these
girls.
And by
setting up
a fund
to provide
for her
children,
not just
their own.
This
widow,
her name
is Marie
Monville
now,
thought for
sure she'd
be leaving
this area,
needing to
move to a
different community.
She stayed
there and
lived,
never had to
leave.
she's since
written books
about the
Amish grace,
the incredible
forgiveness she
was shown,
that she
says,
and I
quote,
helped to
provide the
healing we
so desperately
need.
Gifts
you've given
have touched
our hearts
in a way
no words
can describe.
Your compassion
has reached
beyond our
family,
beyond our
community,
and is
changing
our world.
now you
might not
have realized
that many
criticized the
Amish for
this whole
situation.
This
forgiveness was
ridiculous,
they said it
denied the
reality of
the evil
that had
taken place,
they forgave
too quickly
and too
thoroughly,
but they
knew it
was quite
the opposite.
Forgiveness
like that
doesn't deny
the reality
of evil
or sizable
debt,
quite the
opposite.
It rather
acknowledges
the reality
of debt
and says
there is
nothing
that can
pay a
debt like
this other
than the
blood of
Jesus.
It requires
his payment
for this
to be
covered and
it chooses
to say
that God's
grace is
bigger than
the debt
that is
owed.
That even
though the
Amish had
lost their
own children,
their God
had forgiven
them a debt
at the cost
of his
very own
son.
How could
they not
also
forgive?
And forgiveness
like that
really does
change the
world.
It's soul
food for
you
and for
the one
you forgive,
healing your
relationship
in a way
nothing else
can,
giving them
something to
share with
others as
Jesus has
given to
you forgiveness
to pass
along.
And so
we pray
regularly,
Father,
forgive us
our sins
for we
ourselves
forgive all
those who
are indebted
to us.
We pray
that God
would forgive
the evil
we do,
the good
that we
neglect
to do.
We pray
God would
continue to
allow that
grace to
change us
and flow
through us,
that the
very forgiveness
we experience
would be
expressed to
many others.
Let's spend
a minute
reflecting on
our own
hearts,
confessing our
personal sins
and then we'll
join together
in praying
for God's
forgiveness.
Pray silently
for a minute.
Sometimes
two
rest
ago
to
go
CH
gonna
translate
nothing
good,
voc
fundamentally
over
。
tomorrow
to
.
fingers
or
어나
Completely
apert
join me in your hearts as I pray
and then join me aloud
in the responses each time
it's the same response
forgiving father
God of grace
mercy and forgiveness
we confess our sins in thought
word and deed
the evil we have done and the duties
we have left undone
father forgive us
we have not loved you with our
whole heart mind and strength
nor our neighbors
as ourselves
father forgive us
we confess our
self-indulgent appetites
and ways and our exploitation
and neglect of other
people
father forgive us
we have been prideful
self-righteous
and hypocritical
looking down on others
while minimizing our own
wickedness
father
forgive us
we have neglected your word
your worship
and prayer
and so failed to seek first
your kingdom
and our relationship with you
above all else
father forgive us
we confess our intemperate love
of worldly goods and comforts
and our discontentment
with your fatherly provision
father
forgive us
we have been indifferent to suffering
and injustice in our world
and harbored uncharitable thoughts
towards those who are different from us
father
forgive us
we have pursued our own pleasure
and success
at the expense of those
you have called us
to love
father
forgive us
and we have failed to forgive others
and so been ungrateful
for your abundant forgiveness of us
father
forgive us
let's continue to confess
our sin
and cling to our father's
abundant forgiveness
as we stand and sing
God
be merciful
to me
David's words
from Psalm 51
stand and sing
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