God is Good, Satan is Bad- Chia Cheng Church, Taiwan

The Bible teaches that as believers, we must forgive one another.
I want to show you two reasons why the Bible teaches us to forgive.

Forgive because God is so Good
We must forgive because God is good. We forgive because of what God has done for us when he gave us Jesus.
In Matt 18, Jesus starts telling this story where a King was owed 10,000 talents.
You may have heard this story before, but I have a feeling most of people from different parts of the world don’t understand the significance of Jesus’ story.
When I first read this story, I thought, “Wow, 10,000 talents. That seems like a lot of money!”
But what most of us don’t quite understand is the actual value of the 10,000 talents. It is calculated today to be $8.4 billion USD (227 billion NTD)!
Who can pay off such a debt? No one.
10,000 was the translation of the Greek word myrioi, translated simply as “uncountable”, or “countless”.
Sometimes it’s translated 10,000 as just a general term to mean such a great number it’s uncountable.
Americans people say, “A zillion people”, which is another way of exaggerating and describing something that’s unfathomable.
The Jews listening got Jesus’ point right away. He was making a very obvious point in this story: The debt he owed was unpayable. There was no way that he could pay off what he owed.
And yet in forgiveness, the king lets him go! He had compassion on him and he let him go!
The word forgiveness literally means “to let go”.
The man deserved to be thrown into jail and to have his possessions sold as a punishment, but the King let him go.
He forgave him.
Brothers and sisters, do we understand the debt of what we owed? As sinners, we owed our life.
We deserve the eternal wrath and separation of God.
We have a King who is a perfect God, morally pure and morally perfect.
The Bible makes clear that our sin and disobedience deserves death, for the wages of sin is death.
The Bible also makes clear that there is nothing we can do, for who can possibly pay the debt?
There is not enough good you can do. Not enough money you can pay. Not enough worship you can offer. Not enough sacrifices you can make.
You can try and you can try to earn the forgiveness of the King and make up for your debt, but you will fail.
It is a debt that is too great for us to ever repay.
Just like the Jews understood that it is unpayable, we need to understand that the price for our sin is unpayable.
Yet our God, our King, has let you go. When you believe that Jesus, the Prince of Peace, has died for you, he canceled your debt and let you go. He has forgiven you.
Romans 5:8 “While we were still sinners, Christ Died for us”. He provided the payment that was too great for us to ever repay on our own.
Are you thankful for the cross and the incredible forgiveness shown to you when you believed?
Do we even understand how much we’ve been forgiven?
Many times I hear Christians say that they’re not sure if they really understand what Christ has done for them.
EX: Jason and Cindy
When we forgive, it ought to bring people back to the cross.
Both will understand more and more how much it cost for Christ to die on the cross.
Not just the forgiven, but the forgiver as well.
(BTW, In God’s redeeming plan, they got engage a few weeks ago.)
But the story goes on.
V. 28 says that the servant who was just let go, just forgiven of such an incredible amount, goes about and sees a fellow servant who owes him 100 denarii.
100 denarii, as you might think, is not a small amount. Sometimes we think Jesus is saying that 100 denarii is so small, how can we not forgive those who commit small offense against us.
100 denarii is about 3 months wages.
I’m not sure how much that is for a Taiwanese person, but for an American, that’s easily a 10,000’s of dollars.
I don’t think Jesus is necessarily teaching us that we need to forgive the small things, such as when someone cuts in front of you at 7-11, or if someone takes your parking space at Taisuco.
Of course Jesus would want us to “let it go” and forgive them. Those things shouldn’t be hard to forgive!
But what I think Jesus is teaching in this parable is even the serious offenses against you need to be forgiven.
The kind of hurt that really effects you.
The kind of hurt that might really put you back financially.
The kind of wrong that may have damaged your reputation.
The kind of slander that has broken friendships.
I think that Jesus would is saying that EVEN these need forgiveness.
Why?
Because he first forgave us.
But what he forgave us of is of much greater significance then the things committed against us here on earth.
When we come back to the cross, we realize what Jesus has already done for us. He has forgiven us of crimes we cannot repay.
This is an eternal matter! It goes beyond the consequences here on earth.
And if we allow the Holy Spirit to help us understand the significance of what Christ has done, the riches of his grace and mercy, then these things that others do unto us will begin to fade dimly in the light of Christ.
I know what you suffer aren’t always small things, they are not painless things.
But in response to God’s Eternal forgiveness toward us, how can we receive such great mercy and not also respond to our fellow man with mercy?
As deep as the offense that a brother or sister has committed against you, will you forgive?
Because God is good, and in view of the significance of what he’s done for you, Will you now go forgive your brother or your sister?

Forgive because Satan is Bad
We forgive because God is good, but also because Satan is bad.
We forgive because of what God has done for us 2000 years ago, But we also forgive for what Satan is trying to do to us right now.
In 2 Cor 2, Paul is calling the church to forgive a brother who was living in sin.
The church together had disciplined the sinner, but now Paul commands the church to love him and forgive him.
IN v. 11, he gives the reason why forgiveness is so necessary.
2 Cor 2:11 “in order that Satan might not outwit us. For we are not unaware of his schemes.”
We can see evidence of spiritual warfare in many different ways.
Sometimes it is very obvious that Satan is attacking, but sometimes it’s much more subtle.
In Eph 4:26-27. “Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.
EX: My sister getting her foot in the door. When we were growing up, me and my sister had a special relationship- We Hated each other. We would physically fight all the time.
But see, she had these things extremely scary fingernails. Most people wouldn’t believe they were real.
And so she would chase me around the house, and I came to learn that the first place to run is the bathroom, the door with a lock. And I would run, but sometimes she would get there quick enough to at least get her foot in the door.
I knew, that if I let her keep her foothold, and I didn’t actively fight against it, I was doomed. Because once her foot was in, then she would get her thigh in. And once her thigh was in, I was dead.
Paul says in Eph 4 that when we stay angry at each other, the devil gets his foot in the door.
When you give him place in your relationship, you’ve given him a place to run his business and shed his influence.
We MUST be aware of Satan’s schemes.
One of Satan’s schemes is to divide.
Satan schemes to cause those in the Kingdom of God to divide against themselves.
Even Jesus taught that a kingdom divided against itself cannot stand (Mt. 12:25).
Why do you think God speaks so adamantly against, selfishness, envy, hatred, anger, murder, stealing, lying?
Because these things DIVIDE. They Break relationships.
It is direct rebellion against the command to “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
Satan wants to divide us and cause us to rebel against the Greatest commandments given by God.
Satan is creative. He’s clever. He’s witty.
He can figure out ways to destroy the Body of Christ…better yet, the Body of Christ to destroy itself.
What a great way to destroy the kingdom of God by turning it’s subjects against each other in unforgiveness.
It’s so clever because it’s one of those devices where it’s so subtle, that we don’t realize that we’re being divided by unforgiveness.
Anger can’t be hidden. Hatred is obvious. Murder is the talk of the town.
But unforgiveness, no one has to know. It can be this deep-rooted sin that hides itself deep in the heart. You can keep it all to yourself.
“As long as I just keep my distance.” “As long as we don’t have to be too close.”
“We’ll just go to church on Sundays and I’ll just make sure I sit on the other side.”
Unforgiveness is so easy because it’s so easy to get away with.
And so Satan wittingly will scheme to root us in bitter unforgiveness.
But Paul says WE WILL NOT be outwitted by Satan, but we will expose darkness and we will be aware of his schemes.
We cannot tolerate unforgiveness, lest we let the DEVIL have his way in us.
EX: FCBC Retreat. I spent a lot of time with a guy named Kevin. He was obviously rejected, and spent time by himself a lot. No one talked to him.
I spent a lot of time with him, because it was easy. I didn’t have to talk much. He had so much to say. SO much anger and bitterness because of all the rejection he’s received.
During the retreat, he kept telling me about this one retreat where he was uncontrollably angry.
On the last night, he wanted to confess something to me, that was so shameful.
He said that one time, he was so desperate, that he prayed to Satan to help him.
I was like “WHAT?@!! How can you do such a thing?!”
As believers, we know that we are never to invite demonic influence into our lives.
By doing so, you give Satan permission to have influence over you, and he takes you up on it and never wants to leave. He will not leave easily.
Even when you engage in activities like fortune telling, or idol worship, you invite Satanic influence in.
But here Kevin directly asked Satan to help him. The Father of all evil spirits.
And it made sense, no wonder he became so violent and angry.
I hope that shocks you, because that is extremely disturbing.
But Brothers and sisters, please listen.
Let us not be outwitted by Satan. We will be aware of his schemes.
When we insist and persist in unforgiveness, we are unwittingly giving Satan access to our lives.
We are giving him a foothold to set up shop, and run his business.
Please be aware of Satan’s schemes. AS disturbing as it is for someone to pray to Satan, let us be aware of ways we may give Satan permission in our lives.
We forgive because God has been so good to forgive us first.
And we must forgive because Satan has evil schemes to divide us.
We cannot tolerate unforgiveness; but MUST forgive as Christ forgave us.