Casting Stones, Forgiving, and Forgetting

Today's topic is one about which my mama would say, "You've gone to meddling now." My reading this morning was in Deuteronomy 13, and the topic is casting stones.

Moses gave clear instructions about stoning a false prophet who tried to lead the people to serve false gods. Everyone was to take part so that they would understand the penalty for idolatry and leading others astray. Seeing and participating in the execution was to serve as a deterrent to the sin.

Deuteronomy 13:9 gives the instructions about stoning the false prophet, but there's a verse before it that's easily overlooked. Deuteronomy 13:4 comes before verse 9 for a reason. 

"You shall follow the Lord your God and fear Him; and you shall keep His commandments, listen to His voice, serve Him, and cling to Him." Deuteronomy 13:4 nasb 

Before we attempt to deal with sin in others and purge sin from our midst, we are to be certain we are following, fearing, obeying, listening, serving, and clinging to God as we ought. 

We are to address our own sin first, before we attempt to address the sin of another.

In Jesus' day, a group of men wanted to stone a woman for her sin of adultery. Jesus looked at the group of people holding stones and at the woman who waited for them. She had committed adultery with a married man. There was no question about her guilt. She deserved the punishment that was about to be given. 

Jesus stopped the execution in its tracks with a few simple words.

"He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her." 

                                                            John 8:7 nasb

We read about all the countries that still use stoning as a form of execution, and are shocked, but we have our own form of slow death by torture. It's know as gossip. When we malign another's reputation by spreading gossip, even in the guise of a prayer request, we are participating in a form of "stone casting". 

As the body of Christ, it's our job to act like Jesus. Praise God, He doesn't spread our sin around for all to examine, and neither should we. 

Perhaps equally as harmful to those who have sinned is holding to their sin for years. "I can forgive but I can't forget," is our justification, but we aren't fooling God with that attitude. 

(I am not speaking of "forgetting" about the one who continually wounds, but about the one who has repented and turned from the sin.)

Forgiving does not remove consequences, but it should change how we treat the one who has sinned against us.

Jesus doesn't hold on to our sin, or the sin of others, once we've repented and been forgiven, and neither should we. 

Unfortunately, it is commonly said of the church, "They are the only army in the world that shoots their own wounded." This should not be. 

I recently spoke to someone who surprised me with the way they held to someone else's sin. The sin of another person was recounted with as much fervor as if it had happened yesterday. It had occurred more than half a century before. 

Why not forgive that sin and let go of it? If we expect God to forgive us, we must forgive. Even if the sin of another left tremendous destruction in its wake. 

Why? Because God, in his mercy, offered us forgiveness for our own heinous sin. 

When Jesus walked the earth, He was maligned by the religious leaders because he ate and drank with sinners. And He did. People just like you and me. 

He spent time with them because He loved them. He offered them a new way of life and, to everyone's surprise, they responded to His love, accepted the offer of forgiveness and change, and spread His love all around the world.

That's what Jesus did for me. He loved me in my sin and, to everyone's surprise, He loved me right out of it. 

I am not the same woman I was when He saved me. Perhaps we would find more great sinners serving our great God with the love of Mary Magdalene and the fervor of Peter if we treated them the way Christ did.

He loved and forgave. Even to death on the cross and beyond. We should, too.

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Be sure to check the updated Prayer List 

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In case you missed one of the past week's posts, here are the links:   The Broken Wing That Was Not: The Killdeer and Jesus, Faith and Hope: We Do Not Wait Alone, God Uses Everything, Even Manwich, The Angel-Talk: Fear Not, How Will We Respond to God: Fear or Faith?, The Infinite Pi and the One Who Created It, What God Requires

 #forgiveandforget #faithlife #linesfromleanna #leannahollis

Maggie Speaks Out: Forgiving and Forgetting

Maggie the Wonder Dog is guest blogging today. In case you haven't met her, she's a six-year old Shih Tzu who can dance like a ballerina, sneak like a spy, and herd cows like a border collie. She's the best!
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My mama has talked about my hurt eye all week and she hasn't let me tell you one single thing. She hogs the writing, but that's okay. It's her favorite. My favorite is sleeping in the sunshine. Today, though, it's my turn. Hooray!

Chasing possums is my favorite, too, but it upsets Mama. She says they might bite and give me a disease. I have had enough disease with my eye, so no possum-chasing for me any time soon. No, sir.

Mama has worried constantly about how my eye got hurt, but I told her, "Do not worry about that any more. Forget about it and let the past be the past." She said humans have a really hard time about forgetting. I knew that already. Don't people know about getting over stuff?

Here's a little hint. If you want the past to stay in the past, leave it there and quit talking about it. 

That's what dogs do. If you mess up and don't give us a treat when we want it, we just forgive you and love you anyway. Even if you are mean to us, we still forgive you. We still love you. 

You should check with Jesus about this, but my Mama told me He said, "Forgive." He did not say, "Talk about it all the time until everyone around you goes insane from hearing you gripe and complain." 

(My mama said I had to apologize for that. She wasn't griping and complaining. She was planning how to prevent another eye injury. Yeah, right.)

If my sister hurt my eye, and I'm not saying she did, I'm supposed to forgive her. I don't think humans know about that word, but it means to "deliver unconditionally." If I deliver my sister, if she hurt my eye (and I'm not saying she did), I will not have any conditions on setting her free from me being mad about my eye. I will just set her free and let her go from my anger. I will not keep worrying and saying, "You hurt me. Don't you do it again." That won't help anything. 

Anyway, I meant to tell you about why I keep my eye closed. That is a lesson you need to learn, too. I will tell you tomorrow. If my mama will let me write again. 

It's time for my eye salve, which is really slimy and kinda yucky. Have you tried to see through eye ointment before? It is not easy. 

Before I get my eye slimed, I want to give you the Wonder Dog Lesson of the Day:

Get over it.

(Wonder Dogs like short lessons so we can remember it. When you forgive, you're supposed to forgive and get over it, too. Quit talking about it. Quit thinking about it. Just get over it. That's what Jesus did for you, so you should do it, too. If you're having trouble with this, do what Wonder Dogs do. We ask Jesus to help us, and He does.)

And be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you. Ephesians 4:32 nasb

That's all for today, but don't forget. Let the past stay in the past. Even if the past caused a big hole in your eye. 

Worrying about why won't close the hole in your eye. 

Hey, that's a little rhyme. Time for eye slime. (There's another rhyme.) See you tomorrow. Maybe.
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In case you missed any of the past week's posts, here are the links:  I Shook His Hand Once, Knowing the Goal, Remembering My Way, and Maggie The Wonder Dog and the Hurt Eye, Maggie: Avoiding the Light, and Maggie: Sister Love and the Body of Christ.

The most read post of the past week: Remembering My Way.

Here's the link to The Clay Papers, available as an e-book for personal use or to send as a gift for only 99 cents. 
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#forgiveandforget #MaggietheWonderDog #JesusChrist #letitgo

Teach us to pray, part 38: Forgiving like God Forgives

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 also forgive everyone who is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation.'" (Luke 11:2-4 NASB)

The issue of forgiveness is so vitally important to the life of a disciple that we are going to look at this subject in a bit more depth. In the Model Prayer recorded in Matthew's gospel, Jesus prayed, "forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors." In both accounts, the importance of forgiving others in order to have our own sins forgiven is clear. The problem is that I, of course, want my own sins forgiven promptly. The sins of others toward me, however, tend to loom larger than my own, and I am not as quick to forgiveness as I want God to be toward me. This should not be.


If I want the forgiveness of God, I need to forgive like He forgives. A brief look at the way God forgives draws a sharp contrast between my own tendency toward a form of forgiveness and His utterly complete forgiveness.

1) God forgives promptly. If we confess our sins, He forgives us. He doesn't make us wallow in shame or beg repeatedly to wear Him down for forgiveness. When we confess, He forgives. We should offer that same promptness in forgiveness. (1 John 1:9)
2) God forgives completely. He removes our sin "as far as the east is from the west". (Psalm 103:12) and sweeps them away like a cloud. "Isaiah 44:22)
3) God forgives permanently. God forgives and forgets. He blots out our sins and remembers them no more, rather than bringing them back up over and over again. He does not continued to rehearse our sin to keep them memory fresh. (Isaiah 43:25)

If God forgives promptly, completely, and permanently, then I, too, should forgive promptly, completely, and permanently. We will look at "forgiving and forgetting" in more detail tomorrow, but Scripture makes it clear that I cannot hold on to the hurts of others if I want to have forgiveness myself. 

Corrie ten Boom said that forgiveness is an act of the will. Martin Luther King described forgiveness as an attitude. "Forgiveness is not an occasional act. It is a permanent attitude." When there is something to forgive, I must choose to forgive it. I must also choose not to rehearse it over and over again, which requires that I take every thought captive. If thoughts of the offense recur, my job is to recall that offense only as forgiven and move on.

Forgiveness is a choice. God chooses to forgive us, and so should we forgive others. This Holy Week, we celebrate the forgiveness purchased for us on the cross by Christ. As we thank Him for the price He paid, let us also forgive those who have offended us, and do it just as thoroughly, just as promptly, and just as permanently as God has forgiven us.