Day 16: Forgive Us
Our Lord is so faithful to us in each phrase of His example prayer. He demonstrates such beautiful humility and compassion toward others and the self in recognizing our complete need for God’s presence, provision, Kingdom, will, and forgiveness. As Jesus continues to pray, He reveals a certain prayer that should change the way that we think, speak, act, and live.
He prays, “Forgive us our debts…” as a continuation of asking for the good promises that our Father has for each one of us. We are blessed to read this from another timeline as His disciples. The disciples hearing this would have understood this as a continuous request for a covering over their debts, sins, and trespasses. Whether it be each day or week or month, there were consistent failures and struggles that they all dealt with differently. The prayer for them would be for forgiveness as they recognized their debts and their need for forgiveness.
The interesting thing for us, is that we read this beyond our Messiah’s death and resurrection. This means that we read this from a perspective in which a dear spiritual father and mentor, Dave Collins, would state, “When Jesus died on the cross for our sin, all of our sin was yet future.” We read this and ultimately, we pray this prayer as a recognition that Christ has paid for every one of our sins already. This is a recognition with the disciples of the past that we need forgiveness, and forgiveness has been given to and for all debts.
With this said, when we pray this short phrase we are not necessarily asking God to forgive things He has already forgiven. Rather, we are recognizing our need for God, humbling ourselves, and aligning ourselves with what He has already given. It is not that we are earning forgiveness by what we say, but rather receiving forgiveness by what Christ Jesus has done and by our response to that work. This prayer is a beautiful reminder that God’s abundant mercy and grace extend to all corners of our lives. The question is not about His giving, it is about our reception. Asking for His forgiveness is receiving a gift that empowers you to walk freely and freely forgive those around you as well. Amen.
Action: Throughout the day we find ourselves engaging in practices, words, activities, thoughts, and interactions that may not be freeing, but rather binding. They may be things we think are building up debt, that are hurting our relationship with the Lord, with others, with ourselves. I would encourage you to remind yourself of who God was, is, and will always be. Simply praying “Forgive us” may be that aligning with His Truth that is needed. I would challenge you to pray throughout the day, Lord, align me with Your forgiveness.
