Forgiveness: Having It!

In Luke chapter seven, Jesus explains to the Pharisees that “he who has been forgiven little loves little.”

He said this in the context of the Pharisees’ negative judgement of Jesus for letting a woman of questionable morals weep upon, kiss and pour perfume on His feet, and wipe those tears with her hair.

The Pharisees were aghast. 

But again, as we’ve seen elsewhere, Jesus knew their thoughts—specifically the thoughts of Simon, the Pharisee who had invited Jesus to have dinner in his house—and it is those unspoken thoughts to which Jesus responds:

“‘…Simon, I have something to tell you.’”

‘Tell me, teacher,’ he said.

‘Two men owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii, and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he canceled the debts of both. Now which of them will love him more?’

Simon replied, ‘I suppose the one who who had the bigger debt canceled.’

‘You have judged correctly,’ Jesus said” (Luke 7:40-43).

The woman, who had been forgiven so very much, lovingly responds much to her Savior. 

I believe her tears were the tears of a repentant woman, along with the tears of a woman joyful in Christ’s purification of her. Her adoration was gratefulness in action.

Here is a woman who is forgiven not because she is any worse than the rest of us, or because she needs forgiveness more, but because, perhaps for the very first time, she becomes aware that she needs forgiveness. Once aware, she accepts forgiveness. 

No stiff upper lip. 

No haughty mocking of Christ. 

No self-protective playing of the self-esteem card or intellectual credence to “at heart being a good person.” 

No running in fear from the never-before experience of utter inner conviction that confirmed this man to be Lord of Lords and King of Kings. 

No.

The seed Christ planted in the woman takes, watered into life by His Spirit.

Have we ever tried to reconcile with someone via mutual apology who simply isn’t having it?

. 

Their reaction is often one of stoic stubbornness: nothing we say or do will ever permeate their thick fibrous core. For whatever reason, they want to hold onto their grudge, their victimhood, and their ‘being in the right.” 

Forgiveness, for them, gets in the way of all that. 

When someone comes to them showing a willingness to reconcile and move on, that doesn’t sit well with them because in their minds, the wrong was too egregious, or their point of view and “having been one hundred percent in the right” has not yet been conceded. They are not going to budge an ounce of ground towards forgiveness because it makes them feel uncomfortably vulnerable to be transparent or to accept someone else’s transparency. They squirm at the very idea of acknowledging that they have been mistaken, not just in this particular instance, but in many others as well. 

They refuse to admit what the woman in the Luke passage contritely admitted: they don’t believe they have anything to be forgiven for. 

I’m talking about forgiveness in the context of daily interactions, not acts of abuse and crime inflicted on innocents. That requires a much different process of forgiveness.

For the woman at Jesus’ feet, it is her honest acknowledgement before Him of her unfiltered past that leads to her unspeakable joy that she is now finally and absolutely free from it. She suddenly owns a fresh vista in which to go forward, made possible by the confession of her brokenness to Christ and His redeeming full acceptance, enabling her to become new.

In other words, when it came to forgiveness, the forgiveness Christ offered, she was, indeed, having it!

“Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—for she loved much. But he who has been forgiven little loves little” (Luke 7:47).

This isn’t because Jesus forgives little or not at all. It’s because the person I described earlier, the one who cannot own up to their own inner lostness and error, cuts themselves off from forgiveness—either the receipt of it or the ability to give it. 

“Then Jesus said to her, ‘Your sins are forgiven.’

The other guests began to say among themselves, ‘Who is this who even forgives sins?’

Jesus said to the woman, ‘Your faith has saved you; go in peace’” (Luke 7:48-50).

Copyright Barb Harwood