The Ability To Love Much

I want you to walk in the same kind of love that never holds bitterness, never holds a grudge, never holds anything against anybody, because you know that that thing has already been dealt with by Jesus Christ. What more could you want? And if blessed God, holy God, righteous God can forgive that person, and take that sin and put it on his dear Son, who are you to demand blood out of somebody? That’s what happens on this side of the cross, folks. Now let me develop another thought. The fact is this, and we can split this concept into two parts.

The depth of your love is indicated by how much you forgive. Look at your life. How much do you forgive? Proverbs 10 12 says this. Love covers all sins. Love covers all sins. In other words, total love is total forgiveness. Peter put it this way. 1 Peter 4 8. You are to have stretched love, fervent love. Ectenos speaks of a muscle stretched to its limits. You are to love to the very limits. For love covers what? Multitude of sins. How big is your multitude? Well, however broad your love is, that’s how big the multitude is.

God knows if you love, you’re going to have to let people off the hook. God knows if you love, you’re going to have to forgive. God knows love has to deal with sin, but love does by covering it. It means just throwing a blanket over it, removing it, putting it out of sight. So first of all, the depth of your love is indicated by how much you forgive. Now think about it. Do you hold a grudge against somebody in your house? It isn’t their problem. That’s your problem. Your inability to forgive belies your love.

And I say to you, if this is characteristic of your life, you’re not a Christian, because if you don’t have love, you’re not God’s child. Think about it. Second thing I want to say about this. First is the depth of your love is indicated by how much you forgive. And secondly, the depth of your love is indicated by how much you know you’ve been forgiven. Did you get that? First of all, you can tell a person’s love by how much they will forgive somebody else, and you can also tell by how much they know they’ve been forgiven.

I’ll tell you something. A church is an interesting place. I read that letter this morning about a lady who wants to come here from jail. She’s been a criminal sent to jail. We have other people like that in this church. We have ex-cons, people who’ve served over 10 years. We have people who’ve done everything in this. We’ve got a sordid bunch here. We have ex-fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, thieves, liars, effeminate homosexuals. We’ve got a whole bunch of those kinds of people. We’ve got just everyday rotten, self-righteous, former self-righteous, works-oriented people.

We’ve got a lot of people like that, but you know something? I never cease to be amazed that it is inevitably the people who have the greatest sense of forgiveness in their lives, who grant to others the greatest forgiveness. Did you ever notice that? It is always the smug, self-righteous, religious people who can’t forgive somebody for something in the past, who can’t let them off the hook. You know, you get a person in the church, for example, who’s a former drunk, alcoholic, prostitute, criminal, and they come to Jesus Christ, and then a little later on, somebody else comes along with a terrible, deep, sinful problem.

That kind of person will say, why you know I’ll forgive them? After all, look what the Lord did to me. The Lord did that to me. On the other hand, you get somebody, well, I’ve gone to church all my life, I’ve been in the religious fum-fum-fum, see? Somebody comes along, and somebody’s got a little, why? I look down on that person, fum-fum, see? The riff-raff in the church. Yeah, but you know that the fact of the matter is that Guy’s sin is probably worse than prostitution, because religious super-piousity was the worst thing of all.

But you see, it’s the people who know they’ve been forgiven the most, who are able to forgive. Now, let me show you an illustration of this. Look at Luke 7, and you see these two people contrasted here in Luke 7, and we see a beautiful picture of our Lord. Verse 37, verse 36, sets it up. Now, we don’t have time to go into all of what that signifies, but that thing would be very costly, and it may have been also purchased by her with money that she gained from her trade, which would be prostitution.

So it’s kind of a strange situation. So she comes in the house where the Pharisee is entertaining Jesus, and she stood at his feet behind him, that is Jesus, weeping, a broken and a contrite spirit, mourning over sin. And she began to wash his feet with tears, and she did wipe them with the hair of her head, and she kissed his feet, and she anointed them with the ointment. Now that’s an absolutely shocking scene. If she’d have done that to the Pharisee, he’d have turned around and slapped her across the mouth.

He’d have had his servants pick her up and throw her in the street. How dare you touch a clean person, you vile, filthy woman. And verse 39 indicates that. When the Pharisee, who had bidden him, saw it, he spoke within himself, saying, this man, if he were a prophet, would have known who and what manner of woman this is that touches him, for she’s a sinner. Oh, the self-righteousness is incredible. He didn’t have any forgiveness in his heart. And you know why? He didn’t think he needed to be forgiven for anything. And you will forgive in measure as you comprehend your own forgiveness.

See? You will love as you comprehend that love of God towards you. And the deeper your sin, the greater your sense of forgiveness, and the more magnanimous your love and forgiveness to someone else. Well, he didn’t have any sense of sin, so he didn’t have any sense of forgiveness. And I like this. He was saying it in himself, not out loud. And then Jesus answered him, isn’t that great? Who, oh boy, a few of those deals and you’d be shaken. He can read your mind. And Jesus answering said unto him, Simon, I have somewhat to say to you.

And he got his pious voice and he said, Master, say on. There was a certain creditor. Jesus was a master of illustrations. There was a certain creditor and he had two debtors. The one owed him 500 denarii. A denarii is about a day’s work and the other 50. And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both. Nice guy, right? Tell me therefore, which of them will love him most? Simon answered and said, I suppose that he to whom he forgave most. And he said unto him, thou hast rightly judged.

And he got the point, see. And he turned to the woman and said unto Simon, Simon, you see this woman. I entered into your house. You gave me no water for my feet, but she’s washed my feet with tears and wiped them with the hair of her head. You gave me no kiss, but this woman since the time I came in has not ceased to kiss my feet. My head with oil you did not anoint, but this woman hath anointed my feet with ointment. Wherefore I say unto thee, her sins which are many are forgiven, for she loved much, but to whom little is forgiven, the same loves little.

Oh, what a terrible indictment. The reason she loves me so, the reason she’s doing this to me, the reason she’s responding like this to me, you see, is because she loves much. And the reason she loves much is because she has a deep sense of sin and seeks a deep forgiveness. And Jesus turned to her and he said, verse 48, thy sins are forgiven. He forgave her much and she loved much. Thank you for joining us in this exploration of the ability to love much. Until next time, remember to keep the faith, stay strong and continue to shine your light in the world.

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