All right, let's get after it. Grab your bibles, open them up. We tell you it's always better if you see it. We'll put them on the screen. But we're going to be in two corinthians for a while, so bring your bible, mark it up. We got two Corinthians scripture journals in there that give you a lot of room to write. I would encourage you to do that, but we want to be students of the word. So as you grab your bible and turn to second corinthians, you find it. If you need to use the table of contents, no shame. Use it. Find it. Just get there. But as you're turning there, let's talk about something really important, food combinations. There are some things that just go well together and we all know it. Like, I'll give you some basic ones. I mean, they're good on their own, right? But together, it's just like a whole new world opens up to you. That's exciting. Like when you think of milk and cookies. Yeah, you said cereal. It's cookies. The right answer is cookies. Cheese in crackers, peanut butter in bacon and bacon, everything. Bacon and everything. Just wrap it in bacon. It's going to make it better. And we know that, like, when it comes to food, like, certain things come together and, like, just give a whole new flavor profile. We get that. But what about when it comes to people specifically, like attributes and characteristics, like, what kind of things pair well? Like, if these two things lived in this person, what a flavor profile it would give? Like, what a taste of authentic Christianity. Like, you take something like holiness, what would go well with that holiness? And, like, if you're going to be somebody who cares about a life that honors God and all that it does and magnifying his worth and how you live, like, what would go well with that? Like, what would pair well with holiness to give people a taste of Christianity? And the answer is forgiveness. Now, you might not have paired those two things together. It's a little bit of a flavor surprise, but that's kind of the impact of Christianity that's unique because you tend to think, well, forgiveness, that's what's needed when somebody didn't take holiness too seriously, right? So why would we put these things together? Like, if you need a lot of forgiveness, you probably didn't have a lot of holiness. And if you have a lot of holiness, you probably don't need a lot of forgiveness. So why? Pairing these two together provides such a unique, powerful flavor of Christianity, and I think this is what I want us to grasp. Taking both sin seriously and forgiveness seriously is a powerful and unique christian flavor. And ignoring either one of them is costly. It's costly. There are churches that never confront sin. You can function and live within that church, and no one's gonna challenge you. No one's gonna call it out. No one's gonna push back on just really bad, evil decisions that somebody's making their life. And then there's churches that just never extend grace. Like, you know, if you mess up, you're done. Like, you've kind of separated yourself. There's no way back. There's no reconciliation. There's no forgiveness. It's just kind of hard going there. So you got, I could say, churches or individual christians, both the attitudes can be expressed by a church or an individual. You have churches that, in the name of grace, never talk about sin, never challenge anybody in their sin. And I say in the name of grace because that's not actually grace. That's not actually a loving approach to a person. Or there's some churches or some christians that, in the name of holiness, never extend forgiveness. And I say in the name of holiness because holiness means, like, to be set apart. And we're not called to be set apart in just our behavior. Or put it this way, one of the ways we're called to be set apart is the grace that we extend to other people. That is a unique thing to Christianity, and we need to be a group of people. We need to be a church that takes both sin and grace seriously. It's this unique flavor that we're called to serve up. And it's a flavor combination the Bible serves up and puts together. In fact, in Matthew 18, it's kind of a chapter that's more known for Jesus instructions on church discipline. Like, what do you do when a brother sins against you? It's like you go to that brother, you confront him, you address it, and if they resist, you bring more people. And if they resist, you bring it to the church, and it gets bigger, and it gets bigger, and it's like, yeah, you got to take sin seriously. But do you know what Jesus teaches on right after that section in Matthew 18, he tells the parable of the unforgiving servant, because Peter asks the question, like, well, how many times do I have to forgive my brother if he sins against me? And he offers this suggestion, how about seven times? Which was, like, over double the kind of standard expected time. Like, Peter, you're being super holy and just like, no, 70 times seven. And he tells this parable of the unforgiving servant. And his point is, listen, you need to be people who take sin seriously. If your brother sins against you, deal with it. If he doesn't repent, make it a bigger deal. But if you're going to be people who take sin seriously, then we need to be people who also take grace and forgiveness seriously. Like, you see this in one verse. This is Luke 17 three. He says, pay attention to yourselves. If your brother sins, rebuke him. Don't ignore it. Deal with it, confront it. And if he repents, what are you to do? Then forgive him. So he's saying, be people who take sin seriously. Rebuke it, address it, and be people who take forgiveness seriously. When somebody repents, forgive them. Like, both of those should exist in the Christian. And it provides this unique flavor. We are to take sin seriously, and we're to take forgiveness seriously. And we can't be people that just pick one. Well, I take forgiveness really seriously, but not sin. Or I take sin really seriously, but not forgiveness. Like, that's a misrepresentation of Christ on either end of the spectrum. We need to be people who take both seriously. Now, you know what kind of sin we naturally tend to take most seriously? The sin that is against you. We take that really seriously. Like, how dare you? How could anybody ever do that? Like, we're deeply offended there. How many in this room have ever been sinned against? How many breathe air? Like, should we start there? Like, you've been hurt, you've been wronged, you've been gossiped about, you've been lied to, promises have been broken. Slander has happened. Theft is like, whatever it is. Like you've been sinned against and you have reason to be angry, you have reason to be frustrated. You have reason to be hurt. There's justifiable anger. They did you wrong. Like, that was not okay. And you can feel maybe in your own heart a tendency to, like, hold a grudge, to hold on to anger. You begin to love your anger. You begin to feel entitled to that anger. You don't want to let it go. It's yours. You have a right to it. Why is it important for you to take forgiveness seriously in that moment? I want to put it this way. Why should those who take sin seriously also take forgiveness seriously? Like, if we're going to be people who confront sin and call out sin and deal with sin and rebuke sin. Why do we also need to be people who are quick to forgive and extend grace? Why is it important that those go together? Because we know we're supposed to forgive. Like, that's kind of a big deal in Christianity, right? Like, we know we're supposed to forgive, but I think we need broader understanding of why we are to forgive. Why is it so important that we should pursue it? So two Corinthians, chapter two, we only got seven verses today. But I want to give you some context as we jump into these, because it's a bit odd to see, like, why is Paul spending so much time defending his travel change of plans, like, what's behind this? And there is a kind of a unique situation that if we better understand the situation, we'll better understand what he's getting at here. See, Corinth was a high maintenance church. There was a lot of problems going on in Corinth, and it took a lot of Paul's time and attention. Now, he loved them. He loved them, but they was kind of pulling at him in a lot of ways. In fact, we have first corinthians, and we have two corinthians. He wrote more letters to the corinthians that we don't have. He took more visits to them, dealing with their problems. Paul was dealing with a lot of problems there. In fact, one of the letters that he sent them that we don't have is referred to as the severe letter sometimes, and I so wish we had it. It's probably good that we don't. But it seems like he wrote a severe letter to them. Like, he didn't pull any punches, like, he's dealing with the problems head on and he's addressing this. And right after that severe letter, it says that he went on a visit. It's referred to as a painful visit, but it was a short visit. And at that visit, one of the leaders of the church calls Paul out publicly, confronts him, undermines him, embarrasses him, undermines his authority, just kind of in front of everybody, kind of an embarrassing thing for Paul. And Paul tells the church leaders in Corinth, like, you got to deal with this guy. Like, that's not okay. He's going to cause division in the church. He's not accurate or right in doing this. This is going to cause problems. You need to address it. And then Paul leaves, he moves on, but he sends Titus back to Corinth to say, like, hey, I've been hard on them. I called the leaders to deal with this problem. Can you go see how they're doing. So he sends Titus, and then later he meets up with Titus to get a report on how they're doing. And Titus gives Paul a good report. He's like, yeah, Paul, you were hard on them, but they responded well. In fact, they are dealing with that guy that was causing troubles. They're dealing with that. In fact, even the guy seems to be doing better. Like, good stuff is happening there. And then two corinthians is a response to that good report that he writes them. And our section today is specifically addressing this situation of the conflict with this guy and Paul at that painful, short visit. But the twist is where Paul before was advocating that the church deal with him and the trouble he was causing. Now he's advocating that they forgive him. See? Are you tracking with the situation? Heads nodding, confused. Yep. All right. Confused or not, we're going on now, getting this is important to understand the bigger point, because this shows us that as a church, we need to take both sin seriously and forgiveness seriously. This church was challenged to take sin seriously. You need to deal with this troublemaker. And they did. Now he's challenged them. You need to extend grace and forgiveness to this troublemaker who has repented. That's the new challenge. So he's saying, yes, take sin seriously and take forgiveness seriously. Now, in our text, we're going to get some reasons why we specifically need to take forgiveness seriously. So let's jump into this. Verse five, we ready to go? All right, verse five. Now, if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it. Not to me, but in some measure, not to put it too severely to all of you. So he's like, if anybody's caused pain, it's not to me. And it's like, well, technically, Paul, it was to you. It was directly targeted to you. It had everything to do with you. But Paul's kind of shifting the focus. I'm not making this about myself. He's not playing the victim. And forgiveness, to thrive, egos have to die. And Paul could have easily made this about himself and how he was wrong. But he's like, no, I want you to see the bigger picture. This isn't about you. And I think one of the things that Paul models here that we need to learn from is that we need to be difficult people to offend. We need to be difficult people to offend. We've perhaps been around people that they're easy to offend. Like, everything's personal. Everything probably has some hidden malicious intent. Nobody likes them. There's a conflict behind everything. And it just makes a mess of everything. Paul's like, no, you directly offended me, but this isn't about me. Like, I know who I am, I'm fine. But there's a bigger picture. And you see Paul here shifting the focus off himself to the bigger picture. But also notice he's not downplaying sin. He's like, not to make it too severe, but this isn't about me. It's about all of you. Like, his sin wasn't just embarrassing and undermining me and my authority. This sin affects the whole church and the unity of the church. Like, this has to deal with all of you. He doesn't downplay sin. Listen, forgiveness is not about taking sin lightly. And sometimes we take that approach. Like, if we're going to extend forgiveness, then the offense has to fall in the category of no big deal. Like, hey, I'm sorry. Oh, it's no big deal. Oh, that's no big deal. But all that communicates is the grace is sufficient for only no big deal sins. But what about big deal sins? In fact, this is a sermon for another time. There's no such thing as a small sin, not when you understand the holiness of God. But Paul is saying, hey, I'm not taking this sin lightly. In fact, church, we don't need to minimize someone's sin in order to forgive them. We need to maximize our concept of grace. It's not that sin is no big deal. It's that grace through Jesus Christ is a big deal, and it's sufficient to meet any offense. Don't downplay the sin. Upgrade the grace. And folks, christian forgiveness is radical. Don't try to tame it. Don't try to make it understandable. Don't lose its wildness. It is radical. The grace that God extends to us that we don't deserve it, and it should be radical, the grace that we extend to others. Look at verse six. He says this for such a one, this punishment by the majority is enough. So that word for punishment, it speaks of an official penalty. Something formal happened. There was a formal dealing with this guy, probably following the instructions that Jesus lays out in Matthew 18, because it says the majority. So it got the majority of the church involved in the discipline of this individual and he was dealt with. And Paul is saying, hey, the punishment, it's enough. Like, back off now, show some mercy. He's had enough. Lay off him. And he's calling for that because his challenge and their punishment seem to be effective. See, there's purpose and intent behind church discipline in dealing with sin. One, to honor God and represent his holiness and the purity of the church. Two, to protect the flock, protect the congregation, because if you let sin reign unchecked, it's gonna spread. It's gonna communicate that that's okay when it's not okay. And three, for the benefit or repentance of the sinner, that they might come to their senses. You can't have your cake and eat it too. You can't keep calling yourself a Christian and not act like a Christian. So if we take away your christian community, perhaps God will use that to bring you back to himself. There's reason and purpose behind it. But where sin is persistent, it should get bigger. Like, if you're going to persist in sin, we're going to get more people involved and more people involved and more people involved. If you persist in sin, it's going to get bigger. But if you repent of sin, it's going to get smaller. Like, oh, well, we don't need to keep talking about it like it's over. Like, you're done, you're repenting, you're forgiven. You're met with grace. And I think repentance is implied here. Look at verse seven. So you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. So he has this excessive sorrow. He feels bad about what went on. He feels bad about losing his church community. He feels bad about how he treated Paul, and he has this excessive sorrow. Now, the reason I think this means repentance is later on, Paul will address the difference between worldly sorrow and godly sorrow. But godly sorrow leads to repentance. So let's look at how he addresses that. If you turn over to chapter seven, there's a lot here. We're not going to preach it. We'll get to it eventually. But what he says here speaks to what he's talking about in our text. So chapter seven, verse six. But God who comforts the downcast, comforted us by the coming of Titus. So Titus, bringing the good report to Paul, brought him comfort, and not only by his coming, but also by the comfort with which he was comforted by you. So Titus was comforted by their positive response to Paul's challenge, and he brought that same good news to Paul. So everybody's getting comforted by people responding well to being rebuked, not only by this coming, but also by the comfort with which he was comforted by you. As he told us of your longing, your mourning, your zeal for me. So I rejoice still more for even if I made you grieve with my letter, I do not regret it, though I did regret it, for I see that the letter grieved you that only for a little while. This is kind of confusing. Like, well, do you regret it, or do you not regret it? Like, what do you mean? Paul? He's like, my intention was not to grieve you, but I don't mind grieving you if it leads to your repentance. So I feel bad that it grieved you, but I don't feel bad that it grieved you unto repentance. Does that make sense? He's like, I'm willing to say hard things because I love you and I want to see you do better. And if you're bothered by my hard things, I'm okay with that. So as it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting, for you felt a godly grief, so that you suffered no loss through us. For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death. Now, when we get to this text, we'll talk more about what those two mean. For now, let's just hear how it connects to our text. Foresee what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves. What indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment. At every point, you have proved yourselves innocent of this matter or of the matter. So there's quite a bit of repenting going around here. Paul challenges them in this, to take sin seriously. They do take sin seriously. They deal with the issue. The guy seems to repent from his actions as well, not only the church, but the individual. And now Paul is telling them to take forgiveness seriously. So, new challenge. You took sin seriously. New challenge. Take forgiveness seriously. In fact, this is Luke 17 three. This is what he's living out. Pay attention to yourselves. If your brother sins, rebuke him. Check. You did that. Your brother sinned. You rebuked him. If he repents, what? Forgive him. So that's where we're at now. You rebuked sin. He repented. Now, I'm challenging you to forgive sin, to show forgiveness. But he doesn't just make it a command. It is a command, in case you're wondering. If it's a suggestion, it's not a suggestion. It's a command. But it's more than just a command. There's more than just a command to forgive. He gives reasons or motivations to actually take forgiveness seriously. So we're going to look at four reasons, or hopefully four motivations to forgive that are deeper than just, I'm supposed to. I'm a Christian. I'm supposed to. Yeah, but why? What are the motivations behind that? Because how many in here would love to grow in forgiveness? How many in here would love the people around you to grow in forgiveness? How many think it would be really cool for our church to just exude grace and forgiveness? Yeah, well, we need God's help for that. So let's just pause and pray before we get into the rest of this text together. Father, we need you to want you. We need you to open our eyes and our hearts. And I pray when it comes to this text, you would give us spiritual sight that as people who desperately need grace and forgiveness, you would stir up in us a heart that both takes sin seriously and forgiveness seriously, giving us just that unique flavor that our world needs to taste. So give us understanding as we look in your word. We pray this in your name. Amen. All right, let's look at four reasons. Number one, we forgive for the benefit of the repentant believer. We forgive for the benefit of the repentant believer. Let's look back at verse six through eight. For such a one, this punishment by the majority is enough. So you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. So I beg you to reaffirm your love for him. So Paul is concerned about the individual who mistreated him. He's concerned about that guy. And Paul already feels, or excuse me, the guy already feels bad about it. Like, he already has this excessive sorrow. In fact, the word overwhelmed literally means to be swallowed up. It's like, hey, if you don't reaffirm your love for him, he's going to get consumed with this grief. You have to think about this person's relationship with Christ. He doesn't need your retribution. He doesn't need your rebuke right now. That already happened. He needs your love. He needs to be comforted by you. Like, he's going to be overwhelmed by grief if you don't deal with this. Because, listen, a sinner needs rebuked, but a repentant sinner doesn't need ongoing rebuke. Like, what good does that do? It's like you already repented. They need comforted. They need reaffirmed. They need reconciled. Like, you see this in parenting, right? Sometimes you have a child that does something they shouldn't do and they don't feel that bad about it. And as a parent, you need to help them feel more bad about it. Right? Other times you have a kid that it's like they did something they know they shouldn't do, and they already feel bad enough about it. You don't need to, like, continue to help them feel worse about it. Right. You need to restore them. Now maybe they're just trying to get out of punishment. You can deal with that. You can figure out your own kids. But we know that in punishment, our own kids, like, hey, you don't feel bad about this. You should let me help you. You're already crushed. I don't want to further crush you. Like, you feel bad about it. Let me restore you. And when christians repent, they should be meth by grace and forgiveness by other christians. That's how it should work. Like, there's been, like, we make it more difficult. I've been in so many conversations kind of trying to resolve conflict, and you're just looking at one of the parties, and you're like, dude, just say I'm sorry. Just say I'm sorry. Would you please forgive me? It'll be over. Like, it's not like it's simple. Like, forgiveness can happen. But then I find myself in the same situation where, like, I'm in an argument with Marcy at home or something, and a voice in my head is like, jake, just say you're sorry. Just say, you know, please forgive me. She'll do it. She's a Christian. I've seen it. Right? A lot. Like, why do we, like, wrestle with those things so much? And it's just caught up in our pride. But Paul's not just saying in the punishment, and he's also not just saying forgive him because we can know how that can go. Yeah, you're not punished anymore, and I forgive you. Yet you still don't really talk to me. We still don't really interact. You still feel like there's a problem. So what does Paul say? He says, comfort him, reaffirm your love for him. Basically, how can we help the person who sinned feel better? That's a christian thing to think about. How do we help this person who sinned feel better? Now listen, because this is important. If he's not repentant, this is a different story. Paul is not interested in making a persistent sinner feel better. He's very comfortable helping them feel worse when you persist in sin. But when sinners are repentant, we need to change how we relate, just like we changed the way we related to you and your sin. Like we got to a place where we're treating you like a tax collector and a gentile, as Jesus put it in Matthew 18. We also need to change the way we relate to you in your repentance. We need to reaffirm you as a brother. We need to comfort you as a Christian in your repentance. Now we need to take forgiveness seriously, or put it this way, we took sin seriously and you felt it in our discipline. We need to take forgiveness seriously, and you should feel it. You should feel it in our comfort and our reaffirming of our love for you. We are the body of Christ. So that's the analogy that Paul gives the corinthians. Like you together are the living, breathing, walking Jesus Christ to each other and to this world. We are the body of Christ. So in it and through it, people should feel the seriousness of sin. People should feel the importance of holiness in the body of Christ and also in the body of Christ and through the body of Christ. When people repent, they should feel the grace of God, the sufficiency of God's grace to meet them in their sin. That's what it means to represent Christ well. And if we take sin seriously but not forgiveness, we are misrepresenting Christ to those who repent. We're telling them that God's grace is not sufficient for them. So Paul is saying, hey, he repented enough. Let up. Forgive him, comfort him. Reaffirm your love for him. And it's for the benefit of him. Don't hinder his repentance. Don't make his repentance harder. Cheer him on in that repentance. Reaffirm your love for him. Okay, number two, we forgive to show the genuineness our faith. Show the genuineness of our faith. You forgiving others is more about you than you might realize. You showing forgiveness to others is more about you than you might realize. Our forgiving others is a test or display of genuine faith. And you see this connection between how you forgive others and your get it? Factor of the gospel and your need of forgiveness in your own life. In fact, this is Matthew six. Jesus says this, for if you forgive others, others are trespasses. Your heavenly father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your father forgive you your trespasses. This isn't conditional forgiveness. You're like, well, it sounds a lot like conditional forgiveness. What he's saying is if you don't extend grace, that is an indicator that you never got it like it shows that you never received it. And he gets into that in the parable of the unforgiving servant. This is Matthew 18. Then his master summoned him and said to him, you wicked servant, I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me and you should not. And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant as I had mercy on you. And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers until he should pay all his debts, which is never, if you understand the parable, so also my heavenly father will do to every one of you if you do not forgive your brother from your heart. He's saying, if you're not somebody who extends forgiveness, that is an indicator that you're somebody who's never received forgiveness. Like you don't know how radical grace is. It doesn't flow out of you. It's an indicator that it never flowed in you. Or this is how Paul puts it in Colossians, he says, bearing with one another. And if one has a complaint against another, imagine that forgiving each other, as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. It's this indicator, like it should rain in our lives. So you see this even in our text as well. Look at verse nine. For this is why I wrote that I might test you and know whether you are obedient in everything. So he's referring to this previous letter of why I wrote you that severe letter that he's saying, hey, there was a test in there, I'm trying to test you. And the test was, are you going to deal with the sin? Are you going to dodge it because it's uncomfortable? You're just going to ignore it? Or are you going to deal with it? Are you going to address it? And you see this? Go back to second corinthians seven, verse twelve. He says, so although I wrote to you, it was not for the sake of the one who did the wrong, nor for the sake of the one who suffered the wrong. So it's like I'm not primarily writing for my benefit who was offended, nor am I writing primarily for the benefit of the one who offended me, but in order that your earnestness for us might be revealed to you in the sight of God. That's why I wrote. I wrote to see your genuineness. I wrote to see the obedience of your faith shine forth. And he says it in nine here. For this is why I wrote that I might test you and know whether you are obedient and everything. So that was the real or the previous letter that he wrote. I'm seeing if you're going to deal with sin, and they dealt with sin. So why does he put it in here? Like, what is he getting at here when he says that? It was a test, and I want to see if you would be obedient in everything. What's everything? It's like before, I was testing you to see if you would deal with sin, but I want to see if you'd be obedient in everything. As in now, I'm challenging you to be obedient in extending grace and forgiveness. So you passed that test. New test. Can you extend forgiveness to a repentant sinner? Can you restore somebody who's repentant? Will you extend grace? Can you be obedient in everything? Church, we need to be obedient in dealing with sin in our own lives and among us, and we also need to be obedient in extending grace and forgiveness to those who repent. And when you do, it's like it shows a genuineness, like, you care about holiness. It matters to you, and you understand grace and forgiveness and how radical it is. It shows the genuineness of our faith. Okay, number three, we forgive for the sake of the church. We forgive for the sake of the church. Look at verse ten. Anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. Indeed, what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence of Christ. So Paul is saying I've forgiven him, like, he offended me. I'm over it. I'm good. I'm fine. Like, I've extended forgiveness to him. And he says the reason that he extended forgiveness was for their sake. It was for their sake. Well, more specifically, it was for their sake in the presence of Christ. Literally, it would say, in the face of Christ. Paul said, I'm concerned about your own intimacy with your savior. I'm concerned about your own fellowship in one body of Christ. I'm concerned about your worship. I'm concerned about your closeness with Jesus. I was motivated to forgive based on that. It's like, was I hurt by this person? Yeah, I was hurt by this person. But there is something more important than my feelings and my pride. You guys need to get back. Getting along. Like, don't be divided for my sake. Like, you could see how somebody is, like, you offended Paul. I love Paul. I can never forgive you. Paul's like, but I've forgiven him. Like, I'm good. You extend forgive. Like, don't stay divided for my sake. That's not for my sake. Like, you need to extend forgiveness, guys, divisions in the church or in the body impact the body. They impact the church. When there are people in the same church where it's like, I never want to serve with that person, I don't want to be in a connection with that person. I don't want to go to the same service with that person. We just sit in different places with that person. Like, that's not good, that's not good. And it's a lot easier to do in a larger church. You can just kind of avoid each other rather than dealing with it. But just like undealt with sin is a cancer that can spread in a church, withheld forgiveness is a sin that can spread in a church. And Paul's saying, you gotta deal with it. In fact, Paul's setting an example. He's like, I'll lead out in forgiveness for the sake of the church. I forgave him. I'm over it. I'm good. And sometimes extending forgiveness is acknowledging something is more important than yourself and your feelings. Sometimes extending forgiveness is acknowledging that something is more important than yourself and your feelings. Paul is saying, for your sake. When we forgive others, we often die to ourselves, which is really fitting because our forgiveness requires the dying of Christ. Guys. Forgiving others does cost us something. Like, you eat that pain, you eat, that hurt, you absorb it. Forgiving others does cost us something, but not forgiving others is far more costly. How it impacts the church, how it impacts the witness of Christ, and how it impacts your own soul. And the stakes are perhaps higher than we realize. The fourth reason, as we forgive, to guard against the attacks of Satan. Look at verse eleven, so that we would not be outwitted by Satan if we are not ignorant of his designs. Paul is addressing this relational conflict in the church, and then he brings Satan into it. It's like that escalated fast, right? This just got turned up quite a bit. Like Paul, we just have some disputes. Like, this person doesn't get along with this person, and then he's going to bring Satan into it. Like, it got big fast here. But he's connecting, not extending forgiveness and being outwitted by Satan. And it's not the first time Paul talks like this. In Ephesians four, we get this warning about holding on to anger, that you need to deal with your anger quickly. Like if you let the sun go down in your anger, like you're giving the devil an opportunity or a foothold, like you holding a grudge, holding on to anger, you're going to give the devil an opportunity. And in our text. Notice his word choices here. It's not, hey, if you don't forgive, you're going to be out powered by Satan. Is that what he says? He says if you don't extend forgiveness, you're going to be outwitted by Satan. Like, he's crafty. It's tricky. He's gonna trick you. And here's the thing, you are gonna feel so justified in your anger, right? Because they did do that, and that is not right and it's not okay. And you're just gonna, you're gonna feel entitled to it. You're gonna hold on to it and you're gonna fall in love with it and you're gonna start to identify with it it. And you're going to get duped in to not extending forgiveness and it's going to do damage to you and to the church. It's tricky. It's tricky. You have to realize the bigger picture. There's more at stake in your anger and your frustration and your jealousies and your discontentments and your conflict than you realize. In fact, in Ephesians six, later on when he's talking about, we don't wrestle against flesh and blood. There's a deeper spiritual reality to this. What do you say? Like, this is not against Paul and that individual. There's something deeper than that. And whenever you're in a conflict, it's not just about you and that person. There's this deeper spirituality behind that. Paul saying, you don't wrestle with just flesh and blood. There's more going on here. And you need to be able to stand. This is like where he gets in the armor of God, he said, and you need to be able to stand, stand against the devil's schemes. He's got schemes, he's got game plans. It's like in football, you can have, here's my offensive scheme, hawk fans, you might not know about that, but you have like schemes. Like there's like a plan. Like we've studied our opponent. We have a plan of attack. He's saying he's a crafty person and he's got schemes. And there's attacks. And really there's two kind of main attacks Satan has on the church. One, it's not taking sin seriously. And you see this in revelation when stressing the seven churches. Like you're tolerating the teaching of the Nicolaitans, you're tolerating Jezebel, like you're tolerating things you shouldn't tolerate and it weakens the church. But the other attack is divisions internal splits, the lack of grace and forgiveness that extend to one another. Guys, forgiveness frustrates the plants of Satan. Be quick to forgive. It does point to our holiness. See, the unique flavor of a Christian is that we care about a godly life, and part of a godly life is extending grace and forgiveness to those who repent. So as Paul wrote to the Corinthians who were taking sin seriously and did deal with the problem, he was challenging them, that they also needed to take forgiveness seriously, and they needed to do that for the sake of the repentant believer. They needed to do that for the display of the genuineness of their own faith. They needed to do it for the sake of the church and its unity. And they needed to do it for protection against the enemy and church. The same thing is true for us. We need to take sin seriously. And when we do, we need to be ready to take forgiveness seriously for the sake of the repentant believer. They would continue in their repentance because we cheer them on in that, to express the genuineness of our faith, that we get how radical grace and forgiveness is and will show it for the sake of the church and protecting our unity and for protection against the enemy, that he would not slither in and spin lies and cause divisions in our church. So here's what I want you to remember. Take sin and forgiveness seriously. Take both sin and forgiveness seriously. And if we don't take sin seriously, then sin will begin to thrive. Like, we'll begin to tolerate things we shouldn't tolerate. And when we tolerate things we shouldn't tolerate, they spread and they ruin families and relationships and friendships. We need to take sin seriously, and we also need to take forgiveness seriously. Because if we don't take forgiveness seriously, we misrepresent the sufficiency of God's grace to meet us in our sin. We want to be a church that takes both sin and forgiveness seriously. So listen to me. If you're a part of this church and you're embracing a life of sin, I'll call you to repent. If you're part of this church and you're living in a way that you shouldn't be living, and we never confront you, shame on us. Shame on us. If you're a part of this church and you're embracing a life of sin, I hope that you grow increasingly uncomfortable with your choices. And I want to plead with you to repent. And if you're a part of this church and you turn from your sin, I want to tell you that you're going to find open arms where we reaffirm our love for you and comfort you and remind you that God's grace is sufficient for you. We need to take both sin and forgiveness seriously. And you know where you clearly see that the cross, you see how serious God takes sin on the cross, that he sent his son to bleed and die because of it. But also the cross is a picture of how serious God takes forgiveness, that any sinner that turns here will find forgiveness because the wrath of God that was meant for you was poured out on him. So the truth that is so clearly seen in the body of Jesus Christ on the cross should be seen in the body of Christ in the church, that we take both sin and forgiveness seriously. And if we do, that is a flavor combination that this world needs to get a taste of, that we care how you live and how you live matters. And when you mess up and fail, if you turn back to Christ, his grace sufficient for you. That's who we want to be. Amen. Let's pray. Father, as we turn our hearts to express a praise to you that you rightly deserve, I pray for those in this room that it may come easy to forgive others. And maybe the reason it comes easy is because they don't want anybody to challenge them in their sin, so they're not going to challenge anybody in their sin as well. And they don't take holiness seriously. And then for those of us in this room that are passionate about the decisions that we've made to try to honor you in our lives, and we just get so frustrated with those that aren't making those same decisions, and we really struggle extending any kind of grace and forgiveness. I pray that you would help us be a people that both are passionate about holiness and forgiveness. I pray that for those in this room that are chasing after sin, you would lead them to repentance. And we would be a church that reaffirms our love for them and models the sufficiency of your grace. And as we turn to sing praises to you, I pray that it's not just going through the motions that we are deeply impacted about the grace we've received from you. And we would want, with our whole being, to live a life that honors you. And part of the way that we honor you is we extend the same radical grace we receive from you to others. Pray this in your name. Amen.