Born Free: 16 Principles to Help You Be FreeSample

Principle 14: You Can’t Forgive Until You Have Been Forgiven

Here’s our fourteenth power principle: You can’t forgive until you have been forgiven. And you can only forgive to the degree to which you have been forgiven. “Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, / Whose sin is covered. / Blessed is the man to whom the LORD does not impute iniquity, / And in whose spirit there is no deceit” (Psalm 32:1-2).

Several years ago, I was discussing the subject of church discipline with my mother. If you’re a Calvinist, you know that one of the manifestations of a true church is the willingness to practice church discipline. I agree that church discipline is sometimes necessary, but I believe that it should be prescribed, not based on the sin committed, but based on the lack of repentance manifested.

In our conversation, my mother said, “I don’t believe that the church ought to be that way.” “But the Bible teaches it,” I replied. She said, “Son, maybe it does teach it . . . but not very much.”

Now, my mother was not a Bible teacher and I am. So, I thought, I will look up the hundreds of scriptures on discipline in the Bible. Then I’ll show them to my mother to prove my point, so she'll understand just how important it is. But do you know what? There are not hundreds of references to church discipline; in fact, there are very few. The Bible talks about forgiveness and acceptance more than it talks about church discipline.

If we talk so much about church discipline, and the Bible talks about it far less than we do, what is the problem? It is this: Most people in the church have either never been forgiven or have never felt forgiven. And as a result, the church becomes a place of judgment rather than a place of redemption, love, and forgiveness.