Why Should We Forgive | Ralph West

The Henry Center Archive

Sermon Title - Gracing & Disgracing Grace: Forgiveness and Reconciliation

Preaching on Jesus’ famous parable of forgiveness (Matthew 18), Rev. Ralph West warns us against Disgracing Grace, in a manner similar to the Unforgiving Servant. This doesn’t mean that forgiveness is easy. It wasn’t easy for Jesus, and it isn’t easy for us. Whenever evil is put on a face, someone that looks a whole lot like us, we all become nervous. Yet, when our debt in relation to God is put in perspective–following Jesus arithmetic, a difference of $50,000,000 to $34–to not forgive is to disgrace grace. As with the parable, when the role is reversed, and we are not debtors but creditors, how will we respond? Will we grace grace or will we disgrace grace?

Ralph D. West (DMin Beeson Divinity School) is Founder and Senior Pastor of The Church Without Walls and Adjunct Professor of Preaching at the George W. Truett Theological Seminary.

The Henry Center for Theological Understanding provides theological resources that help bridge the gap between the academy and the church. It houses a cluster of initiatives, each of which is aimed at applying practical Christian wisdom to important kingdom issues—for the good of the church, for the soul of the theological academy, for the sake of the world, and ultimately for the glory of God. The HCTU seeks to ground each of these initiatives in Scripture, and it pursues these goals collaboratively, in order to train a new generation of wise interpreters of the Word—lay persons and scholars alike—for the sake of tomorrow’s church, academy, and world.

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