Forgive us our sins
During the forty days of Lent, God’s baptised people cleanse their hearts through the discipline of Lent: repentance, prayer, fasting, and almsgiving. Lent is a time in which God’s people prepare with joy for the Paschal Feast (Easter). It is a time in which God renews His people’s zeal in faith and life. It is a time in which we pray that we may be given the fullness of grace that belongs to the children of God.
Treasury of Daily Prayer, 26
This is an excellent little summary of what Lent is from a devotional resource called The Treasury of Daily Prayer. ‘Create in me a clean heart, O God,’ we prayed earlier. God is always doing this with us, but we place special focus on it ourselves during these forty days. And how do we go about cleansing our hearts? What we call the spiritual disciplines: repentance, prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.
During this Lenten season, we will be journeying through Jesus’ journey from the Upper Room to the cross and grave in Luke’s gospel at our midweek services. As we walk with the disciples, we will pause and reflect on what each part of that journey might have to teach us. We’ll be hearing select sections from Martin Luther’s Large Catechism to help us do this.
Tonight, as we begin this Lenten journey, we hear Jesus teaching about almsgiving, prayer, and fasting. We didn’t read the whole passage – the part we skipped over is when Jesus expands on his teaching on prayer by giving us his own prayer: The Lord’s Prayer. Of course, this prayer contains a whole year’s worth of teaching, but we’re just going to focus on The Fifth Petition this evening: “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.” From Luther’s Large Catechism:
[86] This petition has to do with our poor, miserable life. Although we have God’s Word and believe, although we obey and submit to his will and are nourished by God’s gift and blessing, nevertheless we are not without sin. We still stumble daily and transgress because we live in the world among people who sorely vex us and give us occasion for impatience, anger, vengeance, etc. [87] Besides, the devil is after us, besieging us on every side and, as we have heard, directing his attacks against all the previous petitions, so that it is not possible always to stand firm in this ceaseless conflict.
[88] Here again there is great need to call upon God and pray: “Dear Father, forgive us our debts.” Not that he does not forgive sins even apart from and before our praying; for before we prayed for it or even thought about it, he gave us the gospel, in which there is nothing but forgiveness. But the point here is for us to recognise and accept this forgiveness. [89] For the flesh in which we daily live is of such a nature that it does not trust and believe God and is constantly aroused by evil desires and devices, so that we sin daily in word and deed, in acts of commission and omission. Thus, our conscience becomes restless; it fears God’s wrath and displeasure, and so it loses the comfort and confidence of the gospel. Therefore, it is necessary constantly to run to this petition and get the comfort that will restore our conscience.
[90] This should serve God’s purpose to break our pride and keep us humble. He has reserved to himself this prerogative: those who boast of their goodness and despise others should examine themselves and put this petition uppermost in their mind. They will find that they are no more righteous than anyone else, that in the presence of God all people must fall on their knees and be glad that we can come to forgiveness. [91] Let no one think that they will ever in this life reach the point where they do not need this forgiveness. In short, unless God constantly forgives, we are lost.
[92] Thus this petition really means that God does not wish to regard our sins and punish us as we daily deserve but to deal graciously with us, to forgive as he has promised, and thus to grant us a joyful and cheerful conscience so that we may stand before him in prayer. For where the heart is not right with God and cannot generate such confidence, it will never dare to pray. But such a confident and joyful heart can never come except when one knows that his or her sins are forgiven.
[93] There is, however, attached to this petition a necessary and even comforting addition, “as we forgive our debtors.” He has promised us assurance that everything is forgiven and pardoned, yet on the condition that we also forgive our neighbor. [94] For just as we sin greatly against God every day and yet he forgives it all through grace, so we also must always forgive our neighbor who does us harm, violence, and injustice, bears malice toward us, etc. [95] If you do not forgive, do not think that God forgives you. But if you forgive, you have the comfort and assurance that you are forgiven in heaven—[96] not on account of your forgiving (for he does it altogether freely, out of pure grace, because he has promised it, as the gospel teaches) but instead because he has set this up for our strengthening and assurance as a sign along with the promise that matches this petition in Luke 6[:37*], “Forgive, and you will be forgiven.” Therefore, Christ repeats it immediately after the Lord’s Prayer, saying in Matthew 6[:14*], “If you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you....”
[97] Therefore, this sign is attached to the petition so that when we pray we may recall the promise and think, “Dear Father, I come to you and pray that you will forgive me for this reason: not because I can make satisfaction or deserve anything by my works, but because you have promised and have set this seal on it, making it as certain as if I had received an absolution pronounced by you yourself.” [98] For whatever baptism and the Lord’s Supper, which are appointed to us as outward signs, can effect, this sign can as well, in order to strengthen and gladden our conscience. Moreover, above and beyond the other signs, it has been instituted precisely so that we can use and practice it every hour, keeping it with us at all times.
Book of Concord, 452-3
