“For if you should forgive people their offenses, your heavenly father will also forgive you.  But if you should not forgive people, neither will your father forgive you your offenses.”

(Matthew 6:14-15)

            While the language of this passage is fairly clear and explicit, conveying what Jesus wants us to understand, there are some things about this passage that we need to highlight so that we will understand the intensity of this statement.  Jesus is not making this statement simply to add clarity to the petition for forgiveness found in verse 12, but he is saying this in such a way as to add teeth to the petition—to drive it home as a carpenter hammers in a nail.  This statement is meant to make us feel uncomfortable and if we simply gloss over it lightly, we are not doing justice to the text.

            The first thing that we should note is that most English translations do well when they translate the word for offense differently than they do verse 12.  Most will translate verse 12 as “forgive us our debits” and verse 14 and 15 as “trespasses.”  When we looked at the body of the Lord’s Prayer, we discussed how some groups have gone back to use the term “trespass” in the actual body of the Lord’s prayer when they recite it.  Though this conveys a very similar idea, translating both verses in the same way causes these two verses to loose some of their punch.

            In Greek, there are two separate words at work.  The word found in verse 12 is the word ojfei÷lhma  (opheilama), which literally refers to a financial debit that is owed to another.  This, we discussed in terms of our sin debit that is owed to God—something that we could never hope to pay and that Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross was a payment for the debit that his people owe to God.

            Yet, in these verses, Jesus alternates to the term para¿ptwma (paraptoma), which is used to refer to wrongdoing or sin.  As you would read through these verses that follow the Lord’s Prayer, you should be expecting that the word ojfei÷lhma  (opheilama) would be used, and there is a shift to para¿ptwma (paraptoma).  This would have caught his original hearers off guard, just as it should catch us off guard when we see the word change from “debit” to “trespass.”  When you read that, a flag should go up, and you should immediately be asking yourself, “why is there a change in language here?”  That forces you to stop and allow these two verse to sink into your heart.

            Secondly, there is a parallel structure to these two verses.  Essentially, both verses say the same thing, but they do so in two different ways and from two perspectives (one positive and one negative.  The language of “offenses” acts as outer bookends or parenthesis to Jesus’ statement.  This kind of thing is very common within the Hebrew psalms and other poetic literature, and is used specifically for emphasis.  And indeed, that is exactly what Jesus is doing—emphasizing this incredibly important doctrine of forgiveness.

            This may seem incredibly technical to be discussing when dealing with verses like this, but when you start to get the handle on what Jesus is doing by structuring his statement in this way, you can begin to appreciate how much it should stand out as being important to deal with as we struggle to grow in our faith.  God gives many wonderful blessings to his people, people who have been forgiven more than we can begin to imagine—but at the same time, he expects us to forgive others their sins toward us.  Loved ones, how is it that we who have been forgiven so much neglect to forgive others the petty things that they offend us with?