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God gives us forgiveness as a free gift, as an undeserved favour, because He knows we can never earn it. But it cost Him the life of His only Son, Jesus. Jesus took our punishment and made the way for the Father to extend His mercy to us. We receive it when we realise that our sins deserve the punishment of hell, and go to the Saviour who came looking for us. Then His blood cleanses the record of our sins, and we receive adoption as children of God. A miracle of love and grace.

A mark of those who have experienced this grace is that they tend to become less and less hard on others who sin against them. Those who take pride in their righteousness, abilities or achievements may not even know God like this. But those who realise they have received mercy learn how to show mercy.

On the other hand, those who refuse to forgive others show that they do not know what it is to be under grace, or that they have forgotten how they received grace. Those who have not been born again may still be active in church and pass off as those whom many consider as godly. But their so-called godliness is merely external, lacking power. They are religious-minded, but they have not come to know God. Sometimes, even those who were once born again through grace become self-righteous again as they gain recognition, go slow on their working out their salvation, and eventually forget from where God picked them up (2Pe.1:9). Now they find it difficult to forgive others, especially when someone has done them serious harm, and may sometimes even lose their salvation which they once had. When they decided that some did not deserve to be forgiven, they showed that they had forgotten how they themselves had been forgiven.

It is good to check ourselves now and then to see where we stand in relation to grace and forgiveness, both in our attitude towards God, and also with respect to the quickness with which we forgive others. Think of the parable of the servant whom the king forgave graciously, and how he found it difficult to forgive another servant (Mt.18:32-35). This man was indeed forgiven, but he did not see the grace the king showed in forgiving him. As a result, he lost his forgiveness.

Growing in the knowledge of God must also result in seeing ourselves more, as we stand in front of Him. Do we think we are better than others that God should take notice of us, or do we understand the value of God's undeserved favour towards us? Do we think that after we were born again, our knowledge and Christian service have now made us 'more deserving' than others, or that we still stand with God purely because of His grace (Ro.11:19-21)? If God was 'fair' towards us, we could only have found ourselves in hell. But He took away what we really deserved, and gave us eternal life which we did not deserve. Do we still find ourselves thinking that some people do not deserve to be forgiven? "Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing" (Lk.23:34).

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