Tag Archive for: Forgiveness

Elders Update – Love, Generosity, and Sharing our Faith

Marcus encourages and challenges us on how we live our lives from the inside out, how we love, our generosity and sharing our faith. If you want to know love, then love; if you want to know forgiveness, then forgive. Craig also updates us on our Covid-19 relief and discusses how we can help our partners in the gospel in Kenya and East Africa.

Stream the video below or download the audio.

Coming Back to Life: Greg Matarelli

Greg Matarelli continues on Joel Chapter 1 and highlights the danger and destruction that sin brings, but, showing how we can live a life of freedom from sin in Jesus. – 01 March 2020

Children’s Church: Forgiveness

One of the hardest actions we can learn as people would definitely be the ability to forgive others. Whether someone performs a small wrong or a deliberate hurt that can scar for us some time, we too often find it difficult to forgive. Our children could grasp this difficulty and in our continued discussion of God’s love, this Sunday we looked at how scripture says that love keeps no record of wrongs. Our prayer is that this ability can be practised far above the choice to display unforgiveness.

Our Part
We looked through the story of David and how he went from being admired by Saul, to Saul wanting to kill David. It was so encouraging to read how David kept his heart on wanting to honour God and because of that, he chose to love Saul, forgive Saul, and not hold any wrongs against Saul. We looked how easy it can be to hold unforgiveness and thus not show love. But when we look at God’s response to us, and how He forgives us, the challenge is how we can forgive others.

Your Part
This lesson has to be practised more than preached. The best way to teach forgiveness is to show it. Parents, teach your children forgiveness by showing them forgiveness. Do not keep bringing up their faults in the past, but rather show them how love keeps no record of wrongs. Help them to see when they can show forgiveness to others. Help them find the words to do it, and the attitude to truly mean it.

We are so blessed live in freedom because we have been forgiven. We pray that our love for others will grow as we learn to forgive.

The Children’s Church team

Photo by juan pablo rodriguez on Unsplash

Key Women: Forgiveness

Zelda Cronje speaks on forgiveness as part of our “One Anothers” series at Key Women.

27 September 2017 at Key Women Bedfordview.

Children’s Church Reflection for 28 August, 2016

One the greatest gifts given to us is also one of the hardest gifts for us to give: forgiveness. We respond with amazement and gratitude to God when we understand the love, security and genuineness of God’s forgiveness towards us. It is only because God chose to forgive us of our sins that we can embark in an intimate relationship with Him. Scripture says that while we were still enemies to God, Jesus died for all so that we could be forgiven. This was the incredible truth we taught this Sunday at Children’s Church.

Our Part

Scripture is full of stories and explanations teaching us about God’s forgiveness. We focused on the story of the prodigal son. Despite the way the son disrespected and dishonoured his father, the father patiently waited every day for the son’s return. When his hope was made a reality and his son returned, the father didn’t say, “I told you so” or, “I will think about taking you back”. The father accepted his son as his son and chose to love him completely despite what he did. This is our God to us. Our children heard about how God wants to forgive us of sins and will if we ask him.

We taught how we cannot remove our sins despite any of our best efforts. No good works can remove our sins and the consequences of our sins. Only Jesus can remove our sins from us. We used a creative analogy using a mirror to teach this (view the curriculum if interested).

We also taught that we too are to forgive others for things they have done to us. Jesus teaches us to forgive because we have been forgiven. How can we be so graciously forgiven by God and then not forgive others?

Your Part

Living in a family dynamic, we are sure that you are aware that the need to practice forgiveness can be on a daily basis. One of the best ways to teach forgiveness is to practice forgiveness. So, when your children misbehaves in whatever manner, address their behaviour, but then forgive them and let them know it. After that, don’t remind them of their wrongs and expose their errors, but allow them to move forward in the forgiveness you have given.

Help your children to practice forgiveness too. They may need to even forgive you. Don’t force your children to forgive (that isn’t real) but teach them the freedom that comes in forgiving others. Forgiveness can be difficult but God graciously forgives us and also teaches us how to forgive.

We pray that your family will experience freedom living in God’s forgiveness and the forgiveness you display to others.

– The Children’s Church team

Children’s Church Reflection (22 May)

One of the most powerful actions God displays to us, His children, is that He chooses to forgive us of our sins. God loves people so much that He chose to give His son Jesus to be a sacrifice to die for us so that our sins could be removed from us. If a righteous God was willing to forgive us of our sins, He commands that we should therefore forgive people when they wrong us.

This was the line in the Lord’s Prayer we focused on this week with our children: “Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.”

Our Part

The first point we wanted the children to grasp was the severity of sin. Sin is a real problem that has real consequences and should not be seen as something like “naughty fun”. Some of the Cornerstone sites attempted to make brownies using all of the right ingredients, except also added a little bit of cat food. The children were horrified. We suggested that just a little bit of cat food shouldn’t be a problem. They were adamant that cat food, no matter how little, would ruin the whole brownie batch. With that revelation we told them how sin is the same. Just a little sin ruins our lives, and whether it was a little sin or a lot of sin, sin is still sin and ruins us and requires forgiveness.

We also taught how Jesus taught the disciples to forgive all of the time. God constantly forgives us. We should learn to forgive repeatedly as well. We also focused on the story where a king was willing to forgive his servant for a large amount of money owed, but how the servant, although forgiven, refused to forgive a friend for a little amount of money owed (Matthew 18:21-35). There is such an important message in this: we need to learn to forgive and ask God to help us to forgive others, simply because we have been forgiven by Him despite our many wrongs.

Your Part

Speak to your children about the action of forgiveness. It is an action, not only a verbal practice. Learn to speak forgiveness but also show forgiveness by not reminding someone of their faults or constantly holding it against them. Imagine how sad life would be if God constantly reminded us of our faults and used them as a guilt trip against us. No, He forgives us and leads us to move on in life. Ask your children if they are carrying unforgiveness against someone. If yes then try to work it through with them to come to a place to forgive that person.

For you, mom and dad, it is important that you learn to show forgiveness. Children learn so much from their parents. If your children have done something wrong (which, being children, will happen quite frequently), after you have challenged them or disciplined them in some way, be quick to express that you have also forgiven them for what they did. Let your children see forgiveness and grace come from you first, especially against their wrongs. This will help them understand God’s grace and forgiveness and help them learn to show forgiveness to others too.

We would suggest that you do not make any brownies this week. Your children may question the ingredients you used and check the bin for cat food tins!

– The Children’s Church team

The Power of Forgiveness

by Marcus Herbert
29 March 2015 at Bedfordview AM

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Sermon on the Mount Part 2

By RT Kendall
20 May 2014
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All Those Sins are Washed Away

by Ryan Peter

One of the hardest things to believe in Christianity is that, quite simply, all our sins are forgiven and washed away through simply asking God to forgive us.

We complicate this endlessly. But the Bible is emphatic — our sins are washed away by the blood of the Lamb.

If they are washed away when you become a Christian, they are washed away as you live as a Christian.

Listen to this: THEY ARE WASHED AWAY. If you sin and sin and sin and sin constantly, doing the same thing, these are WASHED AWAY by the Blood of the Lamb. You can sin now and ask for forgiveness and then sin in the next moment and then ask for forgiveness. God doesn’t count your sins, He washes them away. We count them. He doesn’t. When God looks at you He sees you as righteous because you are in Christ.

Your sins are washed away. Washed away, washed away, washed away.

It’s so hard to really believe it, isn’t it? We want to constantly add conditions. Are you sorry enough for your sins? Are you determined to stop doing them? Did you repent properly? Did you do all the acts of penance correctly?

The promise is that Jesus washes away our sins if we ask. It’s really simple. When I first decided to believe in Christ I asked God to forgive me of my sins and he did so. I didn’t have to worry about all this other stuff. I simply repented and that was that. Why should I have to worry about it now?

His mercies are new each morning. His steadfast love never fails. (Lamentations 3:22, 23.)

Originally published at ryanpeterwrites.com

Kaleidoscope 2013 Session 4: Forgiveness & Healing

TITLE: Kaleidoscope 2013 Session 4: Forgiveness & Healing
PREACHER: Jean Guthrie
DATE: 4 OCTOBER 2013 – Friday PM

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