Bible Text: Matthew 18:21-35 | Preacher: Pastor Ken | Series: Marriage Matters
“Overcoming Personal Resentment”
1 Corinthians 13:5  Love … keeps no record of wrongs. (NIV)
Proverbs 17:22 A cheerful heart is good medicine, but a crushed spirit dries up the bones.  (NIV)
To help us avoid and overcome personal resentments:
Admit our shortcomings, stay humble
Remember your partners’ strengths
Rebuild trust by working through minor disappointments and conflicts helping us develop the skills needed to work through more serious conflicts.
Matthew 6:9-15
9In this manner, therefore, pray …
12And forgive us our debts, As we forgive our debtors.  …
14″For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you.  15 But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
“The Parable of the Unforgiving Servant”
Matthew 18:21-35
21Then Peter came to Him and said, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times?”
22Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven. 23Therefore the kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. 24And when he had begun to settle accounts, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents.
32Then his master, after he had called him, said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you begged me. 33Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?’ 34And his master was angry, and delivered him to the torturers until he should pay all that was due to him.
35″So My heavenly Father also will do to you if each of you, from his heart, does not forgive his brother his trespasses.”
There is actually a just vindication of the wrong committed against you because of the substitution of Christ on the cross for the person who wronged you. We are to forgive others just as God the Father accepted Christ’s substitutionary death on the cross for our sins and proclaimed: that is sufficient.
In the same way, you are to accept what Christ did on the cross for the one who sinned against you and let it go by claiming Christ’s sacrifice on the cross was sufficient to satisfy the punishment for what that person deserved.
Forgiveness has a STARTING PLACE where a decision is made to forgive- you do not have to forgive someone… that is a decision you make; an act of your will
Forgiveness has “A MIDDLE” because it is a “PROCESS”- We will often have to forgive someone for the same offense over and over before you actually are able release all of your emotion and reactions to being wronged.
Forgiveness has AN END, there is a finishing line we cross over- there is a culmination point when you decide to finally let something go…to no longer bring it up or think it through. You know that you have worked through the journey of releasing long enough and you want to let the past go.
Colossians 3:12-17
12Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, longsuffering; 13bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another; even as Christ forgave you, so you also must do. 14But above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfection. 15And let the peace of God rule in your hearts, to which also you were called in one body; and be thankful. …