Thanks For The Visit

Thank you for stopping by. I trust you will find helpful and encouraging information and discussions on this site. Care to comment? Click on the comment button after an article. You can also click on this link https://www.amazon.com/author/robertcoutts and it will take you to my author page where you can view the works I have put together on your behalf. I hope they encourage you. Thanks again and be blessed, He is coming soon!

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

AWESOME FORGIVENESS AFTER 37 YEARS OF ESTRANGEMENT


Here is an awesome message I preached when I met my dad after 37 years of estrangement. Please take the time to read it and view the pictures. It will change your life. Also, please share it with someone.  Thanks for taking the time to read.


At the end of this article, please click on the words No Comments to access the comment page and please leave a comment or feedback. It will be greatly appreciated. Thank you. 

Sunday October 26th 2008

EXTENDED GRACE & FORGIVENESS 


Matthew 18:21-35

 

Mat 18:21; Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times?

Mat 18:22; Jesus saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until seventy times seven.

Mat 18:23; Therefore is the kingdom of heaven likened unto a certain king, which would take account of his servants.

Mat 18:24; And when he had begun to reckon, one was brought unto him, which owed him ten thousand talents.

Mat 18:25; But forasmuch as he had not to pay, his lord commanded him to be sold, and his wife, and children, and all that he had, and payment to be made.

Mat 18:26; The servant therefore fell down, and worshipped him, saying, Lord, have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.

Mat 18:27;; Then the lord of that servant was moved with compassion, and loosed him, and forgave him the debt.

Mat 18:28; But the same servant went out, and found one of his fellow servants, which owed him an hundred pence: and he laid hands on him, and took him by the throat, saying, Pay me that thou owest.

Mat 18:29; And his fellow servant fell down at his feet, and besought him, saying, Have patience with me, and I will pay thee all.

Mat 18:30; And he would not: but went and cast him into prison, till he should pay the debt.

Mat 18:31; So when his fellow servants saw what was done, they were very sorry, and came and told unto their lord all that was done.

Mat 18:32; Then his lord, after that he had called him, said unto him, O thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all that debt, because thou desiredst me:

Mat 18:33; Shouldest not thou also have had compassion on thy fellow servant, even as I had pity on thee?

Mat 18:34; And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to the tormentors, till he should pay all that was due unto him.

Mat 18:35; So likewise shall my heavenly Father do also unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not everyone his brother their trespasses.

 ILLUSTRATION:

 After a long search through her purse, a lady who had just boarded a bus handed the driver a $20 bill.
Noting the driver’s disapproving look, she snapped, Well, I’m sorry, but I don’t have a one dollar bill!


Oh, don’t worry, Lady, said the driver, You’ll have nineteen of them in just a minute.

 ILLUSTRATION:

 I don’t know who said it, but many people have sure adopted a philosophy in life that says, I don’t get mad. I get even.

 ILLUSTRATION:

 I Would like to tell you a story about a man whose name is Kevin Tunell.
Each week Kevin Tunell was required to mail a dollar to a family he’d rather forget.
Why? Because  they sued him for $1.5 million dollars, but they settled for $936 to be paid at one dollar at a time.
The family expected the payment each Friday so that Kevin Tunell would not forget what happened on the first Friday of August in 1982.


That’s the day their daughter was killed. Tunell was convicted of manslaughter and drunken driving. He was 17 years-old at that time. She was 18.
Tunell served a court sentence and he also spent seven years campaigning against drunk driving.
He spent 6 more years than his sentence required campaigning against drunk driving,
But he kept forgetting to send the dollar.


The weekly restitution was supposed to last until Her Birthday in August in the year 2000.
In other words, 18 years.
Tunell was supposed to make the check out to the victim, mail it to her family and it was to be deposited in a scholarship fund.


The girl’s family took Tunell to court four times for failure to comply.
After one court appearance, Tunell spent 30 days in jail. He insisted that he wasn’t defying the order, but that he was haunted by the girl’s death and tormented by the reminders.


He offered the family two boxes of checks covering the payments until the year 2001, one year more than required.
But they refused the checks.
They said, It’s not the money we’re after, but penance.
Probably more like vengeance than penance.
The mother said, We want to receive the check every week on time. He must understand we are going to pursue this until August of the year 2000. We’ll go back to court every month if we have to.


I know that most of us would never question that family’s anger.

But is 936 payments enough?

Is 936 payments enough for that family to demand from Kevin Tunell?

Will that family ever be able to put the matter to rest?

In some ways, no and I realize this.

But will they ever try to forgive?

How much restitution is enough?

If you were that family,  How many payments would you require?

Or better yet,

How many payments do you require of someone right now?

What about the person who has offended you?

What do you require of him or her?

How many payments do you need?

No one makes it through life without being hurt or injured in some form.

No one.

Just like that family, you’ve been a victim as well.

That 18 year-old girl died because someone drank too much.

And perhaps a part of you has died because someone,

spoke too much,

or demanded too much,

or neglected too much,

or rejected too much.

Everyone gets wounded in life. No one is immune.

And when we get hurt or wounded, we must decide:

How many payments will I demand from my offender?

We may not require that our offender write checks to us, but we have other ways of settling the score.

SILENCE is one way. We just ignore them when they speak to us.

DISTANCE is another way to settle the score. When they come your way, you walk the other way or you just move away from them altogether.

NAGGING is another way to get back at people.

Oh, I see you still have fingers on your hand. It’s funny that you never use them to push the buttons on your telephone to call me!

It’s amazing how creative people can be at getting even.

As long as I suffer, you will suffer.

As long as I hurt, you will hurt.

You cut me, and I’ll make you bleed, even if I have to reopen the wound myself.

Anger is a bad addiction.

It may start innocently enough with small doses, but we soon come back for more and more.

And we generally up the dosage.

We not only despise what the person did, but who they are as well. And we even begin to hate anyone like them… You know.

Like All men are jerks.

Every TV preacher is a huckster.

You can’t trust a woman.

All politicians are crooks.

All lawyers are shysters.

We stereotype everyone when we can’t forgive.

Hurt becomes hate.

And hate grows.

Seeking vengeance.

How will the score be settled?

How many payments will I demand from my offender?

Peter had a similar question for Jesus in Matthew 18: that we just read.

Matthew 18:21; he asks, “ Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times”?

Peter is worried about forgiving too much.

The Jewish law required that the wounded person forgive three times.

But Peter is willing to go an extra mile and double the number by throwing in one more forgiveness for good measure.

He probably thinks Jesus will be impressed. But Jesus isn’t impressed.

Matthew 18:22;  Jesus said, “I tell you, not seven times, but 77 times.”

Now, if you’re thinking 77 times is really good, you’re wrong. Jesus is not saying that we are to keep tabs on how many times we forgive others.

If we’re keeping score on our graciousness, or our forgiveness, then we’re not being gracious!

There should never be a point when our grace is exhausted or extinguished!

I Corinthians. 13:5; says that love keeps no record of wrongs.

Nor does it keep a record of how many times we forgive.

God’s grace has never been exhausted and neither should ours be.

In our text, Jesus tells the story about an unforgiving servant who was a debtor, a creditor and a prisoner. Several lessons can be learned from his life.

In and through this story I want to tell you what happened between my father and I last week.

You were all gracious to me in that you prayed for something to happen, perhaps even a miracle.

Well. Through this message on forgiveness today, I want to show you in a moment or two, a few pictures that will tell you a story about forgiveness.

The pictures say it better than I am capable of doing so bear with me if you will.

From this text this morning in Mathew 18:21-35; I found two important lessons that relate to you and I.

FIRST: All people are debtors.

SECOND: All people can become prisoners

So, let’s look at it briefly so I can get to what happened with my own father.

The first thing I found was that…

 ALL PEOPLE ARE DEBTORS

 The man in our story had a great debt. You do too.

Wouldn’t it be great to be out of debt?  Many said AMEN!

It would be nice to be out of financial indebtedness.

But that will never happen for most of us because we have children.

But I do wish you great financial success. And if you succeed, remember me!

But, if you do succeed in getting out of debt, you will still be in debt!

We have a wonderful admonition in Romans 13:8; Owe no one anything, except to love one another.

Love is a debt that we all owe and that debt will never be paid off!

We should never stop loving people!

We must love others until we die!

That is a debt that we all owe one another.

Never stop loving people. Never.

The man in our Bible  story today also had a debt which he could never pay!

One day a king decided to call in his officials and ask them to give an account of what they owed him.

As he was doing this, one official was brought in who owed him 50 million silver coins.

But he didn’t have any money to pay what he owed.

The king ordered him to be sold, along with his wife and children and all he owned, in order to pay the debt.

That servant or official had a serious problem, a serious financial debt!

Somehow or other he got carried away with his MasterCard, Visa and Discover cards and racked up millions of dollars worth of debt.

If he could pay a thousand dollars a day it would still take years for him to pay off his debt.

Fat chance of that. He didn’t make a thousand dollars a day. His debt was far greater than his ability to pay!

But the point of the story is not about money, it’s about sin!

Romans 3:23;  “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”

 ILLUSTRATION:

 One time the famous American evangelist, Billy Sunday, was preparing for a revival meeting in a large city. He wrote a letter to the mayor of that city asking him for names of people who had spiritual problems and needed help.

Billy Sunday was somewhat surprised when he received a city telephone directory from that Mayor!

All of us have a serious spiritual problem and it’s called sin.

All of us have a deep indebtedness because of our sin!

All of us are in a deep, dark hole because of our sin!

Our debt to God is far greater than we can pay!

 ILLUSTRATION:

 One writer put it this way:
Our pockets are empty while our debt is millions.
We don’t need a salary; we need a gift!
We don’t need swimming lessons; we need a lifeguard!
We don’t need a place to work; we need someone to work in our place!
And that someone is Jesus Christ!


I Peter 2:24;  He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds (his death) you have healed (or forgiven).

II Corinthians 5:21; God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Jesus traded places with us! He became sin and we became righteous!

Our Master has forgiven us an insurmountable debt of sin through Jesus Christ!

Does God demand that we reimburse Him?

When our feet took the wrong road, does God demand that we cut off our feet?

When our eyes look where they should not look, does God blind us?

When we use our tongue for profanity or gossip instead of prayer and praise, does God cut it out?

No, God does not demand payment from us.

The payment was made through His Son Jesus Christ!

So from this story I learned that All People Are Debtors.

The second Thing I found was that…

 ALL PEOPLE CAN BECOME PRISONERS

 The man in our story was a prisoner because he had an unforgiving heart and soul.

Someone said, The world’s worst prison is the prison of an unforgiving heart.

When we do not forgive others we put ourselves in a prison of hatred, misery and sorrow.

Even though this man was shown abundant grace, he did not extend it to others!

In Matthew 18: 27; and the verses following the King felt sorry for him and let him go free.

He even told the official that he did not have to pay back the money.

As the official was leaving, he happened to meet another official who owed him a hundred silver coins.

So he grabbed the man by the throat.

He started choking him and said, Pay me what you owe!

The man got down on his knees and began begging, Have pity on me, and I will pay you back.

But the first official refused to have pity. Instead, he went and had the other official put in jail until he could pay what he owed.

This story is almost unbelievable.

How could that official do such a thing?

Something is terribly wrong!

Are these the actions of a man who was forgiven millions of dollars?

Choking another man just because he owed him a few bucks!

Are these the words of a man who has been set free? Pay the money you owe me!

This official demands that his debtor be put in jail until he pay the debt.

Not only is this official ungrateful, he is also stupid!

How can he expect the man to earn money while he is in prison?

If he has no money out of jail, how is he supposed to get money in jail?

Hatred never makes sense.

It is blind.

It is blind stupidity.

It is an addiction that dulls the brain and blinds the soul!

How can a person who is forgiven not forgive others?

How can a person who is shown mercy not show it to others?

How can a person who is shown kindness not show it to others?

How can a person who is extended grace not extend it to others?

Luke 7:47; Jesus said, He who has been forgiven little, loves little.

If we believe that we have only been forgiven a little, we will only forgive a little!

God is willing to wipe away all our sins.

He guides us to a pool of mercy and invites us to bathe.

Some people plunge in, but others just touch the surface!

Perhaps that was the problem of the unforgiving servant or official.

Perhaps he never felt like he was forgiven!

The King or Master forgave his debt, but the servant never really accepted His grace!

Hebrews 12:15;  See to it that no one misses the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.

When the grace of God is missed, bitterness is born.

But when the grace of God is received and embraced, forgiveness abounds!

The longer we walk in the garden, the more likely we are to smell the flowers!

The more we immerse ourselves in God’s grace, the more likely we are to extend grace to others!

Could this be the secret to overcoming anger and hatred?

I think so.

Hatred is too heavy for any of us to handle.

The mountains before us are steep enough to climb without the heaviness of hatred on our backs.

The only wise thing to do is to drop anger, hatred and unforgiveness before they drop us!

Job 21:23-25; Some men stay healthy till the day they die. Others have no happiness at all; they live and die with bitter hearts.

Please don’t let that be said of you.

 CONCLUSION:

 Extending grace to others.

This is what we all need to do.

But, first you have to accept God’s gracious forgiveness before you can extend it to others.

But those who have been touched by grace will give it to others!

They cannot do otherwise!

That brings me to the reason I have spoken on forgiveness today.

Last week I told you that after 37 years of no contact with my father, I received an e-mail which was forwarded to me from someone else. My sister whom I have not had contact with in nearly 15 years as well, felt I should be made aware that my father was not in the best of health and if I were interested I could contact her for more information.

Interested? Do birds fly. Yes I was interested. I made contact within minutes and also within minutes a reply came which set the wheels in motion. My sister and I hooked up by telephone and within minutes we had corrected years of misunderstanding and estrangement.

Her name is Mary and Mary made contact with my father to see if he would be willing to see me if I made my way to Vancouver Island which is on the west coast of Canada.

Many things needed to fall into place before I could go. Air fare had to be right. Time away from here needed approval. Speakers needed to be lined up. And most of all, my father needed to say yes he would see me.

Within hours Mary had been to see my father and he said yes I would like to see Bob.

I made the arraignments’ to go and you prayed for me before I went for which I will be eternally grateful.

Now, before I go any further I want you to know, forgiveness has always been in my heart for what my father had done to me as I grew up. I dealt with it years ago when Jesus dealt with me about my forgiveness and His extended grace to me.

If you will give me a couple of more minutes I will share with you what has happened after 37 years of estrangement from my father.

The best way I can do this so you will see the grace of God at work is to show you 8 pictures that will help me explain to you what the Lord has done.


Picture#1:  



This picture of my father was taken in 1956.  I was 8 years old and it was probably the most awful time of my life.

My father was heavily into alcohol. He abused me in every way imaginable, physically, mentally and sexually and all because of the booze. This picture to me represents anger.

And this man took his anger out on me in those early years.

But something happened to me when I turned eleven.

I accepted Jesus and in a vision at the young age of eleven, Jesus came to me (spiritually speaking of course) and He told me (“Bob, everything will be alright”). He was right.

I finally left home at thirteen and lived with my Grandparents.

Then in the seventies God called me to the ministry and that was the last time my father and I had any contact with each other, at his request.

That was 37 years ago.

Now fast forward to last week.

 Picture #2 


Last week after a culmination of circumstances put together by God, I walked into the hospital where my father is being cared for and he was standing in the doorway of his room.

When we saw each other, all he said was, “Bob, What took you so long to get here?”


Picture #3



I walked over to him and my father put his hand on my shoulder and I put mine on his and I said to him,

“Dad, I came out here in fear and trepidation not knowing how you would receive me.”

He said, “Bob, I was in fear and trepidation not knowing if you would even come and if you did, how you would even receive me.”

 
Picture #4 
 


At that point we both embraced and Dad said,  “I hope yesterday is gone Bob. It should not have taken this long for us to come to this.”

Slide #5:  




I agreed with him and as you can see from this picture there was a release for the both of us.

But that was not the best part!

This next picture I am going to show you is a completely different father than I remember.

I remember the severe alcoholism that caused the horrible temper to be lashed out on me.

I remember the abuse.

I remember the aloneness.

I remember the rejection, BUT! 

But now something was different, not because he is older but because his facial expression was so completely different from the day when He told me to leave.

When I became a Christian and told my father I was going to be a minister.

He told me I needed to denounce my faith and become a mason in his Masonic lodge or I was to get out.

He wanted me to join his Masonic lodge and become a mason like he was and to him masons and my calling to ministry were diametrically opposed.

My father was very high up in the Masonic order so he needed to distance himself from me unless I joined, hence the decision he asked me to make. I chose Jesus.

Dad was the head of all British Columbia and it made him very irate that I would not denounce Jesus and become a mason like he was.

But now, there was something different about my father and I needed to ask him what it was.

Picture #6
 

 
So here is Dad sitting and talking to me.

I had just asked him a question about what was going on with him and why did he look so different because I was mesmerized by his countenance.

And in this picture my father gave me a one word answer that literally took my breath away and left me speechless.

My question to him was this, “Dad, what is so different about you because you look different.”

He simply said, “JESUS”

And like a fool, I said “What?”

My father said, “Jesus changed me. I was a drunk, and a fool. I have asked Jesus to forgive me and to help me right all the wrong I did to my family. I have been asking him every night for almost two years to help me.”

He went on to say,

“I left the Masons two years ago and I have not had a drop of alcohol in those  two years. Jesus is helping me and forgiving me. I let booze come between us Bob, will you forgive me”?

I said “yes I forgive you and will you forgive me?” He said yes.

There was a time of rejoicing like I never imagined. After all those years, 37 to be exact, I never dreamed I would see my father again even,  let alone see him with Jesus in his life.

I asked Dad if I could hear him confess Jesus myself by saying the sinners prayer together and he agreed and so we did.

God is amazing. But, that was not all.

In the next picture I am going to show you, Dad blew me away again. He said, “Bob, you know that Jacob and Esau thing in the Bible where the father passed on the blessing”?

I said I know the story.

He said,

“When you went away, I vowed never to lay eyes on you again.

As far as I was concerned, you were dead.

As I look at it now, I realize that was a curse and not a blessing.

Would you mind if I passed on a belated father’s blessing to you now”?

I was speechless. He put his hand on my shoulder and said,

“Son, I am proud of what you have become and I would like to bless you in your life and work in the name of Jesus. Go in peace!”

I received my father’s blessing. This from a man who vowed to have nothing ever to do with me again. A man who said as far as he was concerned, I was dead, and now he is passing on a father’s blessing to me. God Is Awesome!



After my father passed on a blessing to me, he grabbed my hand and said, 

“never again will I allow myself  to be separated from you or the rest of the family except by death and I know that will only be for a while.”

God Is Amazing!

And as if that were not enough, here is one more miracle.

When I left last week my father said goodbye in four words.

They are the four words I have waited all my life to hear.

And I am serious when I tell you that in 60 years these words have never crossed my father’s lips toward me.

He said, “I love you Bob”.

And we parted.

Picture #9    This picture sums up this message. I hope you got it!



Folks can I ask you to do something this morning.

Stand with me.

In a moment we are going to sing, He paid a debt he did not owe, I owe a debt I could not pay.

But first, listen to me.

God is amazing. He forgave us. All he asks is that we forgive one another.

Forgiving one another is the love of God in us.

God forgave my father, My father asked me to forgive him.

God forgave me, and said if I don’t forgive I do not love God. I love God so I forgive my father.

Let me ask you a pointed question today.

Is there someone that you have  ought with. Someone you need to forgive?

A son or daughter, mother or father, brother or sister aunt or uncle a friend, anyone?

Will you go to them today instead of letting the days, months and years stack up against you and allow bitterness to take hold so you can never forgive.

Is there someone in this church today that you need to go to and forgive.

Is there any  unforgiveness in your heart today?

Before we close this morning, will you go to them, even right now and make peace with them and love on them.

If you have to go home and make a phone call to do it or visit someone or whatever, will you do it today, even if you think you are in the right. If they are here, why not do it now.

Our amazing God will do the rest.

37 years but God did it for me.

Pray with me and then let’s sing He paid a Debt…

Father, thank you for your hand of forgiveness extended to us today. Thank you that that forgiveness is free and all we need do is ask for it.

Thank you for my father and the forgiveness that is now in place between us. I pray that the message conveyed today to these your people will be, forgiveness is because of Jesus, Just like my own father said.

Lord, bless each restitution that happens today and maybe even a revival that will start because of it. We ask in Jesus name, AMEN

He Paid A Debt He Did Not Owe

I Owe  A Debt I Could Not Pay

I Needed Someone To Wash My Sin Away

And Now I Sing A Brand New Song, Amazing Grace,

Christ Jesus Paid A Debt That I Could Never Pay.

AMEN