Heart Check for the Lord’s Table: Forgiveness

Posted on April 10, 2014 by petetackett

I will post some random thoughts this week to guide your thoughts and prayers as you prepare your heart for Holy Week and to come to the Lord’s Table. These thoughts are based loosely on the Model Prayer in Matthew 6:9-13.

Forgive us our debts as we also have forgiven our debtors.

There is an old preacher poem that goes like this. “To live above with those we love, o that will be glory. To live below with those we know, well that is a different story.”

There is no more intimate time of worship and time in God’s altar than the Lord’s Table. Matthew 5:23-24 speaks of the importance of being a forgiving and forgiven person when you worship at His altar. “Therefore if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother, then come and offer your gift.”

Jesus says it even more succinctly in the Model Prayer. We are to pray, “God forgive me as I have forgiven others.” Is that a safe prayer for you? What if today, Jesus meted out forgiveness to you in the same measure you have forgiven others?

As we come to the Lord’s Table this week, take a few minutes to ask yourself some questions.

In as much as it is within your control, are you at peace with everyone in your world?
Is there anyone whose name causes you to wince and/or react sinfully?
Have you done all you can to forgive all you can?
Is there anyone you have refused to forgive?

Take some time today and prepare your heart for the Lord’s Table by taking inventory of past relationships and being sure you have sought and extended forgiveness where necessary. Don’t worry about what others have done and whether they have reciprocated. You are not responsible for them, but you are responsible for you. Don’t come to the Lord’s Table with known relational sin in your life.