Faithful Theology: Preserving Distinctions without Separation

By Ardel Caneday

Doing and teaching Christian theology well requires the skill to recognize and to maintain distinctions among concepts presented in Scripture without separating them from one another. Failure to identify such distinctions, to affirm them, and to instruct others to observe them in how they conduct themselves may unwittingly promote theological confusion or even grave error. For example, the church is marred by many who distinguish justification from sanctification but also separate them from one another. On the other hand, others fail to uphold the gospel’s distinction between justification and sanctification when they essentially merge the two into one. Both lead to injurious confusion, even serious doctrinal errors that subvert the gospel of Christ. The nature of salvation, according to the gospel, requires proper distinction between justification, a legal imagery, from sanctification, a purity imagery, while at the same time not severing the two aspects or facets of salvation in Christ Jesus.

Lack of distinction between the act of forgiving sin and the virtue or grace of being forgiving now seems commonplace in the church. Regularly, because Christians fail to distinguish between forgiveness of sin and the character trait o#f being forgiving they wrongly assume that Christians who do not grant forgiveness of sins to people who refuse to repent are nurturing a “root of bitterness” and seeking revenge. All who believe this commit a category mistake that often incites them to judge fellow Christians wrongly and harshly as full of bitterness and grudge-bearing. Few who commit this category error would suggest that God, who does not forgive the sins of the unrepentant, is filled with bitterness and bearing a grudge. Nevertheless, they impute these sinful traits to fellow believers who seek to be like God (godly) by granting forgiveness of sins only to all who repent of those sins committed against them.

Recently I came upon a presentation titled “Must I Forgive?”. The author’s intentions to admonish Christians never to harbor bitterness or to take revenge against those who refuse to repent of their sins against us is surely correct. Nevertheless, the presentation poses considerable confusion because it proceeds on the premise that Christians who teach that “without repentance we ought not to forgive” sins committed against us is doctrinally wrong but also promotes bitterness and taking revenge. He writes,

The question for us to consider tonight has to do with the forgiving of other peoples’ sins. It begins with a reference to Romans 12:19-21, where the apostle Paul writes this:

Indeed, the apostle Paul’s warning against taking revenge and his admonition to minister grace to those who sin against us are unequivocally clear. Never seek revenge! Never retaliate with evil for evil! Always endeavor to overcome evil with good! What Paul does not admonish us to do is to bestow forgiveness of sins to those who have sinned against #us but who remain recalcitrant and unrepentant. It is correct to use Romans 12:19-21 to warn not to take revenge or to punish fellow humans for sins they commit against us, but the passage does not address the question “whether we must forgive people when they have yet to repent.”

Similarly, it is entirely proper to use Matthew 5:43-46 to call upon us to love our enemies and to pray for those who persecute us for the gospel’s sake. However, we are wrong to appeal to this passage to instruct believers that the gospel obligates us to forgive the sins committed against us by people who refuse to repent. Yet, the presentation confuses love for enemies with forgiving the unrepentant. He states,

One of the main passages on this theme comes from the Sermon on the Mount, where Jesus said in Mt. 5:43-46:

God manifests his love by making the sun shine and the rain fall upon the lands of the ungodly and by prospering them and by giving them healthy families and abundance (cf. Job 21:7ff) while not granting forgiveness of sins to those who do not repent. In other words, God loves the wicked without granting repentance of sins to them. Likewise, we Christians need to distinguish our obligation to love our enemies from forgiveness of sins we are obligated to grant to those who repent of sins they commit against us. To love our enemies is not the same as forgiving the sins our enemies commit against us. To withhold forgiveness of sins from the unrepentant is not at all the same as being unforgiving. Of course, we must be eager and ready to forgive their sins when and if they repent. But, to claim that the gospel’s obligation that we love our enemies requires that we forgive the sins our unrepentant enemies is to commit a category error that has injurious consequences upon the gospel of Jesus Christ and upon those whose sins we remit apart from repentance. It misrepresents the gospel. It distorts what God has done in Christ. It conveys the message that God also forgives unrepentant sinners. But clearly, the message of the gospel is that God grants forgiveness of sins only to all who repent (Acts 2:38; 5:31; 10:43; 13:38f; 26:18).

Lamentably, many Christians have been seduced by modern psychology’s theories concerning “forgiveness.” In particular, modern psychology advances the notion that forgive#ness is principally for the benefit of the injured person, for the individual who has been wronged. Psychologists and preachers alike insist that it is necessary to forgive people who have wronged us, even if they refuse to repent, in order to get rid of bitterness, vengefulness, and retaliation. Surely, the need to banish grudge-bearing and returning evil with evil is right and agrees with the demands of the gospel. Nevertheless, Scripture and the gospel, not modern psychology, must serve as the Christian’s lexicon that governs our use of words, including “forgive” and “forgiveness.” Contrary to popular preaching, forgiveness of sins is not principally for the benefit of the person sinned against but for the one who has committed the sin. Indeed, blessing comes to the one sinned against when repentance is forthcoming and forgiveness of sins can be properly granted in that a relationship is restored through reconciliation. However, the principal benefit of forgiveness of sins comes to the repentant individual who receives remission of sins and release from guilt.

Let us forgive sins like God forgives as he grants forgiveness to us when we repent. As God is forgiving and not filled with bitterness or with grudge-bearing, so we are obligated to be forgiving, always eager and ready to forgive everyone who sins against us and promptly to grant forgiveness when they repent. If we would be like God, we must not bestow forgiveness of sins to people who refuse to repent of the evil they commit against us. Jesus states plainly that we are obligated to discern when to forgive and when not to forgive sins committed against us (cf. John 20:23). To forgive the sins of the unrepentant is not right; it is not godlike. To yearn to forgive and promptly to grant forgiveness when repentance is forthcoming is godliness; it is to be like God who has graciously forgiven our sins which we confess.
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*Recently P. Andrew Sandlin, President, Center for Cultural Leadership, read an essay I had written on forgiveness of sins. He liked it so much that he asked if he could publish it as a booklet. It is now available, Must Christians Always Forgive? A Biblical Primer and Grammar on Forgiveness of Sins.

Ardel Caneday (Ph.D., Trinity Evangelical Divinity School) is Professor of New Testament Studies and Biblical Studies at Northwestern College in St. Paul, Minnesota. He has served churches in various pastoral roles, including senior pastor. He has authored numerous journal articles, many essays in books, and has co-authored with Thomas Schreiner the book The Race Set Before Us: A Biblical Theology of Perseverance and Assurance (Inter-Varsity, 2001).