November 10, 2009: But Didn’t Jesus Forgive The Unrepentant?

It sure looks like Jesus forgave unrepentant people while he hung on the cross. He prayed “Father forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34). The first martyr, Stephen, said much the same as he was being stoned to death: “Lord, do not hold this sin against them.” (Acts 7:60). These may be the two most remarkable utterances ever spoken by man. Think about it: if you were a Fort Hood soldier bleeding to death on the ground last week from bullet wounds inflicted by Nadal Malik Hasan as he praised the hell-bound angel of darkness known as “Allah,” would you be saying, “Lord Jesus, forgive him”? Probably not. My instincts would not be to forgive the demon-spewing maggot but rather grab a gun so I could shoot him in the head.

But if, as his victim, I desired Hasan’s death rather than his absolution, I’d be in pretty good company with the martyred saints of Revelation 6. They pray to God saying “How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the earth and avenge our blood?” (Verse 10). What an interesting prayer! If Christians are always supposed to forgive the unrepentant - if Jesus’ and Stephen’s requests are the norm and our refusal to forgive displeases God - then these saints’ petition should certainly meet with divine rebuke. But they don’t. Instead, the next verse indicates that God approves of their prayer for vengeance: “Then each of them was given a white robe, and they were told to wait a little longer, until the number of their fellow servants and brothers who were to be killed as they had been was completed.” (Verse 11).

Funny thing God doesn’t say to them, “What a shoddy bunch of saints you are! Why can’t you just forgive your killers the way my Son did, the way Stephen did? Haven’t you learned that you’re supposed to be nice to people who murder you?”

The question that intrigues me is how to reconcile Jesus’ and Stephen’s remarkable plea for forgiveness with the saints’ more natural plea for vengeance. Is there any way for both to be right?

I think a big piece of the explanation (there are probably other pieces I’m missing) concerns knowledge. Knowledge matters. It is true that Jesus said “Father forgive them,” but it is also true that he immediately gave the mitigating circumstance: for they do not know what they are doing.

These people did not know they were crucifying the Son of God. They (or at least many of them) thought they were doing a good thing: they were ridding the land of a dangerous heretic. They were ignorant. They would have done differently if they had known better. About 20 years later the Apostle Paul explained that if the rulers of this age had understood God’s wisdom, “they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” (1 Corinthians 2:8). And he could know that for sure because he himself had once been one of the ignorant! He told Timothy that though he was once a “blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man,” he was shown mercy “because I acted in ignorance and unbelief.” (1 Timothy 1:13).

But what if Paul had acted not out of “ignorance and unbelief” but with full knowledge that he was doing the devil’s work? Would he then have received preemptive grace, grace that opens the door ahead of time by crediting a possible future repentance? I don’t think so. In fact, I believe we have a biblical control that answers this thought experiment for us: Judas. People who crucified Jesus did not know what they were doing, and were pardoned, whereas Judas, who spent three years with Jesus and knew exactly what he was doing, was condemned. (Jesus even said it would have been better for him if he had never been born – Matthew 26:24.)

This theme of “He doesn’t know any better – let it pass” versus “He does know better – let him be condemned!” occurs a lot in Scripture.

For example, in Acts 17, Paul tells Gentile pagans that they shouldn’t think that “the divine being is like gold or silver or stone,” (verse 29), and that “In the past God overlooked such ignorance”. He did? God sure didn’t overlook it when the Israelites worshipped idols! That nation was judged a lot, and harshly, for worshipping gods of wood, metal and stone. But meanwhile Gentiles “got away with it” because at the time they didn’t know any better (until now: Paul continues, “but now he commands all people everywhere to repent” – verse 30).

Or consider the deliberate double standard in 1 Corinthians 5:9-11. Paul doesn’t mind it in the least if you associate with sexually immoral greedy swindling idolators – as long as they are unbelievers who don’t know any better. But if they’re Christians and behave like that, then you are supposed to shun them to the point of not even sitting at the same table with them. They should know better. They don’t get forgiven (or even tolerated) until they repent.

That same chapter tells the ugly story of a supposedly Christian Corinthian man who was sleeping with his stepmother. Paul does not command forgiveness for this unrepentant pervert but rather excommunication. It’s a last-ditch effort to try to bring him around. Those who would forgive the unrepentant fornicator would not be doing him any spiritual favor, but rather enabling a “sin unto death” (see 1 John 5:16) that would imperil the man’s soul.

In 2 Corinthians 2 Paul orders the forgiveness of a man who has been restored to fellowship after being punished. (Whether it's the same man we don't know). Paul writes, "The punishment inflicted on him by the majority is sufficient for him. Now instead, you ought to forgive and comfort him, so that he will not be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow." (Verses 6 and 7). Whatever the circumstances of this man's punishment and restoration, it should be noted that Paul's instructions concerning him are utterly incompatible with the doctrine that we must forgive people no matter what they do, even if they don't repent. If that were true, then Paul would not be instructing the Corinthians to forgive this man, but rebuking them for not having done so already!

The forgiveness of wicked men that Jesus offered while on the cross and that Stephen uttered while being stoned to death are not normative in all circumstances. They are limited to particular ones - especially those in which ignorance plays a part. Most of the time, badness must be rebuked and turned away from before we can forgive it.