Friday Night Message: Father, Forgive Them - Part III

March 5, 2021

 

 

Good evening brethren,

 

In these messages I would like to examine a number of important principles undergirding this famous request of Jesus Christ while He was suffering on the cross.

 

Luke 23:34 - “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.” 

 

This is a very profound statement, one that we should come to understand more fully.  It should literally become a foundational, guiding principle for our lives …..in terms of understanding the depth of God’s forgiveness, in regards to how we look upon others, and in having a profound respect and awe about our own calling from God.

 

Brethren, most people in the world lack the knowledge of the true God and His ways and His plan, so they are “not dealing with a full deck”.  Here we begin to list many principles to come, which should help us to better understand these words of Jesus.

 

1.      What the wicked do, they do in ignorance

 

For the most part, people act out of ignorance of the truth.  God’s word is truth [John 17:17], and when someone cannot understand it, they act in spiritual and moral ignorance.  They are devoid of the knowledge of God.

 

2. Some of the wicked have even known the “depths of Satan”

 

Not every citizen of this planet is a mass murderer, or serial rapist.  Many people live a relatively “good” life, and yet disobey God’s commandments by telling little white lies, or by using euphemisms, or by having covetous thoughts, or by worshipping on Sunday, or by observing Easter instead of Unleavened Bread, and like sins.

 

However, there are many situations that are very disturbing to contemplate, where people have committed horrendous acts of violence or have become utterly perverse in their ways. 

 

The apostle John mentions that some people have known the depths of Satan …. which to me is like saying “I’m not just a casual friend or an acquaintance of Satan ….rather I’m very much like him – totally depraved, desperately wicked, horrendously twisted, utterly perverse… devoid of any redeeming qualities whatsoever.”

 

Notice this verse addressed to the church at Thyatira:

 

Rev. 2:24 – Now to you I say, and to the rest of Thyatira, as many as do not have this doctrine, who have not known the depths of Satan, as they say, I will put on you no other burden.

 

What does it mean, “to know the depths of Satan”?

 

It is one thing for a person who is in the military or law enforcement to occasionally injure or kill the enemy or a criminal, and even then, it can be very traumatic for the individual.  But it is certainly a different thing when a mass murderer conducts a spree of tortures and cold-blooded killings over an extended period of time upon completely innocent victims.

 

It is one thing for a person to have a moral lapse and be guilty of a sexual affair, damaging his or her marriage.  But is it a totally different situation when Wilt Chamberlain practically bragged about sleeping with 10,000 women ….that would mean having a different sexual partner each and every night for almost 30 years.

 

Examples of extreme sin are plentiful enough ……A man in Michigan strangled his wife, and then dismembered her body in order to better hide the evidence. 

 

Then there was a story about a man who intentionally ran over his wife on their honeymoon.

 

You probably remember that ISIS decapitated 21 Coptic Christian captives along the Libyan shore of the Mediterranean Sea.

 

Recall that Jeffrey Dahmer in Milwaukee kept parts of his murder victims in the refrigerator.

 

Years ago I remember the case of a man in the state of Maine, (formerly in a mental ward), placing an infant in the oven and turning it on.  The screams were heard by neighbors, but by then it was too late.  The man was later claimed to have told the authorities that “Satan was burning in the oven”.

 

Think about those doctors who choose abortion as their means of employment.  How can some do this for a living, and yet it doesn’t seem to bother their conscience?

 

The Bible reveals that there are some people who are “past feeling”, people whose conscience has been seared as with a hot iron.

 

Eph. 4:19 – …who being past feeling, have given themselves over to lewdness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.

 

I Tim. 4:2 – Now the Spirit expressly says that in the latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron…

 

How utterly perverse, how desperately wicked, how twisted, how violent, how murderous can a person become?  What heinous thoughts and acts are people actually capable of?  How far removed from God’s ways of truth and love and peace can someone possibly get?  And what is the effect of that sin upon the person?

 

Notice how God describes the perversity and wickedness of the nations which God was going to displace, so that Israel could inherit the land of Canaan ….

 

Lev. 18:20-30 – You shall not lie carnally with your neighbor’s wife, to defile yourself with her.  And you shall not let any of your descendants pass through the fire to Molech, nor shall you profane the name of your God.  You shall not lie with a male as with a woman.  It is an abomination.  Nor shall you mate with any animal, to defile yourself with it; it is perversion.  Do not defile yourselves with any of these things; for by all these the nations are defiled, which I am casting out before you.  For the land is defiled; therefore I visit the punishment of its iniquity upon it, and the land vomits out its inhabitants.  You shall therefore keep My statues and My judgments, and shall not commit any of these abominations, either any of your own nation or any stranger who dwells among you (for all these abominations the men of the land have done, who were before you, and thus the land is defiled), lest the land vomit you out also when you defile it, as it vomited out the nations that were before you. For whoever commits any of these abominations, the persons who commit them shall be cut off from among their people.  Therefore you shall keep My ordinance, so that you do not commit any of these abominable customs which were committed before you, and that you do not defile yourselves by them; I am the Lord you God.

 

How apt is this description …..the land vomits out its inhabitants.  What could be more disgusting than vomit?  It is partially digested food, and it looks and smells nasty.  It makes things unpleasant for the one that vomits, and for anyone else nearby.

 

So much for the “depths of Satan”.  In next week’s Friday Night Message we will acknowledge the fact that many if not most of us were once ourselves ignorant of God’s ways.

Have an insightful Sabbath,

Fred