John 20:23

I can only think that forgiving someone takes them seeking your forgiveness.. We must repent of our sins to God.. God does not forgive sins that the person does not acknowledge as being a sin against God..

But we can forgive people without them asking for our forgiveness.. So we can decide to retain sins for those who do not seek our forgiveness or we can remitt ( forgive them ) without their apology..

But i am definite about this if someone comes to you and apologizes to you asking for your forgiveness then we as Christians should forgive them...

Petros2015 said:

This is an interesting verse.

"Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained."

Retain means to keep ownership of or continue to have something.

In the Lord's Prayer, we have "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us".

I wonder, if you 'retain' someone's sin through unforgiveness... who is actually retaining it?

Them?

Or you?

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That is an interesting question. I would think on initial impact it is in reference to us as believers. IOW, if someone asks us to forgive them and we do not then our sins are retained as well but if we do forgive them we will be forgiven

I'll share a story that I think might help shed some light regarding this verse. But my pastor was telling us a story about they had ministered to this man who was having a very rough life, and then he eventually come to know the Lord. So after some time he slipped back into his old habits of drinking and drugs, and so my pastor went to talk to him, and the guy pretty much explained how he didn't see a reason to stop what he was doing because his life wasn't nearly as bad as it was like before he got saved (there is more that happened, but I forget the rest). So my pastor was confused, and sought the Lord for answers. The Lord ended up showing him that because they were praying for him (Remitting his sins), that they were actually protecting him from his own sins. Or in other words, they were shutting the door to satan in his life every time they prayed for him, and that's why things weren't as bad for him now that he went back to living a life of sin. So after learning that, my pastor decided to do what Paul did, and hand the man over to satan (Retain his sins).
A couple days later, the guy came running back to my pastor and ask him, "What did you do!?!?!" "My life is out of control, and worse that what it was!" My pastor talked with this man, and then the man repented of his sins and turned back to the Lord.


I personally have handed only one person (this person and his accomplishes) over to Satan, and the reason was because I believe they were attempting to abduct a child. They were acting very suspicious and following kids around the store, with mine being one of them. Plus, the Holy Spirit warned my wife to keep our kids close. So I prayed that their sins would catch up to them, and that they would not get away with what they were trying to do.

Hope this helps shed some light

Petros2015 said:

This is an interesting verse.

"Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained."

Retain means to keep ownership of or continue to have something.

In the Lord's Prayer, we have "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us".

I wonder, if you 'retain' someone's sin through unforgiveness... who is actually retaining it?

Them?

Or you?

Click to expand...

Interestingly, pope Francis (*see note below) recently used this verse to point that we all are given the power through the Spirit to forgive sins of others! This was quite an interesting coincidence that we were discussing this verse and related, and then in a day or so, Francis pointed to that meaning for it.

That is, each and every one of us believers can forgive sins done against us, of course, but more (!), that this seems to have effect on whether the sin against the one forgiving will be counted, as I understood it. If you forgive, the sin won't be counted against them.

Notice this does not give such a power only to the ordained alone, but to all believers individually in a first hand way.

There may be more to this, and it's still newish to me. We do know already more clearly that by confessing (admitting humbly), and repenting (refusing to continue to endorse the sin in your hidden heart, but truly rejecting it in your heart), that by these 2 we are entering into Grace, forgiveness from God. But, we still may need to reconcile to the one we have hurt, if they haven't already magnanimously forgiven us, and then we can apologize, contritely, and then try to 'make it right', of course.

* - (note: I'm not in the Catholic church, though I consider myself "Christian", only, and not a subcategory of any kind, so therefore I am 'catholic' with a small c, or what "Catholic" really means to begin with.)

Petros2015 said:

This is an interesting verse.

"Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained."

Retain means to keep ownership of or continue to have something.

In the Lord's Prayer, we have "forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us".

I wonder, if you 'retain' someone's sin through unforgiveness... who is actually retaining it?

Them?

Or you?

Click to expand...

Petros, what you don't seem to understand that in John 20:23 Jesus was speaking only to His Apostles the Church Hierarchy. It is His Church Hierarchy of Apostles and their successors within the Catholic Church, that has this power to forgive or retain sins, i.e the Sacrament of Penance. Amen

You nor I or anyone else, that are not part of the Church's Hierarchy can retain sins, we must always forgive each other, however, not His Church's Hierarchy founded on Rock.

Theadorus said:

Or in other words, they were shutting the door to satan in his life every time they prayed for him, and that's why things weren't as bad for him now that he went back to living a life of sin.

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Doesn't this give undue credit to their actions (of prayer)?

friend of said:

Doesn't this give undue credit to their actions (of prayer)?

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I'm sorry, I'm sure what you mean by that question. Are you saying that the person praying for the person living in sin is getting undo credit for basically protecting the sinner for their actions? Or are you saying that the person praying is in a way encouraging their behavior?

If it means what I think it does, the person living in sin has basically walked out from under the protecting of God. Yes, God is the one protecting us, but when we choose to live a life of sin, God's hands are basically tied because we are choosing to fall back under the power of sin and the enemy. He wants to protect us, but if we submit ourselves to sin, and give Satan an open door within our lives, we invite the enemy to do as he pleases, and unfortunate God is unable to help at that moment. But if a person were to intercede on behalf of the person living in sin, they can then put that person back under the protecting of God, and for the most part, protect them from their own stupidity.

Someone was praying for me when I spent many years drinking and doing drugs. A lot of bad things should have happened to me, and there should have been several times where I got hurt. I drove home drunk, and blacked out at the wheel many times, yet, I made it home alive every time. My friend, on the other hand, had that happen once, and totaled his vehicle. It looked like someone peeled open the side of the vehicle. My other friend black out on the side of the road and woke up in an ambulance bleeding from his face. All of my friends had something bad happen to them, but I was the only one who never really suffered the consequences for my actions. Though I did suffer emotionally, to the point where I wanted to commit suicide. But anyways, someone was praying for me, and kept me alive from my own stupidity. I do believe that person should get credit, and will get credit for interceding for me. God put it on their heart to pray for me, and they obeyed, and thank God they did.


Hope that answers your question

God Bless.

Theadorus said:

Are you saying that the person praying for the person living in sin is getting undo credit for basically protecting the sinner for their actions?

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This. It is not the person praying the prayers who should be credited for protecting.

Theadorus said:

God's hands are basically tied

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What you seem to be saying is that God is at the mercy of our prayers, and is not capable of acting independently our prayers. That's what I disagree with. I don't believe prayer necessarily changes God's mind or directs His will, rather, through prayer we become conformed to His will.

Not to discredit your story; I can believe that God allowed your friend to experience a lack of protection so that he would come to the realization of the power of prayer and communion with God as being vital to our walks. Just thought I'd point out that, in the end, it is God whom chooses to honor our prayers by empowering them or not, and this is not something we do in and of ourselves. John 15:5 Apart from God we can do nothing (of any lasting value).

Theadorus said:

and unfortunate God is unable to help at that moment.

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I may accept there to be certain ways that God prefers to operate over others, but I do not accept anecdotal limitations placed upon God by men. Jeremiah 32:27 , Matthew 19:26 , Matthew 3:9

Theadorus said:

I do believe that person should get credit, and will get credit for interceding for me. God put it on their heart to pray for me, and they obeyed, and thank God they did.

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I'm glad to hear that. The only thing I'm disputing is the limitation you seem to Have imposed upon God earlier.

friend of said:

This. It is not the person praying the prayers who should be credited for protecting.



What you seem to be saying is that God is at the mercy of our prayers, and is not capable of acting independently our prayers. That's what I disagree with. I don't believe prayer necessarily changes God's mind or directs His will, rather, through prayer we become conformed to His will.

Not to discredit your story; I can believe that God allowed your friend to experience a lack of protection so that he would come to the realization of the power of prayer and communion with God as being vital to our walks. Just thought I'd point out that, in the end, it is God whom chooses to honor our prayers by empowering them or not, and this is not something we do in and of ourselves. John 15:5 Apart from God we can do nothing (of any lasting value).



I may accept there to be certain ways that God prefers to operate over others, but I do not accept anecdotal limitations placed upon God by men. Jeremiah 32:27 , Matthew 19:26 , Matthew 3:9



I'm glad to hear that. The only thing I'm disputing is the limitation you seem to Have imposed upon God earlier.

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Sorry to leave you hanging, I'll respond to this post as soon as I can. I should have more time to respond here in the next couple of days.

No worries man. Take your time.

Hey Petros, I'm reminded of these verses. Aren't they similar?:

Mat 16:
18 And I say also unto thee, That thou art Petros, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
19 And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

friend of said:

This. It is not the person praying the prayers who should be credited for protecting.




What you seem to be saying is that God is at the mercy of our prayers, and is not capable of acting independently our prayers. That's what I disagree with. I don't believe prayer necessarily changes God's mind or directs His will, rather, through prayer we become conformed to His will.


Not to discredit your story; I can believe that God allowed your friend to experience a lack of protection so that he would come to the realization of the power of prayer and communion with God as being vital to our walks. Just thought I'd point out that, in the end, it is God whom chooses to honor our prayers by empowering them or not, and this is not something we do in and of ourselves. John 15:5 Apart from God we can do nothing (of any lasting value).




I may accept there to be certain ways that God prefers to operate over others, but I do not accept anecdotal limitations placed upon God by men. Jeremiah 32:27 , Matthew 19:26 , Matthew 3:9




I'm glad to hear that. The only thing I'm disputing is the limitation you seem to Have imposed upon God earlier.

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Yea, I have time to respond. Thank you for your patience. After having many days to think about this, I decided to go with a couple of examples. First off, I just want to say that I am in no way an expert on this topic, but I do have some understanding. So, to start off yes, with God all things are possible, and that nothing is too hard for him, but at the same time we are told in Psalms 138:2 that God has put his very words above his own name, or in other words, God binds himself by his own words. And so we see with that verse that even God himself cannot go against what He has spoken. And so with that Psalms verse I'm going to use Adam and Eves story to give an example of God's hands being tied.


So, we are all familiar with their story, but in gen 1:26-28, we are shown that when God created man, he gave mankind power and rule over the entire earth. He created the Earth, and then gave it to us. A verse that goes along with that is psalms 115:16 which pretty much tell us that same thing, that how he gave Earth to man. Now, I can guarantee you that it was never God's intention for Satan to be ruler over Earth, otherwise he would have just made him ruler in the first place, but when Adam and Eve transgressed, they handed over the kingdom of Earth to Satan, and so between the time of Adam and Jesus, the Earth belonged to our enemy. So why didn't Almighty God step in and do something about it? Why didn't he step in and say, "hold up, this isn't what I had in mind; I declare a do-over." Why? Because he had no legal right to do so. He gave mankind his word that the Earth was theirs, and as we read in psalms 138:2, God's word is even above his own name, so even God himself cannot go against his own word, and so that's why he couldn't just take it all back. He gave the Earth to mankind, and because it was ours to do as we pleased with it, sadly we handed it over to Satan (well, Adam and Eve did).


Now that example didn't directly address God being at the mercy of our prayers, but it does give us an example of God's hands being tied within a situation.

Now here is a Biblical example of man being able to limit God through their beliefs (or lack of).

So when the Israelites left Egypt, it was God's will for them to go directly into the promise land and take it. It was never His plan for them to wonder the desert for 40 years, and for that unbelieving generation to die off in the wilderness. But we are shown in Psalms 78:40-41 (KJV says limited, and not provoke), that because of Israel’s unbelief, they limited what God could do through them, and that’s why they did not enter into the promise land. Instead of remembering what God did for them in Egypt, and the miracles that were performed, and how He delivered them out of the hands of Pharaoh, they instead chose to forget all of that and allow themselves to be moved with fear. Numbers 13 gives us the account of what they said,


“We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we.” 32 And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. 33 There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.”

And then this what they eventually went onto say,

“All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, “If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this wilderness! 3 Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?”


The sad thing about this account is that if they would have just continued to trust in God, they would have easily conquered that land. They could have very easily conquered it with little to no resistance because we are shown in Joshua 2 what was going on in the hearts, and minds of the people who lived there,

“I know that the Lord has given you the land, that the terror of you has fallen on us, and that all the inhabitants of the land are fainthearted because of you. 10 For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites who were on the other side of the Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom you utterly destroyed. 11 And as soon as we heard these things, our hearts melted; neither did there remain any more courage in anyone because of you, for the Lord your God, He is God in heaven above and on earth beneath.”


So with this example we see that not only did God’s perfect plan/will for them not come to pass, we are also shown here that we as Christians can limit God though what we believe. They didn’t believe they could overcome the people in the promise land, so therefore their unbelief limited what God could do, and delayed the nation of Israel's entry into the promise land.


Now I wouldn't say that God is at the mercy of our prayer, but I will say that his power can only flow as much as we allow it to flow. So we either have to be trusting in a promises of his, or we have to be cooperating with him in some sort of way for Him to be able to move freely within our lives, or for his power to move freely within our lives. The best example I can think to support this is when it comes to our healing. Now I know without a shadow of doubt that it's God's will all of us to be heal (God demonstrated his will through Jesus, and made it available through Him as well (Isaiah 53:4-5)), but as we can clearly see, people are still sick. So, if it's God's will for all of us to be healed, then why isn’t everyone healed; or more importantly, why doesn’t' He just force his healing (will) upon us? Why isn't He clearing out the children hospitals, or why isn't he healing all of the kids with mental disabilities? Something like that shouldn't be very hard for God almighty, right? Well, the reason he isn't able do that is because he cannot force us to receive something we either don't believe in, don't want, or don't ask for and receive by faith (Or in the case of babys and little kids, the parents have no Idea they've been give power and authority to pray for and believe for their kid healing). But why on earth wouldn't someone want to receive a healing from God? Unfortunately, bad doctrine, and ignorance of the word is to blame for that (Hosea 4:6). Sadly, lot of people don't know that it's God's will for them to be healed, or they have no idea that he has already provided healing them; or that he has given us power and authority over sickness (Mark 16:17-18); Or worst of all, they are told God is the one who is allowing that sickness to come on them in order to teach them some redemptive lesson, so therefore they do not resist the sickness, or believe to be healed from it. So even though God wants and wills for every single one of us to experience his healing, unfortunately not everyone is going to receive it. Why? Because He either needs the person who is sick to believe in the healing he has already provided, and receive it by faith, or He needs a person of faith to operate in the authority his has given to us, and pray for that sick person and release his healing power into them.

Now, even if a person meant well, and knew that God is able to heal, but wasn't sure if he'd be willing to heal them ("If it's God's will for me to be healed"), sadly, that person would still not receive their healing. Again, not because God doesn't want to see that person healed, but rather, because their ignorance of God's will, and unbelief would end up stopping them from receiving that healing (Hosea 4:6). Now, God will do all he can to bring people across that person path in order to show with them the truth when it comes to healing, but God cannot just step in and say, "you meant well, so here you go."

Now I know you mentioned something about God being the one who chooses to empower our prayers or not, but I believe that God already empowered our prayers by giving us the name of Jesus. I don't believe our prayers are dependent on him empowering them, but instead, I believe that some of the keys to getting our prayers answered is dependent on us understanding what God has already provided for us by grace (knowing his word), and the level of faith we allow ourselves to operate in (which involves getting rid of doubt and unbelief). Jesus made it very clear in Matthew 11:23-24, that it's up to us whether we receive an answer to a prayer or not. He told us that if ask for sometime, and do not doubt in our hearts, but expect that we'll receive what we ask for when we pray, then we shall receive the answer to our prayers. So therefore, if we ask for something according to his will, but do not receive it, it wasn't God saying "No," but instead it was us not fully believing in our prayer (doubting that we'll receive it). A verse that goes along with this is James 1:5-7 which tell us that,


"If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that gives to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavers is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord."

Now I will say that some prayers do have a time element to them. For instance, if you are praying for a your ministry to take off, but God knows you are not ready for it yet, he will tell you, "not yet." Not because he doesn't want you to have a successful, and influential ministry, but because if you are given something you are not equipped to handle, chances are you will fail. You may become overwhelmed, and the pressure could cause you to make very bad mistakes and you could end up doing more harm than good.

And just one more thing I would like to add, but it is God's will to answer our prayers (John 14:13-14, John 16:23-24, 1 John 5:14-15), and we are also shown that all the promises of God are, "in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen" (2 Corinthians 1:20). Meaning that if you ask for anything according to God's will, and stand on a promise of His, His answer will never be, "No."


So, there we have it. This is what I believe and hopefully I made sense. I know I touched on a lot of different things, but hopefully this response helped you to understand why I believe as I do. God bless If anything, this response allowed me to re-visit topics I haven't thought about in a while