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Taizé Meditation Service
SERMON – 6.00pm, St. John's Cathedral, Hong Kong
Sunday 14th June 2009
Revd. Canon David Pickering
Luke 7.47
Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.
Forgiveness and Love
Love and Forgiveness
We all need Love
We all need Forgiveness
Like the woman in the reading we are all sinners
Also like Simon we all too easily are quick to see the faults and failings of others.
And just like Simon we use the faults and failings of others to cover up or seek to ignore our own sins.
There's a lot of forgiveness and love in this evening's reading.
And forgiveness and love do go together.
It needs love for there to be forgiveness, and love is often expressed in forgiveness. It is only love that can bear the pain that is sometimes required in forgiveness.
Desmond Tutu at the beginning of the peace and reconciliation process in South Africa said the only way for it to really work, would require a lot of love. And that love would be painful.
Recall two people from the sectarian divide in N Ireland. The woman's husband, or father, had been killed by the man sitting across the table from her.
Desmond Tutu makes the point in both situations, it was not a case of forgive and forget. The loss of a loved one can never be forgotten, but love can begin to bare the pain of forgiving.
Luke 23. 34 tells us how on the cross Jesus said, "Father forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing." The love of God as seen in Jesus was so great that he could ask forgiveness for his executioners. This is recaptured in the stoning of Stephen in Acts 7.60 Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." When he had said this, he died.
It takes real love to forgive. It takes divine love to forgive.
The wonderful thing is that divine love is waiting and wanting to forgive al the time.
We often think we have got to plead with God to forgive us.
In some way or another we have got to placate the wrath and anger of God caused by our sins. But this seems to run wholly contrary to an understanding of a God of love.
God does not like, and is probably angered, by our sins, faults and failings and they deserve his wrath.
But his love is so strong, so pure and so complete that he wants to forgive us.
Prodigal Son – Forgiving Father
Like the son in that story we can only be forgiven when we come to our senses and realise where we have fallen short.
There is no limit to the Love of God, and his loving forgiveness.
The limit is in our failure to recognise and accept our failings.
And this can hinder our love of others.
In this evening's reading, although it does not say so, I am sure the woman recognised that she was a sinner, probably more so than those who would accuse her. But in recognising her sin, she was able to show love, and was truly forgiven.
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