Dear David, Thank you for all your commentaries. They have helped me a lot. 

I’ve been meditating on Matthew 6:14-15 and it seems to me that if I don’t forgive others, God won’t forgive me. When I asked that question in Bible class the answer was: “it is a reflection of the state of our hearts and our relationship with God.”

I think we all have some sin that we struggle with. Some people might have trouble with forgiveness. If you could please explain what that verse means.

Matthew 6:14-15 — More on the importance of forgiveness.

“For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.”

1. If you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: Forgiveness is required for those who have been forgiven. We are not given the luxury of holding on to our bitterness towards other people.
2. “Once our eyes have been opened to see the enormity of our offence against God, the injuries which others have done to us appear by comparison extremely trifling. If, on the other hand, we have an exaggerated view of the offences of others, it proves that we have minimized our own.” (Stott, cited in Carson)
3. Neither will your Father forgive your trespasses: Jesus has much more to say about forgiveness (Matthew 9:2-6, 18:21-35, and Luke 17:3-4). Here, the emphasis is on the imperative of forgiveness; on the fact that it is not an option

When we deal with passages like this, it is important that we take what the Bible says about forgiveness as a whole and understand the different passages in light of each other. If it was as simple as, “If I fail to forgive anyone then I am going to hell,” then that would seem to contradict other passages of Scripture.

• God’s forgiveness is not something we earn by our forgiving of others.
• Jesus told us what the unforgivable sin was, and it doesn’t seem to be unforgiveness towards others.

Matthew 12:31-32

Therefore I say to you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven men, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven men. Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him; but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the age to come.

We don’t have the liberty of throwing out or ignoring relevant passages; hopefully, with God’s help, we rightly divide the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15) and bring these passages together in a good understanding.

Passages like Matthew 6:14-15 and Matthew 18:21-35 stress the urgency of forgiveness, and that there is a price to be paid for our unforgiveness — and, in the big picture, a failure to forgive others may be an indication that someone has not themselves been forgiven.

All in all, what Jesus had to tell us about forgiveness pushes us to be more forgiving, and not less. Jesus never seemed concerned that His disciples were being too forgiving!