Giving the Forgiveness I’ve Received 

Versions of this story will say "a sinful woman," as if we're not all sinners, but this woman who had this bad reputation came in and you can imagine people looking at her and saying, "what is this?" Because she's crying at his feet. She's wiping his feet with her tears in her hair. And yet she's obviously in a completely broken position. 

Then there's Simon, the guy that invited Jesus over. He's sitting there and he's watching. And the more it goes on internally, the more it really starts to upset him because you can picture him thinking, "I didn't invite him here for this." He even just has a thought in his head saying, “If this guy knew who this woman was, he wouldn’t let her do that. He must not be a prophet.” 

In the story, Jesus looked at Simon and he said, I'm going to give you a little parable here. So he does. And he tells him that two guys owe a debt and one's bigger, one less. Who would feel better about being relieved of the debt? Simon said, well, the one who had the bigger debt. And Jesus said, you judge correctly. 

And he said, look, I came here. You didn't wash my feet. You didn't pour oil on my head. You didn't greet me with a kiss. And here's this woman who doesn't own this home. And she's been doing all that the whole time I've been here.

Then, Jesus looks at Simon and he says, “to the person who has been forgiven much they will love much, and to the person who's been forgiven a little they will love little.” And it was very obvious who he's talking about. Simon compared to this woman. 

And you can take that and think about how willing we are to be forgiven or to offer forgiveness to other people. And according to what Jesus says in that text that directly tells us how much we're willing to love people and put ourselves out there for people. 

Think about that in the whole Christian circle. We have to be people who will embrace that forgiveness and be willing to offer it to other people if we're ever going to love anybody. Otherwise, we close off our walls, close off our business, close off ourselves to where we don't have anything to offer anybody else. 

A lot of that has to link to the idea that it just doesn't matter what my status is, what my bank account is, or anything else. How much do I embrace the forgiveness of God and how willing am I to offer that to other people? That’s what I have to ask myself. That's going to determine whether I will love folks or not love folks. 

Alan Robertson

Alan Robertson is the oldest son of Phil and Miss Kay Robertson. He helped start the family business, Duck Commander and left there in the late ’80s to serve as a Pastor for 22 years at the White’s Ferry Road Church in West Monroe, LA.