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                    ||                       How beautiful on the mountains
                    ||                       are the feet of those ... who
                    ||                       proclaim salvation, who say to
                                             Zion, "Your God reigns!"
          Pastor RALPH & GENE ANN WOOD                  --Isaiah 52:7 (NIV)
          E-mail:  randg.wood@encode.com
          FRESH MANNA, 01/04/1997 ......................... MATTHEW 6:14-15
          [Jesus said] ... {14} For if ye forgive men their trespasses,
          your heavenly Father will also forgive you:  {15} But if ye
          forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father
          forgive your trespasses.   --MATTHEW 6:14-15 (KJV)
             In a recent Fresh Manna, on MATTHEW 26:42, we said, "For many
          years now, we've had the custom of starting the day by saying
          the Lord's prayer together in Greek."  Then, one of our readers
          wrote to ask, "Just curious--why Greek?"
             Well, I got started on that when I was taking first-year New
          Testament Greek.  For some reason, I memorized the Lord's prayer
          in Greek; and then found that actually saying it in Greek had
          these advantages:--  (1) At first, while it's still unfamiliar,
          it forces you to slow down, to think through what you're saying;
          (2) It's one language closer to the language the Lord originally
          taught it in-- a straight translation from Aramaic into Greek,
          rather than a translation of a translation-- so you'd hope to get
          closer to the original meaning;  (3) At one place, the English
          version we're familiar with, rather obscures, fails to bring out,
          a key point which is made more clearly in the Greek:--
             We're used to saying, "Forgive us our trespasses as WE FORGIVE
          those who trespass against us".  What the Greek likely said is,
          "Forgive us our trespasses as WE FORGAVE [/HAVE FORGIVEN] those
          who trespass against us".  I.e., we are to -have- forgiven people
          who've sinned against us, before we ever get to this part of the
          Lord's prayer.  This forgiveness is to have been a past action,
          completed in the past, before we even begin the Lord's prayer.
             And indeed, here, Jesus emphasized that very point.  The only
          supplementary teaching He gave, after giving the Lord's prayer,
          was to elaborate on this prerequisite of prior forgiveness.  Why?
          Because holding unforgiveness in our hearts, toward people who've
          sinned against us, disqualifies us from asking God to forgive us
          for our sins against Him.  Unforgiveness toward others blocks the
          flow of His forgiveness to us!
             Before we ask for forgiveness, first we must have forgiven.
          This is a significant point, in our relationship with our Father.
          But it's also significant in our relationships with other people,
          if everyone we contact today, we've -already- forgiven!   --RLW
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