How Love and Forgiveness Go Hand in Hand
Your Nightly Prayer for Mar. 24, 2025
By Lynette Kittle
TONIGHT’S SCRIPTURE
“You, Lord, are forgiving and good, abounding in love to all who call to you” - Psalm 86:5
SOMETHING TO PONDER
When are we most like God? Some might say it is when we love one another. Others may say we’re the most like God when we forgive. In looking at God’s word, the two are inseparable, as John 3:16 sums up, “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
God’s gift of Jesus is the perfect picture of love and forgiveness. Still, it seems difficult for many in the world today, including some believers, to understand how the two are so tightly intertwined: how much we forgive measures how much we love, just as how little we forgive reveals how little we love. After a woman known for her sinful behavior came to the home of a Pharisee where Jesus was dining and poured perfume over His feet, as written in Luke 7:41-43, Jesus took time to explain how love and forgiveness go hand in hand.
“Two people owed money to a certain moneylender. One owed him five hundred denarii and the other fifty. Neither of them had the money to pay him back, so he forgave the debts of both. Now, which of them will love him more?”
”Simon replied, ‘I suppose the one who had the bigger debt forgiven.’”
“You have judged correctly,’ Jesus said.”
Jesus told them and us how love and forgiveness operate. “Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven—as her great love has shown. But whoever has been forgiven little loves little. Then Jesus said to her, ‘Your sins are forgiven’” (Luke 7:47). Love, the real kind that flows from God, is forgiving, as 1 Corinthians 13:4-5 describes. “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.” If we believe we can love God and withhold forgiveness from others, which is sin, then we are mistaken because He is forgiving and abounding in love.
YOUR NIGHTLY PRAYER
Dear Father,
We thank You for Your love and forgiveness, which flows so freely to us. Teach us to love and forgive others the way that You love and forgive us. Help us to let go of pride and seek what pleases You above our own understanding, to lovingly treat others in the way You treat us. Lead us today and every day to follow You in loving and forgiving others.
In Jesus’ name,
Amen.
THREE THINGS TO MEDITATE UPON
1. Do you consider how much God has forgiven you? Have you ever contemplated how love and forgiveness go hand in hand, or is this a new concept for you? If so, take some time now to think of how God’s love and forgiveness both have no limits, offered endlessly and forever to you.
2. Have you experienced someone loving and forgiving you, especially when you felt like you didn’t deserve it?
3. How are you doing in forgiving and loving others? Are you withholding either from others? If so, ask God to help you love and forgive in the ways He urges us to do.
Photo Credit: ©GettyImages/Tony Rowell
Lynette Kittle is married with four daughters. She enjoys writing about faith, marriage, parenting, relationships, and life. Her writing has been published by Focus on the Family, Decision, Today’s Christian Woman, kirkcameron.com, Ungrind.org, StartMarriageRight.com, and more. She has a M.A. in Communication from Regent University and serves as associate producer for Soul Check TV.
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Originally published Monday, 24 March 2025.
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