God *blesses you when you forgive other people.

The Life of Jesus Christ - Chapter 4 - Jesus, the great teacher - Part 7

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An online Bible Study course by Barrie Wetherill about the life of Jesus. This book is in EasyEnglish Level B. Use the links below for other online Bible Study books and commentaries that will help you. Or go to the Word List, which explains words with a *star.

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Matthew 5:7

Words that tell how God will *bless us are called beatitudes. The *beatitudes in verses 3-6 describe how God *blesses people. Although every person has *sin inside, God can *bless that person, because of Christ.

Verse 7, and the other *beatitudes, are different. They show how real Christians live. They describe how a Christian behaves in the world. To become a Christian is not just to add something extra to our behaviour. There is a complete change in the way that we live. It is like a new beginning. You become a new person. Christ makes a person new. This change ought to show in the person’s behaviour and attitudes. If it does not show, something is wrong. Then that person should ask if he or she is a real Christian.

A real Christian forgives other people

The first result of a new life is that we can forgive other people. We have learned that we are poor in *spirit. This has made us sad, and we have confessed to God. We have asked him to fill us with his own *Holy Spirit. Then we will love other people. We cannot do anything else. If we do not forgive other people, we do not fully belong to Jesus. We have not really trusted him to take *sin out of our lives. We have not got a new life from him. This is what this verse means. God does not forgive us because we forgive other people. We are able to forgive other people because God forgives us (Matthew 18:22-35).

We forgive other people because God forgives us

It is not easy to forgive. God loves us and forgives us, but at a cost. God punished Jesus instead of us. Jesus had done nothing wrong, but he died on the *cross. He died because we do wrong things. That is why God can forgive us.

King David, who was God’s favourite King, did many wrong things. We can read about them in the Bible. Often David suffered as a result of his *sin. Sometimes we have to suffer also because of our *sin, but God does forgive us. That is why He sent His only Son. We were enemies of God. We deserved nothing from God, but he sent Jesus. He punished Jesus instead of us.