Round Mountain Community Church Love and forgiveness work together. Unforgiveness or lack of forgiveness, is one hind rance to prayer that Jesus mentioned. Mark 11:23-25, 23. For verily I say unto you, that ___________ w h o s o ever shall say unto this mountain, be thou removed and be thou cast into the sea, and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe those things which he saith shall come to pass, he shall have whatsoever he saith. 24. Therefore I say unto you, what things soever you desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them. 25. And when ye stand praying, forgive if ye have augnt against any; that your father which is in heaven may forgive you you’re trespass.

A lot of times people take these verses out of context and make them say something they don’t say, and try to make them work. But there are some conditions involved in getting Mark 11:23 and 24 to work for us. Did you ever notice that many of the promises of God are conditional? The blessings of God don’t just fall on us, we have our part to play, our responsibility in the matter.

When Jesus tells us in Mark 11:23-24 that we can have what we say, we rejoice and are thrilled with those truths and we should be. But did you know that’s not all Jesus said about answered prayer?

Mark 11:23-24 doesn’t present the whole story on the subject of faith. For example, in Galatians 5:6, the Bible has something else to say about faith. It says that faith works by love. Galatians 5:6, For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth anything, nor uncircumcision: but faith which worketh by love. So, you won’t be able to get your faith to work for you if you’re not walking in love and forgiveness.

It matters not how many biblical confessions you make or how scriptural they are, your faith won’t work without the God kind of love. Confessing the word over you or your children or circumstances is the right thing to do – but if you don’t forgive they will not work.

So, believing you have your petitions and confessing your faith with your mouth is only part of effective faith and receiving answers to prayer. In fact, Mark 11:22-24 won’t work without Mark 11:25: And when you stand praying, forgive. Why won’t they work without Mark 11:25? Because faith won’t work without love and love forgives.

Notice that verse 25 begins with the word

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and.

The word and’ is a conjunction, I joined what Jesus just finished saying to what He is about to say.

Notice what Jesus had just said in Mark 11:24, Therefore I say unto you, what things soever you desire, when ye pray, Jesus is talking about prayer, and He is talking about how to make your faith work.

In verse 25 Jesus said, when ye stand praying, if ye have aught against any, forgive. When you pray – forgive.

Why did Jesus say that? Because Jesus knows that if we have unforgiveness in us, our prayers won’t work. Faith only works by love, love forgives because God is love and God forgives. If Jesus would have just said, when you stand praying, you’ll have your petition, we’d all have it made. But He didn’t stop there, He said when we stand praying we have to do something and that is to forgive. If we have anything against any one we must forgive them.

Most Christians know what the Bible says about forgiveness, but for some reason don’t practice it in their lives and then wonder why their faith or prayer don’t work.

The Bible has a lot to say about the subject of forgiveness and when you really study it out, it’s almost shocking. Jesus doesn’t suggest we forgive, He says we must forgive. If you have accepted forgiveness by God and then won’t forgive others, the Bible calls that wicked.

Matthew 18:23-35, Jesus told this parable in response to Peter’s question about how many times we should forgive others. Notice in this parable Jesus called the man who wouldn’t forgive wicked.

The guy who wouldn’t forgive, was forgiven 10,000 talents, which could be millions of dollars, but he wouldn’t forgive the other guy who owed him $100 pence, which is only a few dollars.

We all owed a debt we couldn’t pay but Jesus caesura and paid our debt for us, because our substitute took our place and was made to be sin for us although He had never sinned. He took the curse of the law for us, that means all sickness and disease was laid on Him, not because He had done wrong, but because we had. He was doing it for us, then He went to hell for us, in our place.

Compared to that, what could anyone do to us that we shouldn’t forgive them for?