Matthew 18

Matthew 18....
Verse 3.....unless you change and become like little children you won't enter the kingdom of God.....
This verse is telling us that out attitude when coming to accept Jesus should be like a child. The childlike version of faith is simple and helpless and full of humility. We cannot be arrogant when it comes to our faith and Jesus. Jesus here is letting us know that conversion is essential.

Verse 7-9..... This was talked about in chapter 5:29-30. Should we literally cut off our hand or cut out eyes out? No.....we just need to deal with the sin in our lives as harshly as possible. If hands cause you to sin....such as stealing, etc.....do what you have to to stop touching unnecessary things. If your eyes cause you to lust or look at ungodly things......do what you need to to stop that behavior. Only you know what sins run deep in your life, or what sin patterns you have. Jesus died to take all the junk out of our life and minds and hearts.  Pray and ask God to help you do what is necessary to overcome and become whole again. He can take all of it away when we ask......thing is.....we have to be willing to give it up.

Verses 10-12 tell us that when we do go astray Jeuss won't stop looking for Us arms waiting for us to return. He will leave the 99 faithful and go after the one lost to return us to the fold. I'm so thankful for this as I am lots of times the one who wanders away.

Verses 15-20 are very important. These verses tell us how to deal with conflict. If someone offends you we are to go directly to the person and tell them. Ok......in reality how many times does this happen? Usually we think it's better to tell everyone but the person who offended us.....which is NoT the right thing to do.
Then if they don't listen we are to take a few people who can be trusted to help in the situation and act as mediators. They can be witnesses and help restore the relationship. Also the people picked to help should be trustworthy enough not to spread rumors about the situations to everyone and their brother.
Then if that doesn't work, tell the body of believers where you attend church. This is a last effort to restore the person to a right relationship with the one offended and the church and more importanly God.
See God wants restoration. He wants us to be in unity and love for His sake. He wants fellowship and harmony among the body as well as with Him. He wants relationships to be fixed and do whatever is necessary to fix them. Period. We can't work and make disciples in the church with fighting and problems in the way. Forgiveness is key.

Verse 19 tells us that when we pray with 2-3 Jesus is with us!! Corporate prayer is where we pray as one body.....and He is there with us.

Read the parable of the unmerciful servant very carefully as it could be easy for us to be like him. How many times do people hurt us? How many times do we not want to keep relationships that are broken? How many times do I need to forgive? Being hurt by others is not fun. But forgiveness is necessary.....again for restoration.
Here Jesus is telling us we need to forgive 490 times.......which is an infinite number. There is no limit to the amount of times we need to forgive someone. Look at it this way......people hurt us all the time. We can choose to forgive like Jesus says and move on.....or hold onto it and in verse 35 tells us if we dont forgive our Father won't forgive us. See God calls us to be a certain way. We can call ourselves a christian, but if we can't forgive....what kind of message are we sending the world? And think about this......no matter how many times someone has offended me....I've offended my God many more times than they have to me. If he forgives me then I need to do the same.