Forgiveness

“Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, ‘Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?’ Jesus answered, ‘I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.’” Matthew 18:21-22
Following this verse, Jesus gives the all-familiar parable of the servant who was forgiven a debt of 10,000 talents (several million dollars) because he couldn’t pay, and who then turned around and abused a man who owed him a hundred denarii (a few dollars). The point He was making is, sometimes we can be like that servant.
Peter thought he was being generous by offering to forgive someone seven times for the same sin. Jewish custom only required you to forgive someone three times. But Jesus says, “not seven times, but seventy-seven times.” (It could also be translated ‘seventy times seven’ – in either case, the intention is that we are to always forgive when someone asks us to, without keeping score.)
How often do we keep holding onto unforgiveness? God does not do this with us, so why do we do it to our fellow man? By doing so, we undervalue the debt that we have been forgiven by God. We could not possibly hope to repay God for what we owe Him. So we should be willing to forgive other people.
Forgiveness is not an emotion, it is a choice. It is a choice to let that wrongdoing go, and not to use it as ammunition against the person in the future. We are to forgive someone in our hearts straightaway, so that when they come to us to ask for forgiveness, we can readily offer it to them. But it is Scriptural not to offer until they ask.