Forgiving the unrepentant. Is it necessary?

Or even possible?

This series of posts from The Briefing are a few years old but an excellent exploration of this question.

I’m also slowly working my way through D.A. Carson’s Love in Hard Places. This quote is particularly challenging

Over against the personal hatred that some people thought was warranted on the basis of their selective reading of Old Testament texts, Jesus mandates something else: “Love your enemies,” he says, “and pray for those who persecute you” (Matt 5:44). Here is a vision of love that is rich and costly: it extends even to enemies. It is manifested not least in prayer for enemies. We find it difficult to hate those for whom we pray; we find it difficult not to pray for those we love. In no one is this more strikingly manifest than in Jesus himself as he writhes on the cross and yet prays for his enemies, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34). If Jesus is our example as well as our Lord, what arrogance, bitterness, pain, or sloth could ever justify our failure to pray for our enemies?

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