Luke 17:1-4

Rachel Workman: 1 One day Jesus said to his disciples, “There will always be temptations to sin, but what sorrow awaits the person who does the tempting! ² It would be better to be thrown into the sea with a millstone hung around your neck than to cause one of these little ones to fall into sin. ³ So watch yourselves! Hard words aren't they? We need to be sure that we are not the cause of another person's sin. Even if it's just the way we live our lives.

“If another believer^[a] sins, rebuke that person; then if there is repentance, forgive. ⁴ Even if that person wrongs you seven times a day and each time turns again and asks forgiveness, you must forgive.” This is one of the hardest verses in the bible for me. I can forgive someone who sins. That's easy. Forgiving someone who wrongs me is much harder. I do forgive the person, however I'm usually done with them at that point. I'm pretty sure that's not how God wants me to be.

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John Burnett:  17 He said to His disciples, “It is inevitable that ^[a]stumbling blocks come, but woe to him through whom they come! ² It ^[b]would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea, than that he would cause one of these little ones to stumble. ^3 [c]Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. ⁴ And if he sins against you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ ^[d]forgive him.”    Those who are teaching a gospel contrary to the one taught in the Bible are in store for some “woe”.  This a passage that anyone who steps up to teach children’s Sunday school should heed as important.  Eternal consequences are in place for those who teach children the wrong gospel and becomes a stumbling block for them to understand the true gospel.  Repentance is mentioned here again and Jesus’s instructions for forgiveness are pretty clear when you consider how many times He has forgiven us of our sins.

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Today’s reading for Luke 17:5-6

⁵ The apostles said to the Lord, “Show us how to increase our faith.”

⁶ The Lord answered, “If you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘May you be uprooted and be planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you!