In his sermon 'Dealing with Stumbling Blocks & Sins,' Peter Allison explores the challenges Christians face when confronted with offenses and sins, emphasizing the inevitability of stumbling blocks in life. A stumbling block, derived from the Greek word 'scandalon,' refers to anything that causes another person to sin. While such offenses are unavoidable, individuals must take responsibility for their own sins and cannot blame others for succumbing to temptations. Jesus warns against being the cause of stumbling blocks, highlighting the severe consequences for those who lead others, especially children, astray. The sermon also delves into the importance of rebuking a brother who sins and the necessity of forgiving those who repent, reinforcing that forgiveness is a promise to release the obligation of punishment. The speaker stresses that forgiveness is essential for true freedom and peace, as holding onto vengeance hinders spiritual growth. Ultimately, Christians are encouraged to be vigilant against placing stumbling blocks and to seek God's grace in practicing forgiveness.

Luke chapter 17. I'd like to read the first four verses this morning. Then he said to the disciples, It is impossible that no offenses should come, but woe to him through whom they do come. It would be better for him if the millstone were hung about his neck, and he were thrown into the sea, then that he should offend one of these little ones. Take heed to yourselves.

If your brother sins against you, rebuke him. And if he repents, forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times in a day and seven times in a day returns to you saying, I repent. You shall forgive him. May his word be hidden in our hearts that we might not sin against him.

Almighty Heavenly Father, we pray that you would teach to us your Word, that you would open it to us by your Holy Spirit. May the hearing of it this morning be mixed with faith, mingled with faith. And I pray that you would sanctify my sinful lips, that you would keep me from error, and that your riches, the riches of your grace may be proclaimed this morning. In Jesus' name, Amen. Please be seated.

Dealing with stumbling blocks and sins. Those two things, dealing with those things, are probably the hardest things that we ever do as Christians. And things that we are doing or ought to be doing very frequently, probably almost more than as much as anything else that we are doing. Dealing with stumbling blocks and with sins. These are very short words and in some ways simple words.

There's not a lot that's difficult to understand about what Jesus has said in these four verses, but there is a lot that is packed into these short verses. Jesus says it's inevitable that offenses would come. That word is a stumbling block. What is a stumbling block? Well, that word in the Greek is where we get scandal from.

Scandalon. It means something that causes another person to sin. That's what that word offense is. Something that causes another person to sin. Jesus said if your right hand causes you to sin, That's the verb form of this word offense.

If your right hand scandalizes you, if it causes you to sin, then you were to cut it off and cast it from us for it's more profitable that one of our members perish than the whole body be cast into hell. So that which scandalizes Us is usually a sin in itself But not always, but not always. The gospel itself was foolishness to the Gentiles and a stumbling block to the Jews, a scandal, an offense to the Jews. It caused them to sin in rejecting the Messiah. But of course, preaching the gospel is not a sin, it's not wrong at all, it's something we're commanded to do.

Christ's own community was offended by him. They said is this not a carpenter, the son of Mary, aren't these all his brothers here? Aren't these his sisters? And they were offended. He was a stumbling block to them.

But there was no, of course, no offense in Christ. So it's a scandal is something which causes us to sin, but it doesn't always have to be. It often is, it usually is, but doesn't always have to be sinful in and of itself. And just as a stumbling block doesn't have to be sinful itself, neither does a stumbling block, even if it is sinful, force someone to sin. A stumbling block is that which causes another to sin.

It is a temptation, an inducement leading them to sin, but it doesn't always have to result in a person before whom that stumbling block has been placed. It doesn't always have to result in them sinning. Does it? In other words, it doesn't force somebody to sin. People who sin in the face of a stumbling block sin because their own heart is wicked and sinful.

And people who sin in the face of a stumbling block can't blame anyone else for their sin. No matter how many stumbling blocks have been placed in front of them. When we sin because a stumbling block has been placed in front of us, that's our own sin. We are 100% responsible for that sin. When Satan tempted David to number Israel, he placed a stumbling block in front of David.

He was a temptation. He moved David, the Bible says, to do this sin. A sin that even Joab was concerned about. David didn't blame Satan for his sin. His sin was his own sin.

It was against the Lord that he sinned. And he was 100%... And he accepted full responsibility for that sin. Peter was a stumbling block to Jesus. When Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to heaven and suffer many things from the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and then be killed and be raised on the third day, Peter took Jesus aside privately.

And it says he began to rebuke Jesus, saying, Far be it from you, Lord, this shall not happen to you. And then Jesus turned to Peter, And he said, Get behind me, Satan, you are an offense to me. You are a stumbling block to me. For you are not mindful of the things of God, but of men. Now Jesus does in that example, Jesus does exactly with Peter does exactly what he teaches us to do here in the face of sins and stumbling blocks.

Peter put a stumbling block. Peter was sinning in what he did. He was being more mindful of the things of men and not mindful of the things of God. He was a sinning in that. And in that, when he did that, he was putting a stumbling block in front of Christ.

And Christ rebuked him. He also recognized that Peter was being moved by Satan at that point, and so rebukes Satan as well. But he also says to Peter, you aren't mindful of the things of God but of the things of men. Now Jesus certainly obviously clearly did not sin even though that stumbling block was placed in front of him. And so even though stumbling blocks themselves are sin, they don't mean, They don't force the person before whom they are placed to sin.

But Jesus then teaches us that stumbling blocks are inevitable. They're inevitable. That means that we need to prepare to face stumbling blocks. For Jesus says it is impossible that no stumbling blocks come. If Jesus says it's impossible that no stumbling blocks come, If he says it's inevitable, then we would be very foolish indeed to think that we won't face them or that we might not be stumbled by them.

If Jesus faced stumbling blocks from his own disciples, we should expect to face stumbling blocks as well. Stumbling blocks even by our own family members. Stumbling blocks by our spouse. Stumbling blocks from our children. Stumbling blocks from one another in the body of Christ.

After all, Jesus said, we're not greater than our master. Jesus faced persecution. We should face it, too. If Jesus is facing stumbling blocks, Jesus, we should, too. And That's what Jesus is saying here.

They're inevitable. We will face them. We live in a world of sinners and fallen angels. And between these two alone, we can expect many stumbling blocks. As well as Sometimes from our own our own flesh We don't want to be ignorant of Satan's devices And so like good foot soldiers who always need to be alert, who always need to be on guard when they are in the enemy territory, when they are advancing into enemy territory, We need to be alert as well.

Alert to, aware of, and anticipate stumbling blocks that are likely to come. But even though Jesus says they are inevitable, we should avoid placing them. Jesus said, we don't want to be the one who places stumbling blocks. Yes, they're inevitable, but woe, Jesus said to him, who is the cause of them. We should be willing to go out of our way to avoid doing anything that could unnecessarily give an offense.

We should be willing to go out of our way to avoid doing anything that could unnecessarily give an offense. Now use that word unnecessarily. What's the difference between an avoidable stumbling block and an unavoidable stumbling block. Well, an unavoidable stumbling block concerns something that we are commanded to do. We are commanded to preach the gospel.

We are commanded to be witnesses. So if people are offended with that, that's unavoidable. But of course, of course, we want to be sure that it is the message that is the cause of the offense, and not the messenger, not us. That it's the message itself that is offensive and not we who are bringing that message, not the manner in which we bring the message, not the timing or the deliverance of the message that we are bringing. We want to make sure that it is the message itself That's the offense.

That's an unavoidable stumbling block to people. An avoidable stumbling block is something that maybe concerns an area of liberty. We may be free to do something, but if it would cause someone else to stumble, we should ensure that our liberty is not the cause of someone else's sin. There's a very interesting example of Jesus avoiding giving offense to the Jews, the church leaders of the day, that's recounted in Matthew's gospel. One time when the disciples had come to Capernaum, those who received the temple tax said come to Peter and said does your teacher not pay the temple tax?

It's a rhetorical question right here. It's a you could say it's it's a provocative question. Does your teacher not pay the temple tax? And Peter said yes and he he didn't want to cause any conflict with them. And when he had come into the house Jesus anticipated him.

He saying what do you think Simon? From whom do the kings of the earth take customs or taxes from their sons or from strangers? And Peter said to him from strangers And Jesus said to him, then the sons are free. They're not obligated to pay taxes. He said, nevertheless, lest we offend them, lest we put a stumbling block in front of these Jews, go to the sea, cast in a hook, and take the fish that comes up first and when you have opened its mouth you will find a piece of money.

Take that and give that to them for me and you. Nevertheless, Jesus said, even though we're free, even though we're sons, even though we have liberty, even though we're not under obligation to these tributes and customs, which are not levied on those of the house, but they are levied on strangers, even though we are sons and not subject to this, nevertheless, go pay that tax so that we don't put a stumbling block in front of the Jews. You see, if Jesus used his liberty to claim that he didn't owe the tax, it would look like to the Jews he was using that to get out of having to pay a tax, using that to his own benefit. And so rather than let the Jews think that he was doing something for his own benefit, he paid the tax that he didn't have to pay. All to avoid a stumbling block to the Jews, all to avoid the Jews thinking uncharitably and improperly of him.

You see stumbling blocks are serious and we want to avoid putting a stumbling block in front of people wherever it is avoidable Because you see putting a stumbling block in front of somebody is itself a sin. Now some sins the Bible teaches us are more heinous, more wicked than other sins. This is one that is particularly heinous. Jesus said that if someone causes a little one to stumble, it were better that a millstone were hung about his neck and he were thrown into the sea. That's a punishment that's reserved for the worst of all malefactors.

It's better that that were to happen than that somebody would put a stumbling block in front of these little ones. That's strong language. Woe, woe to him. That's a word that Jesus usually reserves for his strongest denunciation of the Pharisees, the hypocrites who laid all kinds of burdens on people, who blocked the way to the kingdom for people and refused to enter themselves. Jesus uses that same word, woe, to somebody who puts a stumbling block in front of people.

One of the most tragic stumbling blocks today are sexual sins against children by people in authority over them, in their own family and in the church, it wounds them deeply and scars them, leaves them and often leaves them bitter or simply opposed to everything connected to the person who violated them and if that if that person is connected to the church and everything that that person believes they reject Many people have nothing to do with the church because of stumbling blocks that were put in their path by the very people whose duty it was to nurture them and to teach them and to love them. And so they will grow up and completely reject anything to do with the faith. Now that's their sin, their rejection of the faith. But woe, Jesus says, woe to that person through whom the stumbling block came. It were better a millstone were hung about his neck and he was cast into the sea than to ever place a stumbling block like that before a little one.

Of course with the rise of satanic rituals in this land these sorts of crimes are proliferating all over this country and the Western world. But there are many other kinds of stumbling blocks that are put before people. One of the more common in our day, and even in many churches, are women that are immodestly dressed. Now I know this is a very, very sensitive topic. And it's not my intent this morning to talk about what is modest dress and what isn't modest dress.

Modesty really goes far beyond clothes and that's not our, it's really an expression of the heart. But the point here is that there is a biblical standard. There is a biblical standard for such a thing as modest dress because Proverbs 7 describes a woman dressed as a harlot. That's a stumbling block. It doesn't mean that everyone who encounters such a stumbling block will sin and if they do sin because of that stumbling block they are hundred percent responsible for their own sin.

But regardless of whether anyone actually stumbles or not before that stumbling block, Jesus is saying it's wrong to place the stumbling block there in the first place. In other words, the sin of placing the stumbling block doesn't have anything to do, doesn't depend in any way on whether anyone stumbles or not. Peter placed a stumbling block in front of Christ. Christ didn't stumble. And just because there are stumbling blocks doesn't mean that we have to stumble either by the grace of God.

Because for every temptation that comes, God has provided a way of escape that we may be able to bear it. It really doesn't even depend, the sin of placing a stumbling block doesn't depend entirely on whether someone intended to place a stumbling block there. Peter didn't intend to place that stumbling block before Christ, but he did. Christ said he did. We don't have to intend it to place a stumbling block before others to actually do so.

Jesus is warning that it is a woe to be the one who places that stumbling block. Another common stumbling block, particularly for children, is religious hypocrisy on the part of parents, following the traditions of men that don't arise from a Holy Spirit conviction in our hearts that this is what God's Word is leading us to do or presenting one face in the public. This is how we are in the public but then in the home, in the privacy of the home, having some other standard or some other face. You know, not allowing certain conduct before people because that wouldn't look good but then allowing that same conduct at home because nobody else can see it then that's a that's hypocrisy and that's a stumbling block to our children. Scripture admonishes fathers especially fathers especially not to provoke children to wrath because that puts a stumbling block in front of them injustice favoritism of one child or another or just simply benign neglect you know not having time for our children being preoccupied with our own entertainment, our own pursuits, our own pleasures, not teaching them diligently.

These are to provoke our children to wrath. And this kind of what I'll call benign neglect is anything but benign in its effect on our children. Jesus exhortation in light of these truths about stumbling blocks is to take heed to ourselves. Take heed to ourselves that we don't place stumbling blocks in front of others and take heed that we don't stumble ourselves when we encounter the inevitable stumbling blocks. To take heed means to exercise caution.

It's to think and to plan ahead. To carefully consider how both how not to place stumbling blocks in front of others and and how to avoid those that come in our path. Here are some of the cautions of scripture on taking heed to ourselves. Let us not judge one another therefore anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or to cause to fall in our brother's way. Romans 14.

It is good neither to eat meat or drink wine or do anything by which your neighbor stumbles or is offended or is made weak. Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble, I will never again eat meat lest I make my brother stumble, Paul told the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 8. See, this is the extent to which we have to be willing to go to take heed to ourselves that we don't cause others to stumble or stumble ourselves. See, while stumbling vox are inevitable, falling into sin because of them is not inevitable. And so we need to take heed that we don't stumble because of stumbling blocks.

We have God's promise that with every temptation, as I said earlier, He will make the way of escape so that we are able to bear it, so that we are able to not sin. In verse three, Jesus gives us the way of escape in dealing with stumbling blocks in our path, and that is to rebuke the one who has sinned against us if our brother sins against us Jesus says we are to rebuke them in other words we are to have a care for them a care that they not sin. And that means going to them. Now if you if. Now that's hard that's really hard to do.

We would much rather just ignore it. We would much rather just say, well, I'm going to overlook that. And there is a place for for overlooking things. But we need to ask ourselves, what's Why are we overlooking it? We really need to ask.

Would I be loved? Would I better serve my brother? Would I better love my brother if I humbly went to him? About this matter. About this matter.

You know, we, it's much easier to not go to them. That's hard. It's hard because it requires us to humble ourselves and go gently and go humbly to get the log out of our own eye first. It's much easier to just feel sorry about it, to just hold a party, a pity party, and share our hurts with a few other friends and get them to join in our pity. Or we could get furious and attack our brother, or get furious and take out our wrath on the walls in our house or the people that are there or we may avoid both of those recognizing how wrong they are and instead go to the elders and show them our bloody toes that have been smashed and our fingers that have been stepped on in the guise of asking for prayer for for this situation.

You see that's not what Jesus says to do is it? Jesus says we are to rebuke them. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him. Now in the scriptures there's two kinds of rebukes. There's two different things that are described as a rebuke.

One is to convict or to refute, to prosecute if you will. Paul told Timothy, those who are sinning, elders who are sinning, rebuke in the presence of all that the rest also may fear. That's that's the word for convict. Convict them, refute what they're doing, denounce it and prosecute the case. That's not what Jesus is saying here.

And it's a different word for rebuke. This word here means to confront, to present the facts as we see them, and to allow for a response that might provide a different explanation than the one that we were assuming. To recognize we may have misunderstood the situation, we may have taken an offense when there wasn't one. In other words, we may be the ones who are assuming evil in this situation. And so we're to go to our brother and to humbly present what we see and ask if there isn't a possible different explanation for what we've seen.

And when we do that, we might learn that we were wrong, we misunderstood, we didn't have our facts, we were misinformed. Or we might find that our assumptions were correct. And when we go humbly, when we go in such a way that our that our love is evident that our desire for their restoration is foremost and we're not going because we're angry and hurt and upset that we've been hurt. And we're not going to exact revenge. See, then the Lord will often bring repentance.

And so if your brother sins against you, rebuke him. And if he repents, Jesus says, forgive him, forgive him. That's a command. Forgive him. What is forgiveness?

It might be one of the more misunderstood things in the Christian faith. Forgiveness is not a feeling of being warm and cozy about some sin that someone has committed against you. Fundamentally, forgiveness is a promise. You might say it's simply a promise, but it's anything but simple. Forgiveness is fundamentally a promise.

The word forgive comes from two words give and for. The word for is a preposition prefix that means failure or refusal to do something, a failure or refusal to do something. And so giving forgiveness, then, is a failure to give punishment that is due to the guilty. Forgiveness in its root, where the word comes from, is a failure to give punishment that is due to the guilty. Forgiveness, in its root, where the word comes from, is a failure to give punishment that is due to the guilty.

See, guilt is the liability to punishment. And the promise not to bring punishment The liability to punishment is removed by the promise not to bring it. The liability for the punishment is removed by the promise not to bring it. When God forgives us, He removes our guilt. That means He removes our liability to punishment because God promises not to bring it.

There's a the story told of a doctor in England who had many poor clients who couldn't pay him and in his account book he would simply when that happened, he would simply write a line, draw a line through it, and say, forgiven. Well, after he died, his wife went to that account book. She wasn't so happy about all his forgiving of these debts. And he wanted to get people to pay while they were poor and they couldn't pay. So she took her case to the judge and said, here, look, all these people, they owe this money that my husband never collected.

And the judge asked her, well, what's it say right here? What says forgiven? Well, the judge says well, there's no judge in all of England that can change that your husband forgave them That means he removed their liability. I can't add it back. It's been removed.

That's forgiveness. To remove, to make a promise, not to bring a judgment that is due. And when there is no more liability to punishment, then there is no more guilt. When God forgives us, He promises not to remember our sins. Does that mean that God gets amnesia?

That there are some things that God doesn't know because He forgot? No, of course not. To not remember is a way of saying I won't bring these things up before you I won't use this these things against you in the future I won't as it were exhumed them and use them as a club against you. Use them as a mark against your character, as a reason why you're a bad person. And I'm justified in whatever bad thing I'm trying to do to you.

We're not, when God doesn't remember them, it doesn't mean he forgets them, it means he does not remember them. He doesn't bring them up against us. See, when we bring something up that someone has done against us in the past, that's a fundamental meaning of failing to forgive. It's easy to do. Forgiveness in that sense can become, it's something that is ongoing because we can not remember something for some time and then remember it again.

We can bring it to our mind and replay those events in our mind. And when we do that, we are remembering. We are remembering the sin that we said we'd forgiven, that we weren't going to remember. Now, if rebuking somebody is hard, forgiveness is ten times harder. To do what God is calling us to do here is very difficult for us as sinners.

And then people come up with a lot of excuses as to why they can't forgive something. They might say, well, I don't have enough faith to forgive a sin that big. Jesus goes on to talk about that and then he goes on to answer that in the next section that we'll look at later. It's not in the amount of faith. If you have faith as a mustard seed, it can move a mountain.

Because faith is not a power. Faith is that channel to the power of God. You might also say, well, there wasn't genuine repentance. When I see fruit, then I'll grant forgiveness. But Jesus takes that response away as well.

He says, if your brother repents, forgive him. And if he sins against you seven times in a day, and seven times in a day he returns to you saying, I repent, you must forgive him. There's nothing there about bringing forth fruits fit for repentance as a condition of our forgiveness. It says if he says, I repent, we must forgive him. Repentance, the bringing forth the fruits of repentance.

Maybe that could involve making restitution. If something's been stolen or lost or damaged or ruined you can make restitution can be made for it. Those are all parts of repentance but none of those are given as conditions. If somebody comes back seven times in a day, if somebody sins against us seven times in a day, and they come back and you say, what happened? Well, my temper got the worst of me.

I'm sorry I have a bad temper. Will you forgive me? We can't say, well you just did this three times before. I can't forgive you. You must not have really repented.

The ability to put off sin is a fruit that grows out of repentance. Fruit doesn't grow in a day. And so this is never given as a condition of forgiveness. Seven times. And this doesn't mean that the eighth time then you can say, well you must not really have been sincere, you didn't really repent.

No, seven is that number that Jesus uses, that the Bible uses for completion, perfection. It's representative of, it doesn't matter how many times. In another passage Jesus says 70 times 7. 70 times, they're again in the sevens, but It's 490 times. That doesn't mean the 491st time we don't have to forgive.

Jesus saying, if our brother repents, then we must forgive them. And it's not a matter of our feelings either it's a matter it's a duty and Jesus goes on to talk about that excuse as well in in this in this next section where he talks about a servant. When we've done our duty, we've done nothing meritorious worthy of merit. We've simply done our duty. This is a Christian duty.

This is a Christian duty. Truly, the ability to forgive, though, is a grace. And it only is available to those who have been forgiven, who've truly been forgiven by Christ. And when we have been forgiven by Christ, you see then we are able to forgive others who have sinned against us. We are able to release that debt and that obligation.

And in doing this, this is what brings freedom For all those people who are stumbled by stumbling blocks, for those people who have been grievously sinned against and may be bitter, may be totally opposed to the truth, There is only freedom and deliverance in forgiveness. It's only when we release that obligation and that debt that is against us that there is rest, there is peace, and that there is emotional deliverance from those who have sinned against us. And so it's sad but true that the very thing people hold onto, their right to vengeance against somebody who's harmed them. And sometimes in very, very grievous ways. People want to hold on to that right to vengeance, and yet that is the very thing that is keeping them from freedom and from peace and from rest.

This is fundamental to our Christian faith. And when Jesus taught his disciples to pray, that prayer that we looked at earlier, even in the very Lord's prayer, it's forgive us our debts as we forgive those who sin against us. Because Jesus says if we don't forgive those who sin against us, then Jesus doesn't forgive us. So may the Lord give to each of us the grace of forgiveness, the grace of forgiveness, to release the liability and the debts that others owe us because from their sins against us. Let us pray.

Heavenly Father we thank you for your forgiveness. We thank you that your forgiveness is full and free. That you do not have to contemplate or think about whether you will forgive. But you promise that if we confess you do forgive freely and fully. And you do not remember our sins.

You remove them from us as far as the east is from the west. So great is your mercy toward us. Father, we acknowledge our failings in this, even when we have forgiven and given up those debts, how we can take back what we have given. And so Lord we ask for your grace. We ask for your strength.

We ask for your Holy Spirit that we may know of the joy of our salvation. And that we may know the rest that is in you. And we might know the peace that passes all understanding. Which only you can bring and only you can give. Father, I do lift up any here in our in our midst today who are burdened by grievous sins against them who have yet to forgive.

But I ask that your grace might flow to them. You might give to them that forgiveness that you give to your children. Pray in Jesus' name. Amen.