Q: Does forgiving everyone make you a good Christian? If you can’t forgive someone, does that make you a bad Christian?
The Explanation
This question comes from a real place of pain — and God is not surprised by it. Let’s walk through what the Bible actually says, because the answer is more honest and more gentle than you might expect.
How Many Times?
Peter once asked Jesus how many times he had to forgive someone who kept hurting him. He thought seven times was already very generous. Jesus said not seven — but seventy-seven times (Matthew 18:22). That is not a math problem. Jesus means: stop counting. Forgiveness is a way of life, not a quota.
Then Jesus told a parable to explain why (Matthew 18:23-35). A servant owed a king an enormous debt he could never repay — and the king forgave it all. But that same servant walked out and grabbed a fellow servant who owed him a tiny amount and threw him in prison. The king was furious. The point is clear: we forgive others because we have been forgiven something far greater. Our forgiveness of others is an overflow of the forgiveness we have received from Jesus.
Not Being Able to Forgive Does Not Make You a Bad Christian
Here is the honest truth: not being able to forgive does not make you a bad Christian. It makes you human. Revenge and keeping score are deeply wired into us. For most of human history, “an eye for an eye” was the code people lived by — and that instinct does not disappear the moment we become Christians.
If you struggle to forgive, do not add shame on top of your pain. Instead, bring the whole thing honestly to God.
Be Honest with God
One of the most raw prayers in the whole Bible is Psalm 109. David — the king, the man after God’s own heart — pours out his bitterness and anger toward people who wronged him. He does not clean it up or pretend to feel something he does not. He takes his real, messy feelings straight to God.
That is a model for us. You do not have to have forgiveness all figured out before you pray. Bring your hurt exactly as it is.
And here is the boundary the Bible draws: bring your anger to God, but do not take revenge yourself. Paul writes, “Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord” (Romans 12:19). You can release the person to God’s justice without pretending you are not hurt. That is very different from suppressing your feelings or forcing yourself to say words you do not mean.
What About Forgiving Yourself?
Sometimes the person hardest to forgive is yourself. If you feel you have done something so bad that you cannot let yourself off the hook, start here: God, who knows everything you have done, already forgave you through Jesus. If God — whose standards are perfect — chose to forgive you, then your own self-condemnation does not get the last word.
David knew this too. After one of the worst failures of his life, he did not just wallow in guilt. He turned to God and cried out: “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me” (Psalm 51:10-11).
That is not a rejection of self. It is a lament — honest about the failure, and honest about where the help must come from.
God Works in You — and with You
Here is something important about how forgiveness actually grows in us. Paul writes: “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure” (Philippians 2:12-13).
Both things are true at once. Your effort and your will are real and matter. And God is the one who shapes your heart from the inside. We do not sit back and wait to feel like forgiving. We also do not white-knuckle it on our own strength. We work, and the Holy Spirit works alongside us. Theologians call this concurrence — God acts, and we act, and both are genuinely real.
God chose deeply flawed people throughout Scripture to do great things. He is not waiting for you to be perfect before He works in you. He works on you precisely because you are not perfect — and He is very patient.
What Doctrine Says
- We are called to forgive others as God in Christ forgave us. This is the heart of the 9th commandment applied to relationships (WCF 19).
- The Holy Spirit works in believers over a whole lifetime to grow Christlike character, including the ability to forgive (WCF 13).
- God works through His providence as the primary cause, but our will and choices are genuinely real as secondary causes. Both matter. (WCF 5).
- True repentance includes turning from sin and making right what we can — and extending that same grace to others (WCF 15).