“True, and what did God say?”
It doesn’t matter how the Father responded, for the purposes of this question. All that matters is that Jesus Christ showed us that we can forgive those who continue to sin against us, and those who mock us and are unrepentant, and we can even beg forgiveness on their behalf to our Father. This is the example set for us by the Lord.
“But if no repentance is necessary for God’s forgiveness...”
We’re not talking about God forgiving, but about ourselves, so we don’t need to be speculating about that.
“What is just is just, you cannot have one standard for the state and another for the individual.”
Of course you can, because I, the individual, am the only one who determines what is just for me personally. I can decide to forgive or not forgive based on whatever standard pleases me, for it is my business and my business alone. When it comes to the state, that argument cannot be made, because the state’s decisions on justice impact everyone.
“If Christians are to forgive all sins immediately and unconditionally, then Christians cannot create an entity to punish those individuals. That makes no sense.”
No, what makes no sense is to think that because I have forgiven someone, the state shouldn’t punish them. That is nonsensical. When someone commits a crime, they have trespassed against both the victim and society as a whole. The victim can forgive his portion of the debt, but that doesn’t forgive society’s portion, because the individual has no right to forgive that debt.
“And not holding grudges is not the same as forgiveness.”
Well, they are very closely related. It is not possible to hold grudges if you have forgiven those who sinned against you, and it is not possible to forgive all who sinned against you and still hold grudges.
“Forgiveness is the act of accepting repentance.”
No it is not. Repentance is the act of turning away from sin, of changing your behavior. It is not the act of asking forgiveness, although the two hopefully should go hand in hand. Someone can repent and never ask forgiveness, or they can ask forgiveness and not repent. I can also forgive if forgiveness is not asked for, and if repentance is lacking.
For example, say you owe me a debt of 100,000 dollars. I can forgive that debt even if you are too proud to come to me and tell me that you can’t repay and ask my forgiveness. It’s entirely my prerogative to forgive, you do not need to do anything in order to receive it.
Sorry, but Jesus didn’t forgive them, he asked God to sometime in the future. That is not the same.
Why didn’t Jesus say that both of the men that hung on crosses with Him would be in Heaven that very day, if he instantly forgave the second of his unrepentant impertinence?
As I keep saying, the very connotation of forgiveness is that it is a reciprocal action that is proceeded by another action.
What you are in fact saying is that I can accept your apology for being totally wrong on this subject, even though you haven’t offered me any such apology. That is quite different than having the capacity and in fact obligation to accept any forthcoming apology, which is the only biblical guidance I see in scripture.
Although Jesus used financial debt in parables, the presumption in them was that the person in debt really, really wanted to be free of that debt. You twist the parable quite a bit to presume that the said debtors wanted remain in debt.
And again, those parables addressed capacity to forgive, not obligation to forgive. Of course there are a multitude of reasons why forgiveness of debt and forgiveness of transgressions are not the same thing, but if you insist that they are, then I do hope that you've never sent anyone a bill or expected payment for your labors, as those would be things that by your logic, you should have immediately forgiven.