What "Forgive Us Our Debts" means
Brian Doerksen has been one of the most pastorally attentive songwriters in the contemporary worship movement, and "Forgive Us Our Debts" is among his most specifically theological pieces. The title reaches directly into the Lord's Prayer, specifically into the petition that most people rush past in the recitation: "Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors." Matthew 6:12. The song does not let you rush past it.
What Doerksen is doing is taking a phrase that has been domesticated through repetition and returning it to its original weight. A debt is not a vague sense of spiritual inadequacy. It is something owed. Something real has been unpaid. Something that should have been given or done or not done has failed to be. The language is transactional, almost legal, which is precisely why it is so honest.
The second half of the petition is the part that rarely gets preached: "as we also have forgiven our debtors." The forgiveness the song asks for is not disconnected from the forgiveness the singer extends. Jesus hammers this in the very next verses after the prayer: if you forgive others their sins, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. If you do not forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins. This is not an optional postscript.
What this song does in a room
This song moves at 70 BPM in F, and that slow pace is not an accident. Doerksen is not creating atmosphere for its own sake. He is creating space, literal temporal space, for the congregation to actually do something. Forgiveness is not a sentiment. It is a decision, and decisions require a moment in which they are made. The song is that moment.
What the room tends to experience is a kind of dual movement. There is the inward movement: taking stock of where you stand before God, what has gone unpaid in your relationship with him, what has accumulated that needs to be released.
That dual movement is rare in worship songs, which tend to address either the vertical relationship or the horizontal one but not both in the same breath. This song holds both simultaneously, which is what Jesus does in the prayer it is drawn from. When both movements are happening in a room at once, something unusually honest occurs. The congregation is not performing devotion. They are doing something real.
What this song is saying about God
The God of this song is a God who forgives, which sounds simple until you consider the weight of what forgiveness actually requires. Forgiveness is not pretending the offense did not happen. It is not minimizing the real cost of what was done or left undone. It is absorbing that cost and releasing the claim. For God to forgive is not a small act. It is the act that required the cross.
Doerksen's song holds the character of God as both just and merciful. The language of debt is honest about the justice: something real was owed and went unpaid. The language of forgiveness is honest about the mercy: the debt is being released by the one to whom it is owed. These are not in contradiction.
The song also holds, implicitly, the character of God as one who expects his forgiveness to flow through his people. The Father who forgives is a Father who expects his children to forgive each other. This is a demanding portrait of God. Not a sentimental one. Not a God who asks nothing of you in response to his grace. A God who says: now you.
Scriptural backbone
Matthew 6:12 is the direct source: "And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors." Jesus, teaching his disciples to pray, places forgiveness at the center of the relationship between the people of God and the God of the people. It is not an add-on. It is a petition.
Matthew 6:14-15 follows immediately: "For if you forgive other people when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive others their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins." Few passages in the Gospels are as direct about the conditionality of grace. Not that we earn forgiveness by forgiving.
Colossians 3:13 gives the New Testament congregation the same instruction in different words: "Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you." The forgiveness of God is the model and the measure.
How to use it in a service
This song belongs in a service where you are giving the congregation space to do something rather than feel something. That is a subtle but important distinction. When the service has a moment of confession, a time of response, a call to surrender or repentance, this song can be the musical container for that moment.
It works particularly well following a message on forgiveness, on the Lord's Prayer, on reconciliation, or on the relationship between receiving grace and extending it.
In services with a formal confession liturgy, this song can serve as the congregational sung confession, the moment where the corporate acknowledgment becomes personal. At 70 BPM, there is enough time inside each phrase for the words to land before the next ones arrive.
Communion services are also natural homes for this song, particularly if your tradition practices confession before the table. The song's content aligns exactly with the examination the table invites.
Things to watch for as the worship leader
At 70 BPM, the silence between phrases is doing theological work. Do not fill it. Do not play through it. Let the room sit in the stillness, which is where the actual decision-making happens. If your natural instinct as a worship leader is to stay musically active, this song will challenge that instinct. Trust the space.
Watch for the room to sing this song as a comfortable religious recitation rather than a genuine act of reckoning. The words are familiar enough, drawn from the Lord's Prayer, that they can be sung without real engagement. Your job is to slow the room down enough that the words are heard as words again rather than liturgical habit.
The phrase "as we also have forgiven our debtors" will be the hardest line for some people in the room.
If you plan to repeat sections, let the choice be governed by what the room needs, not by what feels musically satisfying. Sometimes one pass through the song at a slow walk is more powerful than two.
A note for the team behind you (techs, vocalists, band)
Drummers: if the song needs percussion at all, a very soft brush pattern on the snare or a simple kick pattern to anchor the pulse is sufficient. In many contexts, no drums at all is the right call. This song is slow enough and emotionally substantial enough that heavy percussion can actively work against what the room is trying to do.
Keys: you are carrying the harmonic weight here. Sustained voicings in the middle and lower register. Avoid upper-register fills or melodic doubling. The acoustic space of the song should feel warm and grounded, not bright.
Guitarists: acoustic guitar with very light picking or fingerpicking is the natural fit. Strumming can work in a larger dynamic moment, but the default should be restrained. Electric guitar risks making the song feel larger than it needs to be unless it is very clean and very quiet.
Vocalists: this is a song where the lead vocal sets the emotional posture for the entire room. Sing it as if you are actually asking for forgiveness, not as if you are performing a song about asking for forgiveness.
Sound techs: warmth is the goal in the mix. Avoid any EQ settings that make the vocal feel harsh or exposed. Reverb should be natural and sustaining enough to feel like the voice is landing in a room, not cut off abruptly. Keep the overall level lower than you might for a more upbeat song. This is not a moment for the room to be driven.